My Debut in Thief-Catching

Bob Flanders was noted as a connoisseur in horseflesh. He could enter a stable in the dark, and straightway pick out the best animal there. Unfortunately he wasn’t always careful as to whose stable it was, and his indifference on this point sometimes got him into scrapes—on one occasion, indeed, into the State’s prison. But Bob was too great an enthusiast to succumb to trifles, as was evidenced by the fact, that shortly after his release, he and a certain likely bay filly, to which his chain of title was far from perfect, disappeared together. The result was a fresh indictment, and a warrant for Bob’s apprehension which it became my duty, as sheriff of the county, to execute.

I had just been elected, and this was my first official service. I could have wished it had been simpler, for Bob was a cunning rascal, up to all sorts of dodges, to which I had nothing to oppose but the rawest inexperience. Besides, I had never seen him, and had nothing to go by but a rather vague description.

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