Flynn’s Weekly Detective Fiction. Vol. 27, No. 2, September 24, 1927

The Two Mrs. Thomas by Robert W. Sneddon

It had been better had Mrs. Thomas opened her door to a tigress with four legs than this one with two.

Richmond is one of the most beautiful of many beauty spots near London. Poets have sung of Richmond Park and the wide sweep of the Thames spanned here by a noble five arch bridge.

On the terraces which rise one above the other, with their rows of houses overlooking the river, elderly gentlemen and ladies sun themselves in summer and look down on the river alive with lovers in punts, canoes and other river craft. These spectators are mostly retired tradesmen, old maids and widows, who struggle along on tiny incomes and make a brave showing on very little.

Mrs. Thomas lived in a semi-detached two-story villa in Park Road, which she rented from her next door neighbor, Miss Ives. She had a nice little garden in which she pottered about with her plants and flowers, and everything was quite “genteel,” though there was a horrid public house, “The Hole in the Wall,” just a little way off.

Mrs. Thomas was a widow whose two marriages had brought her just enough to live on comfortably, though foolishly she led her neighbors and tradesmen to believe her fortune was greater than it really was.

She dressed well in black silk, with a cameo pin, wore a number of rings, a gold watch, and had other jewelry and some silver plate. Her relatives thought her eccentric and flighty, for she loved changes and refused to stay put. She never stayed long in one house but had to be up and away.

She had a habit of packing up suddenly and neglecting to let friends and relatives know where she went. It was little wonder they lost interest in her and let her go.

She was a smallish brisk lady, rather more prim than her adventurous movings would indicate, and timid in many ways. In her home she was a martinet for cleanliness and order. There must not be a speck of dirt in her drawing-room with its draped mantelpiece, its wax flowers under glass, its crocheted mats, and on its wall the portrait of the late Mr. Thomas by an unknown artist.

Woe betide the wretched servant who did not sweep under the sofa, or moved the family photograph album from its appointed place. Mrs. Thomas, who had little to occupy her mind and time, was excitable and easily annoyed.

When she was this way her tongue would run away with her, and she would have to be looking for another servant. She could not live alone, and no one in her position in life could be servantless and hold up her head in society.

In January she was lamenting the departure of a maid, and her friend Miss Loder who had dropped in for tea and chat was sympathetic.

“Don’t worry, my dear,” she said, “I know just the woman for you. She’s strong as a horse. She’s lodging with her little boy—”

“Little boy!” exclaimed Mrs. Thomas in horror. “Is the woman married? Where’s her husband? I couldn’t think of having a child here.”

“Oh, you needn’t. She’s living with my Mrs. Crease, you know, my charwoman, and she will leave the child with her to board. Several times when Mrs. Crease has been unable to come, Webster has come in her place. She’s most reliable — I don’t think you could do better. Irish—”

“I’ve certainly got to have some one right away,” Mrs. Thomas confessed. “I can’t stand being alone. And you’re sure she’s married — she’s not — not — you know.”

Miss Loder shook her head.

“Of course, she’s married. You know me. I wouldn’t have her in my house if she wasn’t. I’ll ask her to see you at once.”

That evening there was a ring at the front door of No. 2 Mayfield Cottages, and timidly turning up the hall light Mrs. Thomas went to the door and opened it

There on the step stood a tall, bony woman in a dark dress with a long jacket, its pockets trimmed with rubbed fur, and wearing a bonnet. In the gas light she had a dark complexion and her teeth showed white and prominent.

“Mrs. Thomas, ma’am?” she asked in an Irish brogue.

“Yes—”

“Miss Loder said you were looking for a ‘general,’ ma’am.”

“Oh, you are Webster.”

“Mrs. Webster, ma’am. Kate Webster,” said the caller grimly, as she surveyed the shrinking little lady.

“Come in!” said Mrs. Thomas with a gasp. What a queer woman — with those slanting eyes and that hard mouth. She felt like shutting the door in her face, yet for the life of her she couldn’t. She hadn’t the will to do it, with those eyes looking into her.

“Come in, won’t you?”

Kate Webster stepped inside, and the door dosed. It had been better had Mrs. Thomas opened her door to a tigress with four legs than this one with two. One swift paw stroke and all would have been over.

In the drawing-room under the painted eyes of Mr. Thomas, Kate was hired, without references. Miss Loder had spoken for her. And Mrs. Thomas had dismissed as absurd the feeling of repulsion which had come over her at first.

The poor woman with a child to support — she seemed capable and willing, and there was a reassuring strength about her which was comforting in a house without men. If a burglar came Kate would not faint away and leave her mistress unprotected.

Mrs. Thomas showed Kate over the house and detailed her duties. They went into the kitchen with its washhouse.

“That’s a nice boiler you have, Mrs. Thomas, ma’am,” said Kate as she looked at the copper boiler set in a brick foundation with its fire grate beneath to heat the water. “I’ll be getting anything that goes in there nice and clean, I’ll be thinking.”

“Then that’s settled, Kate, you’ll bring your box here to-morrow morning.”

Next morning Miss Ives announced to her mother who lived with her that their neighbor had a new maid. She was hanging out clothes in the garden. She was odd-looking — so — what was the word — it was on the tip of her tongue — “sinister” that was the word. She gave you the creeps.

The weeks crept by in that house tenanted by two women, in whose souls a strange ferment was stirring. Not on the surface at first; no bubbles came to the light to betray what was passing beneath. Kate was subservient almost. It was “Yes, ma’am!” and “No, ma’am!” and strict attention to business.

There was no running down to Mrs. Crease’s to see her son, young George, a lad of twenty who had fallen under the spell of this strange woman. He had been helper to the barman in the King’s Hotel, Twickenham, near by, and Mrs. Thomas’s trusted Kate had been in the habit of going drinking with him in a public house and taking him from his work.

True Kate used to drop in to see Mrs. Flayhoe, hostess of the Hole in the Wall, but it was done discreetly and without offense to the ladies in the Mayfied Cottages.

And Mrs. Thomas kept her irritation in check, though Kate was no model servant. She was careless and sloppy, untidy and unattractive.

This state of affairs could not last long, and Mrs. Thomas gave Kate notice to leave at the end of February. This was the first or second of the month.

Kate heard her dismissal in silence, but there was a look in her oblique eyes which sent a stab of apprehension through Mrs. Thomas’s heart, none too strong. And there had been a twitch to Kate’s fingers as she crumpled up the apron in them that had been horridly suggestive of violence.

At night in her soft bed Mrs. Thomas lay awake, beset with unaccountable fears. She made up her mind to get some one to stay with her, but all to whom she applied for this support had excuses and reasons for not coming.

Finally she got a mother and daughter to lodge with her for a fortnight, and no doubt fortified by their presence gave expression to her feelings toward the inhabitant of the kitchen. Her lodgers stayed their appointed time and then left.

Mrs. Thomas was now in a panic. She sent a frantic appeal to her friends to come and share her house, but none would come. It was only one more of the poor dear’s odd ways. Why this desire for company all of a sudden?

Meanwhile Kate went about her business, marketing, dusting, sweeping, washing and ironing, getting her clothes ready to leave.

On February 25 she went to see a friend of hers or, more correctly, a woman who made her bonnets, Mary Durden a straw hat weaver, and in the course of trying on a bonnet, told her she was soon going to Birmingham to see about some property an aunt had left her — furniture, a gold watch and chain, jewelry, et cetera.

“You ain’t ’arf lucky!” sighed Mary Durden. “Wish some aunt of mine ’ud pop off and leave me summat nice.”

It was probably to hear more about this legacy that on Friday, the twenty-eighth, the day set for her leaving, Kate humbly begged Mrs. Thomas to let her stay on a few days longer. She hinted that Friday was a bad day to start on a journey or make a change.

Her mistress hesitated, then weakly agreed. She knew of no other servant she could get at once, and well — yes — Kate could stay.

You may be sure that Miss Ives next door heard rumors of Mrs. Thomas’s Kate leaving and was surprised to see her still there on Saturday, March 1. But there she was, and there was Mrs. Thomas in the garden attending to her plants.

On Sunday mistress and maid went different ways. Mrs. Thomas rustling in her silk gown went in the morning to church.

Kate went out in the afternoon ostensibly to see her child, whom she really adored, but fell by the wayside. She dropped into a “pub” and laughed and chatted with several men. What there was in this woman to attract men, as she undoubtedly did, no one can definitely say. She was in many ways repellant, yet this repelling quality which to some was a signal of danger, was to others a veritable beacon light to destruction.

She was anything but good-looking or well dressed, there was nothing feminine about her, she had a forbidding aura of sullen darkness. Yet on occasions she could laugh and joke, she was a skilled actress of emotions she was far from feeling, and a glib liar. She could lie her way out of most traps. An extraordinary primitive passionate creature of no apparent charm she awakened in the men with whom she came in contact an almost instantaneous passion.

The afternoon sped on. When Kate got back to her kitchen, she found Mrs. Thomas much annoyed, all dressed to go to evening service. Mrs. Thomas gave Kate a piece of her mind and the servant flew into a terrible passion.

Mrs. Thomas hurried from the house — it would never do to be late for church, and when she reached her pew, she was all shaken and upset. A former servant, Julia Nicholls, saw her and noticed how white and frightened-looking she was.

“Whatever is the matter, ma’am?” she whispered.

“Oh, Julia,” said Mrs. Thomas, clutching her arm nervously, “I had to speak to Kate and she acted like a crazy woman. I wish I had you with me again.”

Quite a number noticed Mrs. Thomas in church, but few guessed what courage it took for her to go back to her home alone.

It was quite dark. Only a peep of light showed in the fanlight over the front door. As Mrs. Thomas opened the door a lurking shadow stirred and slid against the wall.

As the feet of her mistress reached the landing on the upper floor a black mass disengaged itself from the shadows and Kate ascended the stair. It was well that no other was there in the house to see the expression of her tigerish face.

In the next house Miss Ives looked up from her book.

“Did you hear that, mother? It sounded like something fell next door.”

The two women listened, but all was silent.

Monday morning dawned. The chimney over the washhouse in No. 2 smoked lazily. One might have said greasily.

“What a strong smell,” sniffed Miss Ives. “I wish that Irish servant wouldn’t burn rubbish under the copper. Hum, there she is in the garden hanging out clothes, for two pins I’d speak to her, but after all, she’s Mrs. Thomas’s maid, not mine.”

In the afternoon Mr. Deane, a coal agent, who was passing, thought he would drop in and see how Mrs. Thomas’s coal supply was holding out.

“Missus at home? I’m taking orders for coal,” he said to the maid who came to the door.

“No, she ain’t home, and there’s no coal needed.”

“All right, miss. You needn’t bite me ’ead off,” remarked the wounded Mr. Deane as he turned away.

“Wonder what that gal was up to,” he mused to himself. “Seemed fair upset, snapping at me. I guess missus ain’t home and ’er ladyship is sampling the port wine and sherry.”

Scarcely had Mr. Deane gone than the front door opened and Kate came out carrying a parcel. She turned in the direction of Twickenham. Whatever her mysterious errand it did not take her long, and when she came back she was minus the parcel.

She dropped in at The Hole in the Wall.

“What’s yours, dearie?” asked Mrs. Hayhoe.

“A drop o’ gin. Sure, and it’s glad I am to have a rest. The missus has gone on a trip, and I’m all my lone in the house.”

At eight o’clock the guardian of Mrs. Thomas’s house got home, but not to dawdle. No, she set to work washing and scrubbing floors and paint work, cleaning the kitchen implements till meat cleaver and carving knife shone.

She seemed to have acquired a passion for work, for next morning, which was Tuesday, March 4, she was seen cleaning the windows.

She had a caller, a Miss Roberts, sent by Miss Ives to say that she would like to know when it would be convenient for Mrs. Thomas to have the men come to repair the leak in the roof she had spoken of.

Kate met this lady at the door and told her there was no need for any repairs, and, besides, Mrs. Thomas had gone away for a visit.

This was a strange statement to make, for at three o’clock Mrs. Thomas came out of the house, or if it was not Mrs. Thomas it was some one who certainly wore one of Mrs. Thomas’s silk gowns, had on her gold watch and chain, and her fingers adorned with several rings.

This person, who was taller and bonier than Mrs. Thomas, locked the door carefully. There was something in the house which she was determined no one could get at.

In her hand she carried an oilcloth bag containing a carefully covered parcel.

She was going to make a call in Hammersmith, a section nearer to London City.

Mr. Porter, house painter, had just come home from his work and washed up. He was waiting for his tea or supper, and Mrs. Porter was bustling about the stove frying a pan of “bloaters.” Their two sons, Robert, a boy of sixteen, and William, somewhat older, were standing near the door of the little brick house when a splendidly dressed lady in silk gown, mantle and bonnet, and carrying an oilcloth bag appeared in the street and looked at the numbers. She came near the door and looked at Robert.

“Sure, and you must be Bob. How you have growed, my dear. Is your pa and ma in?”

Bob called his mother.

Flustered, Mrs. Porter came to the door.

“Don’t you know me, mother?” said the visitor.

“Well, if it isn’t Kate. Come in, my dear. You’re just in time for tea. ’Ow long since I saw you last — six years, yus indeed.”

“Look ’oo’s ’ere, pa,” announced Mrs. Porter triumphantly. “Kate w’ot used to lodge next door to us six years ago.”

Kate smiled and put her arms about the astounded Mr. Porter,

“I’ve simply been longing to see you again, father.”

“Changed a bit for the wuss, I am, eh?” smirked Mr. Porter. “But, bless me soul, you’re an ’owling swell nowadays. Married, eh?”

“A widow, father. Mr. Webster passed on, poor man.”

The party sat round the table, and the visitor told her story. She had been left a nice little house at Richmond by her aunt, who had just died, furniture and all effects. It was too bad she couldn’t live there, but she was going to her parents in Scotland.

She flattered Mr. Porter greatly by asking his advice about selling the furniture. Could he recommend an honest agent who would buy it?

Mr. Porter rubbed his chin and thought he could find some one. In fact he had some one in mind, a neighbor. He’d speak to him about it.

Kate rose to go, and picked up the bag which had been resting between her feet at the table. She asked if Mr. Porter wouldn’t like to walk with her to Hammersmith station, and if Robert could be permitted to see her home to Richmond.

Porter insisted on Robert carrying the bag, and the boy, finding it strangely heavy, lagged behind. His curiosity did not lead him to investigate, though it might have been well had he done so. He caught up with his father and Kate outside a public house at Hammersmith Bridge.

Kate hesitated and said she had to deliver the bag to a friend at Barnes, and would her companions wait in the bar for her. She was back without the bag in twenty minutes, an incredibly short time for her to go and come back from Barnes, but she gave Porter and his son no time to remark upon this but caught their attention with a case of rings and some photographs she had. They all had a drink, and then Mr. Porter left them at the station.

When Kate and the boy reached the villa in Park Road, Kate unlocked the door and made her companion go in ahead and light up.

“A drop o’ rum will do you no harm,” she said, “and I could do with it myself, for we have a little job to do, Bob. I want you to help me carry a box to Richmond Bridge, where I am to meet a gentleman.”

The box was upstairs, a hat box about a foot square, hinged and padlocked and tied about with a cord, and the pair brought it down. They had another drink, and Kate ran her fingers over the piano keys as though used to playing, and asked Robert to notice the “foine tone.”

They left the house, carrying the box between them. It was a good weight, and several times they changed hands. One of the handles was missing, and Robert had to carry his end by the rope and grazed his knuckles. That graze was later to make him remember the absence of a handle.

Half way over Richmond Bridge, Kate asked Robert to set the box down on a bench in a recess, and then to go back the way he had come and wait a bit while she handed over the box to the gentleman who was to meet her.

Robert obeyed her, but did not go far. It was very dark and the spot was lonely, so he slipped into another recess and waited.

All at once he heard a splash and a gentleman passing looked over the parapet.

In a moment or two Kate came hurrying back and said she had seen her friend and everything was all right. She took the boy to the Richmond Station, but the last train was gone. There was nothing else to do but to go back to the villa and stay all night.

Hogarth alone could do justice to the scene. On one side of a round table Kate with her gleaming eyes and rat trap mouth, on the other an open-eyed boy growing dizzier and dizzier as he swallowed down the rum with which his glass was kept continually filled. Overhead a spluttering gas jet. Beyond, in the kitchen, an atmosphere from which the horror had not entirely been filtered.

When the boy’s head slid to the table, Kate put out the light and went upstairs to the comfort of her mistress’s soft bed.

The morning came. Kate stole downstairs, glanced into the kitchen, then into the dining room, and smiled with satisfaction as she saw her guest had not stirred all night. She shook him awake and fed him. She sent him on ahead of her to his mother’s, with whom she spent the evening and stayed the night.

In the morning the newspaper boys were shouting:

“ ’Orrible Discovery at Barnes! Mysterious body in box!”

“Wot’s that?” asked Mrs. Porter.

“Just a catch penny, mother,” said Kate calmly. “You can’t believe a word they say in the papers.”

A number of people in London and all over the country were, however, deeply interested in the story.

Shortly before seven o’clock on the morning of March 5, Henry Wheatley, a coal porter, was driving a cart along the banks of the Thames. On arriving opposite Barnes Terrace, some thirty yards from Barnes Bridge, he saw an object half in half out of the water, and, going closer, saw it was a wooden box.

With the aid of the man with him he drew it ashore, a corded box. Wheatley cut the cord and gave the box a kick, when it fell apart, disclosing a mass of flesh. His friend thought it was butcher meat, but Wheatley thought different and set off to the police station. A surgeon summoned pronounced the flesh to be human.

Pieced together, it constituted almost the entire body of a woman, and from the parchmentlike look and absence of decomposition Dr. Adams concluded it had been boiled. The head, one foot and several minor parts were missing. There was nothing to identify the murdered woman.

Kate returned to the villa, but this time with William, the elder of the Porter boys. She said she had forgotten her keys and had him climb in through a window. There was evidently some underlying purpose in her use of the boys.

No one seeing Mr. Church, proprietor of the public house known to the residents of Hammersmith as The Rising Sun, could have mistaken his calling in life. He oozed prosperity as he walked down the street in his light tweeds, field glasses over his shoulder as he went his way to the races.

Behind his bar, in shirt sleeves, a heavy gold chain across his vest, and a twinkle in his eye he made a genial host. An ex-cavalry man, he now wore a sandy beard and mustache, and had his hair brushed up into a curl over his bold forehead.

He had a laugh and a joke for all, especially for the ladies, though his wife swore there never was a better husband had been born. His gallantry was all on the surface, in the way of trade, and it paid. Mr. Church was well to do, and highly esteemed, a member and official of several clubs.

On Sunday evening, 9th of March, Mr. Church saw his friend Porter come into the bar with his wife, William, and a strange lady who gave him a smile and a nod as though she knew him.

“This is Mrs. Thomas, old boy,” said Mr. Porter, “and we’ll all ’ave a drink.”

Mr. Church took the hand extended to him and noted the rings.

“We’re old friends, I think,” said Kate.

Mrs. Church looked at her blankly.

“First time I’ve had the pleasure of meeting you, ma’am,” said Mr. Church. “However, there’s no time like the present. Happy to know you, Mrs. Thomas.”

“Lived next door to us six years ago,” said Mrs. Porter.

“W’ot I’ve missed in them six years!” said Mr. Church gallantly. “W’ot’s it going to be, friends?”

Mr. Porter soon brought up the subject of Mrs. Thomas’s furniture, and Mr. Church, after consideration, said he’d run over and look at it, and if he fancied the stuff would make an offer for it.

When the party broke up Mrs. Thomas was calling Church by his first name as if she had known him all his life, and he foolishly responding, was calling her Kate.

On Monday another item was added to what was now known as the Barnes Mystery. A working man found in a rubbish heap near Twickenham a neat parcel containing a woman’s foot. This was found to belong to the dismembered body found a few days before.

On Tuesday Church went to inspect the furniture. He found his hostess all dressed up for the occasion and the table set with eatables and drinkables. Though she pointed out the portrait on the wall with the statement “That is my late husband, Mr. Thomas,” Kate did not seem to revere his memory.

She summoned all her secret charm to entertain Church and he spent several hours smoking and drinking. He agreed to pay her sixty-eight pounds for the furniture and advanced her eighteen.

Whatever his reason we do not know, except that he found something exciting in her company — this model husband — but Church visited Kate every day up to the seventeenth when he superintended the packing of the furniture.

The morning of the eighteenth came and the moving van drove up to the door. Church and Porter, who was to assist him, were already there, and the removal began.

At this point Miss Ives, who had been attracted by the stir, looked out. Her first thought was — Mrs. Thomas is moving — and she hasn’t given me notice. She sent out a servant to ask what was happening, and the van proprietor said he was moving the things to Hammersmith on “Mrs. Thomas’s” orders.

Kate overheard the conversation and asked Porter who was asking, and he told her the lady next door. Drawing herself up and with a determined expression Kate went next door and saw Miss Ives on her steps.

“Where is Mrs. Thomas?” asked Miss Ives.

“I don’t know,” answered Kate, and turned away.

“What’s wrong with the woman? She can hardly speak,” thought Miss Ives, but aloud she said: “Can you give me her address?”

“No!” snapped Kate.

“Indeed!” said Miss Ives sharply. “Then you must excuse me, I will have to attend to it; I must see my agent.” She shut the door.

In a few moments she came out hastily and, after a scathing glance at Church who had overseen but not heard this talk, went off to the agent’s.

“W’ot’s all this?” asked Church suspiciously. “Anything wrong? I don’t like the looks of it, Porter. If she owes rent we’ve no right to move out her furniture; best call the bargain off. Play safe, eh?”

“I’m sorry, Kate, Mrs. Thomas,” he apologized, “but—”

“Yes, yes,” Kate said excitedly; “send the van away!”

“But my money, Kate!”

“I’ll pay you it back. Here, you can take these dresses.”

She threw some dresses she had sent Porter to get, into the van, in her agitation neglecting to go through the pockets.

“All right, Joe,” said Church to the van proprietor, “nothing more to be done ’ere. Drive us back. See you later, Kate.”

The van drove off with Church and Porter. Ten minutes had not passed before Kate appeared dressed as for a journey. She hastened down the road and got into a cab, for cabs and strong drink were her passion.

She drove to Church’s and got there ahead of the host, but Mrs. Church was there and from her she borrowed a pound.

Tigress as she was, she had the tigress’s love for her offspring. Even in that moment she could not leave her boy. She ran into Porter’s and got him.

Robert dressed him and brought him downstairs. Another cab to the suburban station at Hammersmith. Train to King’s Cross, the boat train to Liverpool, a coal boat to Ireland.

In her uncle’s house at Killane, her birthplace, near Enniscorthy, in County Wicklow, she thought she had found a refuge from the doom which was pursuing her.

Church when he came home and found Kate had borrowed a pound and then learned from the Porters that she had removed her child began to be worried. It was not so much the loss of his money, but the feeling that he had been made “a blooming mug.” So he hied himself off to see Miss Ives, who refused to see him. She had no use for publicans and sinners.

Kate had gone without leaving any address, but Church thought he was lucky when in one of the silk dresses he came across a letter to Mrs. Thomas from a Mrs. Menhennick with whom she appeared to be on intimate terms.

He went to see what he could learn at the address given in the letter and saw Mr. Menhennick.

Mr. Menhennick heard the story with growing amazement. It’s not at all like Mrs. Thomas to do a thing like that — a child, indeed — she has no child. Tall, bony, sallow. Why, Mrs. Thomas was small and fair. There was some mystery here which ought to be looked into.

The two men went to see Mrs. Thomas’s lawyer to whom Church told his story without any attempt to disguise his part in it. Church went with Porter to the Richmond police station and accompanied Inspector Pearman to Mrs. Thomas’s villa.

Scrubbing and cleansing had not been able to remove suspicious stains from the floor of the kitchen and the kitchen table. Under the copper washboiler were ashes and calcinated bones. In the copper itself was a greasy deposit.

The hostess of The Hole in the Wall almost fainted away as she recalled that the missing servant had tried to sell her two jars of rendered fat. The suggestion was too horrible for human contemplation.

“And to think,” Mrs. Hayhoe wailed, “as ’ow when she called ’ere ’er missus was cooking in the copper.”

In the villa kitchen Inspector Pearman found the missing handle of the box, the box of the Barnes mystery — mystery no longer. The remains were plainly those of Mrs. Thomas. Robert Porter, brought forward by Church, who had just learned of the expedition the boy had taken with Kate, identified the box. Cord similar to that which bound it was found in the villa.

The case was clear. The following notice was published:

On March 28 Kate Webster, alias Webb, alias Shannon, alias Lawless, alias Lawler, was arrested at Killane, Ireland.

It was discovered that the servant whom Miss Loder had recommended to the murdered mistress had a notorious criminal past.

Born in Killane of the farming class in 1849, she began by serving a short term for larceny. She moved to Liverpool where she became expert in robbing lodging housekeepers.

She was a glib liar and a consummate actress. She would take a room somewhere and move out in the night with all the goods she could lay her hands on. Traps were laid for her, but she was slippery as an eel.

She was caught, however, and served three years. She then went to London as a general servant, and lodged next door to the Porters who knew her as “Kate,” an out of work servant. It was there she met the man known as “Strong,” among other names, who betrayed her and became the father of her child. She set up house with him and passed as a sea captain’s wife.

She played the game of getting goods on credit and selling them, and once more fell into the hands of the police, getting eighteen months this time. She lived again with Strong after another imprisonment for one year, but left him to have an affair with young Crease. It was shortly after this that she went into service with Mrs. Thomas.

No sooner was this scheming woman arrested than she began to accuse Church, and on her arrival in Richmond made a statement which led the police to arrest the host of The Rising Sun.

She said she had known Church for seven years, having first met him when she was living next door to the Porters, and he used to take her into London and treat her at various public houses.

She had renewed the friendship, and when she took service with Mrs. Thomas he came to see her one night much the worse for drink. Her mistress came home and she told her Church was her brother and introduced him. A few days later he came again and he said: “Couldn’t we put the old girl out of the way?”

Kate said: “What do you mean?” and Church’s answer had been: “Oh, poison her.”

Kate’s answer had been: “You must do that yourself. I’ll have nothing to do with that.”

Church said: “We would have her things and go off to America together and enjoy it. I’m getting tired of my old woman.”

Church came again on Monday night, March 3. “He had tea with Mrs. Thomas. I waited on them. After tea I asked to go out and see my little boy. When I returned late in the evening I noticed the light was turned down. I knocked three times at the door; the third knock Church opened the front door when I saw Mrs. Thomas lying on the mat in the passage, struggling and groaning, and he said ‘Come in.’

“I drew back on the step, frightened to go in. At this time there was a policeman standing on the opposite side of the road, a tall dark man. Church catched me by the arm, pulled me in and closed the door.

“I said, ‘Whatever have you done?’ He said, ‘Never you mind, I have done for her, and if you say a word about it I’ll put this knife into you up to the handle.’ That was a carving knife belonging to Mrs. Thomas. I said, ‘No, John, don’t. I won’t tell.’ ”

The story then ran that he took her to Mrs. Porter’s, and himself returned to the villa. He told her to go with young Robert Porter to the house and get the box. She met him on Richmond Bridge, and asked him what he was going to do with the box. He said, “That is my business.” She heard a splash. She had seen blood on the carving knife, but noticed it had been cleaned. Church was always about the house.

He gave her his photograph and a card with his address, and said when she went away that he would stay home and “braze it out.” She was to stay three weeks in Ireland. He would then send her money and they would go to America together.

“I never laid a hand on Mrs. Thomas,” she concluded, “and had nothing to do with murdering her, but I knew Church had done it. I intend to tell the whole truth, as I don’t see why I should be blamed for what Church has done.”

Church was able to prove a complete alibi. On the evening named and at the time stated he was present at a meeting of the Slate Club. The various members swore to his presence.

He was one of the three men in charge of the keys required to open a fund box. The books of the club were produced bearing his signature, signed that night to certain entries. There was not the slightest doubt that he had not been near Mrs. Thomas’s villa.

Kate was undaunted. She said she had made a mistake. Church had committed the murder, not on Monday but Sunday night, and added that Porter had been a party to it.

Both men were, luckily, able to prove a most manifest alibi for Sunday night. Church was discharged at once and was hailed by the cheers of hundreds.

He did a roaring trade for days at The Rising Sun, and basked in the light of popularity and prosperity. He became a famous character, and prints of both he and Kate Webster were sold everywhere.

On July 2 Kate Webster was brought to trial. The defense tried to prove that it was in no way clear that Mrs. Thomas died by violence, or that the remains found were those of her.

Dr. Adams, who first examined them, thought the body belonged to a woman eighteen to thirty years old. Mrs. Thomas had been subject to fits. She probably had a fatal one. Kate had found her on the mat.

The police evidence as to charred bones, bloodstains, et cetera, was ignored. The defense could advance no theory as to what had become of the body.

The prosecution had an easy task. Miss Ives gave highly incriminating evidence that the boiler in the house next door had been in use the morning after the murder. The two boilers were back to back, and there was only a thin wall between.

The box with the remains was proved, without a doubt, to have been prepared in the villa and taken out by Kate with the innocent assistance of Robert Porter.

That she had premeditated the murder was proved by the evidence of Mary Durden, the bonnet maker.

Public opinion was all against Webster. She was hooted and booed in transit from prison to court. The trial ended on July 8, the verdict was “Guilty,” and the sentence “Death by hanging.”

On July 10 the prisoner made a long and rambling statement in which she said the actual murderer was a certain man who was the father of her child, and that he had been assisted by a woman whom she did not know.

Webster belonged to the Roman Catholic faith, and persistence of her confessor induced her to tell the truth at last.

Her confession was given only in part to the press, the details being the most horrible narrative of ghastly facts ever poured into human ears.

“Mrs. Thomas came in and went upstairs. I went up to her and, after a violent quarrel, I threw her from the top of the stairs to the ground floor. I ran down and, to prevent her screaming and getting me in trouble, I caught her by the throat, and in the struggle she was choked.

“I then became entirely lost and without any control over myself, and looking on what had happened and the fear of being discovered, I determined to do away with the body as best I could.

“I laid it on the kitchen table and chopped the head from the body with the assistance of a cleaver. I also used the meat saw and carving knife to cut the body up. I prepared the copper with water to boil the body—”

But there is no use continuing the actions of a frenzied fiend. The head, never discovered, she dropped into the river, in the oilcloth bag, weighted.

At a quarter to nine on the morning of Monday, July 29, 1879, the bell of Wandsworth Jail began to toll, and the prisoner came out into the yard leaning on the arm of her confessor.

They descended a flight of steps to the place of execution, where Marwood, the hangman, was waiting. He pinioned the prisoner’s arms and placed her in position.

Shortly after the black flag was run up to the head of the flagpole, and the crowd of curious persons waiting outside the prison walls knew that Kate Webster had paid the penalty of her crime. They quietly dispersed.

It is a curious commentary on the case that when Mrs. Thomas’s effects were auctioned off there was a large and jovial crowd present.

Popular Mr. Church was there, with his usual genial laugh and joke, and bought a number of things. One collector bought the meat saw and cleaver, and another paid as much as five shillings for the fatal carving knife.

And for years maiden ladies and childless widows were scared to death to hire servant maids who did not come provided with a whole portfolio of sworn and attested references.

No servant applying for a place dare admit to the possession of the name of Kate or its several variations. Such was the dark shadow which the name of Kate Webster cast upon English homes and their fabled security.