Thus armed, we proceeded to Paris. To discover the suspected clerk was not difficult. It was one of the easiest tasks I ever had allotted me. I found out the hotel he put up at. He was not in when we arrived there, somewhat early in the evening. I left my companion with the warrants at the hotel, while I went further, in quest of Mr. Wilson. I had a special motive for this part of my little arrangement. I did not think my man would return during my absence from the hotel. I thought it most likely--as I knew my way about Paris, was acquainted with the institutions of the gay capital, knew I could get aid from the French police in my search, and for other reasons--that I should bring Mr. Wilson back to the hotel, a prisoner in fact, although under no formal detention. In case I did not discover him out of doors, I resolved to return alone to the hotel in good time--in all likelihood to meet him there. I wanted to have the first word with him, and, if I could, to have that word in the absence of my fellow-traveller, clothed with so much authority. And why, the reader may ask, did you want to take this advantage of the law's proper servant or officer? I did not want any such advantage. I would have given him an advantage, which might have served his turn at Scotland Yard, if I could have done so with what I considered fairness towards the suspected. I did not wish the circumstances of his arrest to prejudice him with his masters, and it might have been before a criminal tribunal. My experience of human nature and of society had suggested to me that this young man might perhaps, when so far from the scene of his labours, beyond, as he supposed, the eyes and ears of his employers, and in a holiday mood, visit some places, not thought proper places by many right-minded folks, of whom I am, at least in this respect, one. As I felt that the weight of suspicion, before evidence of guilt, already bore with undue force upon the clerk, I thought it wrong to let the weight of another element (however fair in itself) be added to the burden of prejudice. If I had then been, as I have on other occasions often been, employed to watch leisure movements and scan the holiday pursuits of a clerk, so that his masters might by my report determine whether or not he were fit to hold a position of trust, I should have had no desire to screen the incidents of Mr. Wilson's visit to Paris. Here I saw or thought I saw it my duty to bring him back to London, in order that he might render such explanations as he could about a particular crime. To do this effectually, I argued that it was desirable, for his sake truly, but also for the interests of justice, that he should encounter no prejudice which the clerks' reference book, his antecedents, and his general conduct did not warrant. This, I hope the reader will see, was but an act of simple justice to the suspected. Let me add, that I foresaw, if the clerk were really innocent, but if