Tracing a Counterfeit

1899

The tracing of counterfeit bills back to the person responsible for their issue is a curious and exciting employment. The experts assigned by the government to this work are among the most skillful members of the secret service. The protection of the currency depends in large measure upon their efficiency, and the pains they take are almost infinite. A curious story told by a government employee in the New Orleans Times-Democrat illustrates the difficulties which they meet and overcome.

One day a bank clerk in Cincinnati detected a counterfeit twenty-dollar bill in the deposit of a small retail grocer. I was sent for, and undertook the case.

I found that the grocer received the bill from a shoe-dealer, who had it from a dentist, who had it from somebody else, and so on, until I finally traced it to an invalid woman who had used it to pay her physician. When questioned, she said the money had been sent to her by her brother, who lived in New Orleans.

I looked up her brother's pedigree, and was certain that he was my man. He had a bad record, was the proprietor of a dive, and was just the sort of person to be a confederate of counterfeiters. I came to New Orleans with the handcuffs in my pocket, but I was a little premature.

The man proved to my complete satisfaction that he had received the money as rent for a small house he owned in Pittsburg. That was discouraging, but I couldn't give up after going so far, and took the next train for Pittsburg.

The tenant of the house turned out to be a travelling oculist, who spent most of his time on the road. He was then away in the West, but I saw him on his return, and he at once recognized the bill. It had been given him by a patient in Cincinnati, the very point from which I had started.

The patient was a boss carpenter. I dot his address from the oculist and made a bee-line for the city. I had a premonition that something was going to happen, and I wasn't disappointed.

The carpenter was an honest old fellow, and told me without hesitation that he had received the bill from Mr. —— for repairing his barn. Mr. —— was the small grocer in whose bank deposit the counterfeit had turned up. I flew to his store as fast as a cab could carry me, and found it closed. He had left town.

Afterward it was shown beyond question that he was the regular agent of a gang. His shop was a mere blind. That the bill which he gave the carpenter should get back again into his own till after travelling all over the continent was one of those miracles of chance for which there is no explanation. — Youth's Companion.