Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: CHAPTER HI OF THE ANTECEDENTS OF ALICE'S BELONGINGS Twenty years before his mortal remains were left in charge of that impassive police officer in that extensive basement with cellarage, Samuel Kavanagh had been as prosperous and hopeful a young tailor as ever rejoiced in a new wife and a new shop in what was then the suburban district of Camden Town. Such a handsome young couple as he and the former, when they were married at Trinity Church opposite the burying ground, in Upper Camden Street, were enough to make that dull structure interesting for the moment, and even to soften the heart of its pew- opener into concession of their right to compete with bygone records. While, as for the latter, it went without saying that there never was such a shop. In after years, when Samuel had been obliged to give up this shop and hadn't taken another yet-a-while, and when he was working for hard taskmasters to keep his much too large family alive, his mind was still able to dwell with satisfaction on the beauty of the cataracts of superb trouserings that flowed in the window to fascinate the passer-by; of the convincing twills that only needed inspection of a corner for you to see at once that they would wear, and wouldn't show dust; of the numerous portraits of the same young gentleman of property, as he appeared in the whole of his wardrobe, including several uniforms and hunting and shooting costumes; and the masterly inscription over all that declared that Kavanagh, in Roman type, was a tailor and professed trousers maker, in Italian lettering, though whether the last was effrontery or modesty was a mystery. All these things were so beautiful and so new, and the paint smelt so fresh, and Samuel was so well able to say to himself that he had got value for his money, that his regret ...