Beadle's New York Dime Library, No. 565

This installment of Prince Paul, the Postman Detective by J.C. Cowdrick presents a detective-mystery serial. Paul Boothman, a cheerful young postman working New York's east side streets, is abruptly ambushed and dragged into a house by three villains. Despite strong resistance, he is overpowered, gagged, and bound. The men selectively steal certain letters from his mail bag, suggesting they sought a specific correspondence rather than simple robbery. Paul is then transported to a hidden sub-cellar containing a trap door leading to a water-filled chamber, where the criminals attempt to drown him and conceal his body. The narrative then shifts to Paul's uncle, Horatio Boothman, a fifty-year-old genealogist obsessed with tracing his family history. Horatio lives comfortably with his long-serving housekeeper Selina Peppertree, spending his days organizing genealogical data in his study, apparently unaware of his nephew's peril.