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

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.

Mystery No Longer

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.

Her Criminal Past

The case was clear. The following notice was published:

WANTED

for-stealing plate, et cetera, and supposed murder of mistress, Kate—, aged about thirty-two, five foot five or six inches high; complexion sallow, slightly freckled; teeth rather good and prominent; usually dressed in dark dress, jacket rather long, trimmed with dark fur round pockets; light brown satin bonnet; speaks with Irish accent, and was accompanied by boy, age five, complexion rather dark, dark hair; was last seen at Hammersmith.

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.