And I was hurried away, and locked up in a cell for the night.

I cannot say that, when left to myself, I felt much uneasiness regarding the result of the extraordinary matter that had occurred.  I felt perfectly satisfied that, however awkward and unpleasant my situation was in the meantime, the following day would clear all up, and set me at liberty with an unblemished character.  From all that had taken place, I collected that I was apprehended on a charge of robbery; that is, of abstracting property from Mr. Wallscourt’s house, of which the silver spoon found in my possession was considered a proof.  There was much, however, in the matter of painful and inexplicable mystery.  How came the constables to be so opportunely in the way when I left the house? and, more extraordinary still, how came the silver spoon into my possession?  Regarding neither of these circumstances could I form the slightest plausible conjecture; but had no doubt that, whether they should ever be explained or not, my entire innocence of all such guilt as the latter of them pointed at, would clearly appear.  But, as the saying has it, “I reckoned without my host.”  On the following morning I was brought before the sitting magistrate, and, to my inexpressible surprise, on turning round a little, saw Richard Digby in the witness-box.  Thinking at first that he was there to give some such evidence as would relieve me from the imputation under which I lay, I nodded to him; but he took no further notice of the recognition than by looking more stern than before.

Presently my case was entered on.  Digby was called on to state what he had to say to the matter.  Judge of my consternation, gentle reader, when I heard him commence the following statement:—­

Having premised that he was servant with Mr. Wallscourt, of No. 19, Grosvenor Square, he proceeded to say that during the space of the three previous weeks he had from time to time missed several valuable pieces of plate belonging to his master; that this had happened repeatedly before he could form the slightest conjecture as to who the thief could possibly be.  At last it occurred to him that the abstraction of the plate corresponded, in point of time, with the prisoner’s (my) introduction to the house—­in other words, that it was from that date the robberies commenced, nothing of the kind having ever happened before; that this circumstance led him to suspect me; that in consequence he had on the previous night placed a silver table-spoon in such a situation in the servants’ hall as should render it likely to be seen by the prisoner when he came to tea, Susan Blaikie having previously informed him that he was coming; that, shortly after the prisoner’s arrival, he contrived, by getting Susan and some of the other servants out of the room, on various pretexts, to have the prisoner left alone for several minutes; that, on his return, finding the spoon gone, he had no longer any doubt of the prisoner’s guilt; that, on feeling satisfied of this, he immediately proceeded to the nearest station-house, and procuring two constables, or policemen, stationed them at the area gate, with instructions to seize the prisoner the moment he came out; and that if the spoon was found on him—­of which he had no doubt—­to carry him away to Bow Street.