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[Illustration: CHAMBERS'S JOURNAL

OF

POPULAR

LITERATURE, SCIENCE, AND ART.

Fourth Series

CONDUCTED BY WILLIAM AND ROBERT CHAMBERS.

NO. 729.      SATURDAY, DECEMBER 15, 1877.      PRICE 1½_d._]




A BUNCH OF KEYS.


I am a professional man, and reside in the West End of London. One
morning some few months back, my assistant on coming to attend to his
duties produced a bunch of keys, which he informed me he had just
picked up at the corner of a street leading from Oxford Street.

'Hadn't they best be handed over to the police?' suggested my
assistant. I wish to goodness I had at once closed with his suggestion;
but I didn't, much to my own cost, as will be presently seen.

'Well, I don't know,' was my answer. 'I rather think it will be a wiser
plan to advertise them, if the owner is really to have a chance of
recovering them; for to my mind, articles found in that way and handed
over to the police are rarely heard of again.'

An advertisement for the _Times_ was duly drawn up and sent off for
insertion. It merely stated where the keys had been picked up, and
where the owner of the bunch could have it returned to him on giving
a proper description. The next morning the advertisement appeared;
and though I half expected that some applications might be made later
on in the same day, it passed over quite quietly. But the following
morning I had a foretaste of the trouble that awaited me so soon as the
postman had deposited my letters in the box and given his accustomed
knock. A glance at my table shewed me that my correspondence was very
considerably beyond its average that morning. The very first letter I
opened was in reference to the advertisement; and before I had gone
through the collection I found there were over twenty applications
for the bunch of keys in my possession. Some of the writers took the
trouble to describe the keys they had lost; but none of them were in
the least like those that had been picked up by my assistant. Some did
not take the trouble to give any description at all, or to state if
they had been in the part of the town where the keys were found; and
a few boldly claimed them on the strength of having dropped a bunch
miles from the spot indicated in the advertisement!

By the time I had got through my letters and my breakfast, my
servant came to tell me that my waiting-room was already full of
people--'mostly ladies,' he said--though it was nearly two hours
before the time I was accustomed to see any one professionally. With a
foreboding that a good deal of worry and a loss of much valuable time
was in store for me, I entered my consulting-room, and gave orders that
the ladies should be admitted in the order of their arrival. They were
all applicants for the keys; and out of the sixteen persons that were
waiting, fourteen were ladies. The two gentlemen were soon despatched.
They _had_ lost keys, near the spot for anything they could tell; but
on being satisfied that what had been found did in no way agree with
the description of what they had lost, they apologised for the trouble
and went at once.

But it was no such easy matter to get rid of my fourteen
lady-applicants. Some of them were for inflicting upon me a narration
of family affairs that had not the most remote connection with the
business in hand. A few kept closely enough to the subject on which
they had come; but would not take a denial that the keys in my
possession were not the least like those they said they had lost; and
it was only at the sacrifice of some of my usual politeness that I was
able to get rid of them. Not one of the morning's arrival could make
out anything like a fair claim, and one or two owned that they had not
even been in the quarter where the keys were found on the day specified.

More letters, more applicants, came as the day wore on; and I began
heartily to repent of my well-meant desire to benefit my fellow-mortals
by taking the trouble to find out the rightful owner of a lost article.
I was just on the point of giving orders to my servant to put off all
further applicants until the following morning, when he ushered in
a comfortable-looking lady of middle age, who proceeded straight to
business by at once describing with the greatest accuracy the bunch of
keys that had given me so much anxiety that day; and assuring me that
she had passed the spot indicated in the advertisement on the morning
they were found.

'Nine keys on the bunch, all Chubb's patent; three very small ones,
five of various sizes, and one latch-key longer than any of the others.'

The description was perfect. Some of the other applicants had curiously
enough been right as to the number, but wrong as to description.

I at once told my lady visitor that I had no doubt the keys were hers;
and that I was ready to hand them over to her. But I ventured to add
that it would give me greater security were she to permit my assistant
to accompany her to her residence, and there, in his presence, to
open the different locks to which the keys belonged. To this proposal
not the smallest objection was raised. She begged I would call my
assistant, as she had a cab waiting at the door. The direction was
given to some place in Bloomsbury, and they drove off. In less than an
hour my assistant returned. He stated that the lady opened the street
door with the latch-key, and that the other eight keys opened desks,
writing-tables, cash-boxes, &c.--all quite correct and satisfactorily.
The expense of the advertisement was of course paid.

Congratulating myself that this troublesome business was well over, and
mentally resolving that another time, under similar circumstances, I
should act on my assistant's suggestion, and hand such matters over to
the police, I gave orders that all applicants that might come were to
be told that the rightful owner had been found and that the keys were
disposed of.

Two days passed, and I had almost dismissed the whole affair from my
mind. On the morning of the third day my attention was attracted by
an altercation going on between my servant and an irate lady--well
advanced in years--to whom he refused admittance. Anxious to
escape disturbance, I gave orders that she should be shewn into my
consulting-room, where I presently went to see what