Читать книгу Joe Leslie's Wife; or, a Skeleton in the Closet онлайн

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The detective was a little proud of his collection, as well as the Rogue’s Gallery over the desk, where some hundreds of faces were represented, many extremely brutal and some good-looking, while the pictures of women were not infrequent.

“My clerk is out this afternoon, madam—we are quite alone, so that you may speak without any fear of being overheard,” he said, as he took a chair, and sat down facing his unknown client.

“I am glad of that, Mr. Darrell, for what I have to say to you must be kept a dead secret.”

The detective was more than ever convinced that he had to deal with a young woman—her figure was exceedingly pleasing, and her voice a sympathetic one.

“Madam, I am daily entrusted with secrets by all manner of persons. You can rely upon it that anything you tell me in confidence will be as safe as though whispered in the ear of a father confessor. That is my business—we detectives rival the family doctors in being made the repository of secrets.”

This was well put and quite reassuring, as he had intended it should be.