I once had a particularly dangerous and unfortunate case where
a private client was being blackmailed by a half-crazy ruffian
who had never seen him, but had selected him arbitrarily as a
person likely to give up money. The blackmailer was a German
Socialist, who was out of employment--a man of desperate
character. He had made up his mind that the world owed him a
living, and he had decided that the easiest way to get it was
to make some more prosperous person give him a thousand
dollars under threat of being exposed as an enemy of society.

The charge was so absurd as to be almost ludicrous, but had my
client caused the blackmailer's arrest the matter would have
been the subject of endless newspaper notoriety and comment.
It was therefore thought wise to make use of other means, and
I procured the assistance of a young German-American of my
acquaintance, who, in the guise of a vaudeville artist seeking
a job, went to the blackmailer's boarding-house and pretended
to be looking for an actor friend with a name not unlike that
of the criminal.

After two or three visits he managed to scrape an acquaintance
with the blackmailer and thereafter spent much time with him.
Both were out of work, both were German, and both liked beer.
My friend had just enough money to satisfy this latter
craving. In a month or so they were intimate friends and used
to go fishing together down the bay. At last, after many
months, the criminal disclosed to the detective his plan of
blackmailing my client, and suggested that as two heads were
better than one they had better make it a joint venture. The
detective pretended to balk at the idea at first, but was