Decidedly; the murder of Matilda J. Hacker in Euston Square, in the year 1878, is one of those cases that are to be marked with an “and yet. . . . ” No doubt the verdict of the jury was the right verdict, according to the rules of the law; but. . . .

Miss Hacker, if she had lived in an earlier age, would undoubtedly have been one of those “Characters,” of whom we were talking. Like Miss Betty Bolaine, she lived at Canterbury; like Miss Bolaine she had an aversion from the spending of money. But, born in a later age, she did not appear in polite company as an animated and malodorous rag-bag, nor did she make her meals of rotten meat picked up in the gutter and roasted on a fire of cabbage stalks. We have long lost the courage of our opinions; and Miss Hacker expressed herself in a purely negative way — she would not pay her rates at Canterbury. She was a well-to-do old woman, but she did not like paying rates. Accordingly, she absconded. She took various names, and lived in various places, so as to avoid being traced and proceeded against by the Canterbury authorities. At length, she called herself Huish, and took lodgings at 4, Euston Square — the place changed its name in consequence — a house kept by a Mr. and Mrs. Bastindoff. Like many other “Characters” of the chronicles, she was accustomed to keep a good deal of money by her in a cash-box.

On the 10th of October, 1878, she wrote a business letter to her agent about some property, the reply to be addressed to “M. B., Post Office, Holborn.” On Sunday, October 14, Mr. and Mrs. Bastindoff were out for the day, and Miss Hacker was alone in the house with the servant, Hannah Dobbs. Next day, Mr. Bastindoff told the servant to go up to the old lady and get some rent due to him. Hannah, Mr. Bastindoff declared, ran upstairs with alacrity, saying, “I’ll go,” and came down again with a ￡5 note. The note was changed, the rent owing deducted, and the balance handed to Hannah Dobbs; it does not appear why. But one would think that the lodger would have received the balance. And now a very singular point. Mrs. Bastindoff said afterwards in the witness-box that on the morning of Sunday, October 14, Hannah had told her that she thought that Miss Huish (otherwise Hacker) was going to leave the lodgings that day; indeed, that she believed the old lady had already gone. This statement seems to have produced little effect on the Bastindoff family, since Mr. Bastindoff sent up his servant to collect money from his lodger on the Monday morning, and collected it. It is not recorded that he said: “So she hasn’t gone, after all,” or made any remark in particular. But after the successful embassy of the ￡5 note, it would appear that the lodger’s disappearance was gently allowed to steal on the family consciousness. Still, nobody troubled to go into the old lady’s rooms for a couple of days, and then only to get them ready for a new lodger. In these rooms, Mrs Bastindoff declared, she saw a stain on the carpet, and also clear evidence that someone had tried to wash the stain away. Still, Mrs. Bastindoff did not seem afraid with any amazement. A lodger had disappeared, probably on Sunday morning; had handed over five pounds on the Monday; her room, on the Wednesday, was found to be darkly stained; afterwards, analysis showed that this was, indeed, the stain of blood. But, so far as we can see, all these odd circumstances were accepted by the Bastindoffs as being completely in the natural order of things.

And there were other queer things, that appear to have aroused no particular comment at the time of their occurrence. Soon after October 15 Hannah Dobbs showed one of the Bastindoff children a Dream Book, which, she said, had belonged to Miss Hacker. She gave another child a funny toy, the lodger’s cash-box — with a broken lid. She also mounted a watch and chain which no one had ever seen about her before. But she explained that the watch and chain had been left her by an old uncle, lately dead at Bideford. She pawned them, later, under a false name, and it turned out at last that they were originally the property of Miss Hacker. It was found that there was no uncle at Bideford, and, naturally enough, therefore, that he hadn’t died. Soon after the disappearance of the old woman, Hannah Dobbs left the Bastindoff service, and went into lodgings. She could not pay her rent, so left her box as security. Eventually it was opened, and several articles in it were identified as ha............