ot be expected that the clerks can remember very much about any
particular transaction many hours after it occurs. Three weeks later,
when another lady called, also purporting to be Mrs. Richard Stone, to
make inquiries about a money order for L10 sent to her husband from
Lowestoft, England, there was not very much to say except that the
order had been paid.

This lady also produced a letter from her husband's sister in
Lowestoft, saying that on a certain day she sent a money-order for the
amount named; that she had just received his last letter, and there
being nothing said about having received the order, she wrote to
ascertain if the order had not been received.

Mrs. Stone, the second, stated that this was the first that her
husband, or herself, had known of the existence of such an order, and
she had called to see what could be done about it. If it had been
paid, surely somebody must be responsible for the wrong payment.

It is the custom, where a wrong payment can be established, for the
postmaster or the clerk making the mistake, to make the amount good to
the right payee. Mrs. Stone's case was accordingly referred to me for
adjustment.

Her story was told in such a simple manner that no one who heard it
could doubt her word. But it was possible that she had received the
money, and had forgotten about the transaction.

When the order was paid the lady who received the money was questioned
by two examiners, both of whom were satisfied that she was the person
to whom the order should be paid. The same two examiners talked with
Mrs. Stone, the second, and one of them thought she was the lady to
whom the money was paid, while the other could distinguish very little
similarity and felt confident the first Mrs. Stone was not the second
Mrs. Stone.

On the following day Richard Stone himself called to talk the matter
over and give me some points. He suspected a young woman named Nellie
Mason, who had been in the habit of calling on his wife, who was an old
friend of hers, and who resembled her very much.

Mr. and Mrs. Stone resided in Twenty-eighth Street at this time, but at
the time the missing letter must have arrived in New York they were
living in a flat in Twenty-seventh Street. The mail for the occupants
of this flat was left by the carrier on a table in the lower hall, and
any person so inclined could have picked up the lost letter.

He had several samples of Nellie Mason's writing in the form of