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every sense of the word. Indeed, I have always 

 entertained more than a suspicion that his was an 

 acute as well as a sympathetic understanding. To 

 him, therefore, I owe a debt of gratitude. His gen- 

 erosity was well-timed, if not — as some may insist 

 — well-directed, for as subsequent events proved, 

 I would have been for an overlong period at des- 

 perate straits to make up the balance of my in- 

 tended deposit. 



Years later, when one of the most celebrated 

 murder trials in Chicago was engrossing the atten- 

 tion of the populace, it was to me, as well as to the 

 rest of the world, of absorbing interest. But its 

 interest, in my case, had a unique aspect. The most 

 important clue by which the convicted murderers 

 were traced was obtained through the formula of a 

 broken spectacle lens belonging to one of the mur- 

 derers. And I recalled how in the far-away days^ 

 in a cubicle of a pawnshop, I had among other 

 points in an animated conversation touched upon 

 principles of lens formulas and upon forensics and 

 its relation to things optical . . . And one of 

 those most vitally interested persons in that fa- 

 mous case was the victim's sorrowing father — my 

 pawnbroker. 



[21] 



