The New York Dime Library: Inspector Williams' Great Case

# Museum Catalog Note

This 1898 pulp magazine issue features two detective/adventure stories by Harold Payne. "Inspector Williams' Great Case" details a swindle involving a gardener named Earnest Maynard. A mysterious stranger claiming to represent Maynard's deceased father arrives with news of a gold fortune left in the western mining fields. The stranger, Preston H. Bradish, presents a gold brick sample (valued at $2,688) to be tested by a local jeweler, claiming fifty thousand dollars awaits in a hotel. Bradish insists Maynard provide additional security money before releasing the full amount, raising suspicions of fraud. The second story, "The Arch Schemer's Jugglery: A Story of the Mystic Brotherhood," begins but the OCR becomes too degraded to discern plot details clearly.