“We’ve compromised!  The jokers will sing a different tune to-morrow!  Follow me!”

He took a lighted candle and strode down into the vast vaulted basement where sixty detectives always slept, and where a score were now playing cards to while the time.  I followed close after him.  He walked swiftly down to the dim and remote end of the place, and just as I succumbed to the pangs of suffocation and was swooning away he stumbled and fell over the outlying members of a mighty object, and I heard him exclaim as he went down: 

“Our noble profession is vindicated.  Here is your elephant!”

I was carried to the office above and restored with carbolic acid.  The whole detective force swarmed in, and such another season of triumphant rejoicing ensued as I had never witnessed before.  The reporters were called, baskets of champagne were opened, toasts were drunk, the handshakings and congratulations were continuous and enthusiastic.  Naturally the chief was the hero of the hour, and his happiness was so complete and had been so patiently and worthily and bravely won that it made me happy to see it, though I stood there a homeless beggar, my priceless charge dead, and my position in my country’s service lost to me through what would always seem my fatally careless execution of a great trust.  Many an eloquent eye testified its deep admiration for the chief, and many a detective’s voice murmured, “Look at him—­just the king of the profession; only give him a clue, it’s all he wants, and there ain’t anything hid that he can’t find.”  The dividing of the fifty thousand dollars made great pleasure; when it was finished the chief made a little speech while he put his share in his pocket, in which he said, “Enjoy it, boys, for you’ve earned it; and, more than that, you’ve earned for the detective profession undying fame.”

A telegram arrived, which read: 

                         Monroe, MICH., 10 P.M. 
First time I’ve struck a telegraph office in over three weeks.  Have followed those footprints, horseback, through the woods, a thousand miles to here, and they get stronger and bigger and fresher every day.  Don’t worry-inside of another week I’ll have the elephant.  This is dead sure. 
                         Darley, Detective.

The chief ordered three cheers for “Darley, one of the finest minds on the force,” and then commanded that he be telegraphed to come home and receive his share of the reward.

So ended that marvelous episode of the stolen elephant.  The newspapers were pleasant with praises once more, the next day, with one contemptible exception.  This sheet said, “Great is the detective!  He may be a little slow in finding a little thing like a mislaid elephant he may hunt him all day and sleep with his rotting carcass all night for three weeks, but he will find him at last if he can get the man who mislaid him to show him the place!”