it minutely. It was stained with blood – evidently the weapon with which the murderer had dealt the fatal blow.
The doctor also looked at it, and wiping the blood from the victim’s breast, gazed upon the wound, saying, “Yes, that’s the knife, without a doubt; but who did it is the question.”
“Who’s this gentleman?” asked the officer, jerking his thumb towards me.
“Gentleman who informed us, sir.”
“Do you know who lives here?” he asked, sharply, turning to me.
“No, I do not. I am quite a stranger; in fact, I have never been in this street before in my life.”
“Hum!” he grunted, in a rather suspicious manner. “And how came you to know anything about the affair?”
“I chanced to be passing at the time, and my attention was attracted by a scream. I found a space between the blind and the window, and my curiosity being aroused, I looked in and saw the woman had been murdered.”
“Is that all you know?” he asked.
“That’s all.”
“Well, you won’t mind just stepping round to the station for a few minutes, will you? Then you can give us your version of the matter.”
“Oh, certainly I will, with pleasure,” I replied. The inspector having given some instructions to his men, the body of the murdered woman was covered with a table-cloth, and we went out leaving two constables in charge of the premises.
Dawn was spreading now; the stars had disappeared, and there were some saffron tints in the east, heralding the sun’s coming. At the corner of Montague Street the doctor wished us “good-morning,” and strode away in an opposite direction, scarcely well pleased at being aroused from his bed and called out to witness so unpleasant a sight.
Chapter Three
What the World Said
A quarter of an hour later I was in the inspector’s office at Tottenham Court Road Police-Station, relating to him all I knew of the horrible discovery.
“You saw a man come out, you say? Are you certain of this?” the inspector asked, after I had concluded my story.
“Quite; and, what’s more, I saw his face.”
“Would you know him again?” he inquired, eyeing me keenly.
“Certainly, I should.”
“Well, when you saw him, what did you do?”
“I followed him. We ran for nearly five minutes without meeting a constable, and I subsequently lost sight of him in Gray’s Inn Road.”
“For five minutes without meeting one of our men?” repeated the inspector, dubiously.
“Yes. I shouted, but nobody came to my assistance,” I replied, for I had not failed to notice the suspicion with which he regarded me.
The inspector’s brows contracted slightly as he took a slate from his desk, saying, “Give me his description as accurately as possible, please.”
I did so, and he wrote at my dictation. As soon as he had finished, he handed the slate to a sergeant, who at once went to the row of telegraph instruments and transmitted the description of the murderer to all the stations in the Metropolitan Police District.
“And this was upon the body when you saw it?” exclaimed the officer, smoothing out the crumpled piece of paper before placing it upon the desk in front of him.
I nodded an affirmative, and proceeded to describe the position of the paper as pinned upon the breast.
“Hum! well, I think that’s all,” said he, when I had finished. “You say you live in Torrington Square. Ah! I have the number. And you spent the evening at the Junior Garrick Club – was that so?”
“Yes.”
“At the inquest we shall want you as a witness; but you will get warning in due course. Good-morning.”
I left the station, and trudged homeward, full of thoughts of the horrible scene of which I had been an involuntary spectator.
Truly the night had been an eventful one.
The discovery had been made too late for the first editions of the morning papers, but those published on the following evening gave accounts of the tragedy, headed “Another Mysterious Murder: The Mystic Seal again,” in which the details of the crime were most graphically told, the facts exaggerated, and plenty of fiction infused; for that style known as the New Journalism seems to have been invented for the purpose of satisfying the craving for sensational reading.
During the day I was pestered with interviewers. Several enterprising reporters, who saw a chance of making an interesting column of “copy” out of me, sent up their cards, and to them I granted an audience. Following these came two detectives from the Criminal Investigation Department, who also wished for a description of my night’s adventure.
This I gave willingly, yet to my astonishment and annoyance I found, when I went down to the club in the evening, that the police had been making inquiries of the servants as to what time I left on the previous night, besides endeavouring to learn various other particulars.
I, Frank Burgoyne, was evidently suspected of the crime!
There had been six murders, all curious, unexplained mysteries, which had formed the chief topic of conversation and comment in the newspapers for the past few weeks. In each there appeared an utter absence of motive, which made the enigma doubly puzzling; and though the murderer had sought his victims from every rank of society, the same seal – evidently impressed by the same hand – had been found pinned upon the breast of the corpses.
Premeditated the crimes undoubtedly were, and accomplished by one to whom murder was an art, for in not a single instance was there the slightest clue to his identity, though some were committed in broad daylight. The modus operandi appeared to be similar in every case, and with the exception of one victim, who had been shot, the remaining five had all been stabbed to the heart by a stiletto, which the murderer usually carried away with him.
Various were the theories advanced as to the motives for these appalling deeds.
Some journals suggested that the murderer was a maniac, whose insatiable thirst for blood was controlled by the moon’s changes. This appeared plausible enough to some, but others asked how, if he were a lunatic, did he continue so effectually to conceal himself. These were told there was method in madness, and that in all probability the murderer was insane whilst committing the crimes, and immediately afterwards, on gaining his right senses, he remembered nothing of the fearful deeds.
Such hypotheses, and others of a far wilder character, were daily talk, not only throughout the Kingdom, but in all the Continental capitals, and in America. Although several heavy rewards had been offered for the apprehension of the defender, and a free pardon to any accomplice, all efforts to discover him were futile. The shrewdest detectives acknowledged themselves utterly baffled.
The most inexplicable part of the mystery was the fact that the crimes were not confined to one city, or even to one country, but had been committed at places at great distances from one another. This plainly showed that the murderer travelled with
