Walking a Fine Line: Day 7

Word Count: 42,032

Summary of Events:

Not believing a word of Mr. Varley's story, Joseph was dismissive when Mr. Varley asked him for help clearing his name, but he couldn't help thinking about what Mr. Varley had told him, eventually coming to the conclusion that he might be able to corroborate the story by getting his hands on a Philadelphia newspaper. On his way to work the next day, Joseph did just that, buying the previous day's copy of the Inquirer from a newsstand. He took it home and sought out any articles that might corroborate Mr. Varley's tale that evening, and eventually found one…

Excerpt of the Day:

The article reported that Philadelphia police were, indeed, still looking for an accused thief by the name of Charlie McElligott, who was accused of robbing Mr. Marion Bradley and his wife — named Genevieve — of over $100,000 in jewellery that formed a special collection known as the Augusta collection after Mr. Bradley’s late first wife, for whom the collection had been made.

Each piece, it was reported, prominently featured a large and reasonably valuable ruby, as rubies had been Mrs. Augusta Bradley’s favourite gem. The collection had been largely a display set since her passing, seeing as it’d been made especially for her.

It was also reported in the article that the two least valuable pieces of the collection, a simple bracelet and a ring had been recovered in the backyard of Mr. and Mrs. Clayton McElligott, Charlie’s parents, while Charlie had vanished, presumably with the rest of the collection, within the first few days of January.

The article went on to say that police were becoming more sure that Charlie had left Philadelphia, and so were expanding their search beyond Philadelphia, with New York, Washington, and Pittsburgh being named as places that they were looking for Charlie.

Joseph shifted his jaw as he read on about police having not yet found any of the pieces at pawnshops or jewellery stores in Philadelphia, and their advising of all jewellers and pawnbrokers to be on the alert for the pieces.

He was interested to note that the article said that an earlier edition of the paper had published photographs of the still-missing items, which had been provided to the Inquirer by Mr. Bradley. He’d have to ask Mr. Sheenan if he could track down that edition specifically.

Seating himself, as the article had been toward the top of the page, so he’d had to stand up to read it without lifting the paper from the desk, Joseph thought about what he’d just read.

There had been more details in that article than Mr. Varley had supplied, but Joseph felt like that was more likely to disprove Mr. Varley’s identity as Charlie McElligott than prove it. If Mr. Varley really were Charlie McElligott, he ought to know things that the papers didn’t, instead of having the papers know things he didn’t.

Although, if Mr. Varley was Charlie McElligott, future editions might be worth acquiring to learn how the police’s search in Pittsburgh went, as Mr. Varley had said that he’d bought Philadelphia papers in Pittsburgh and Cleveland on his way to Chicago. That meant people would’ve seen Mr. Varley, and, if Mr. Varley were Mr. McElligott, those interactions might be reported to the police by the newsstand operators who had sold him the papers.

That could then function as a proof of Mr. Varley and Mr. McElligott being one in the same man, but Joseph wasn’t fully sure, as there was no photo in this article of Mr. McElligott that he could compare with Mr. Varley’s face.