for a long time on the
following day, when the lengthy interview with Cronin was sent out; that
he had told the Toronto detectives that Cronin was at Starkey's house,
and that he had given the latter's name as a witness and as one who had
known Cronin in Chicago, to the fact that the dispatches were truthful.

"_Starkey told me that Cronin was at his house_," exclaimed Long, who by
this time was in a condition, bordering on the hysterical.

"Why didn't you bring Cronin out to your house?" the visitor asked.

"Why should I?" replied Long. He had evidently forgotten that two weeks
before he had assured Detective Reburn that Cronin had visited his
residence. Two days afterward, when confronted with Reburn, he repeated
his original statement.

"Cronin _was_ at my house," he said.

"Why didn't you say so in your dispatches? Why did you tell another
story the other morning?" asked the visitor.

"I did not telegraph everything that passed between Cronin and myself,
nor did I tell you everything the other day."

"Who saw Cronin at your house?"

"My wife."

"Did the servants?"

"Well, they wouldn't remember him."

"Did you present him to your father and mother?"

"They were away."

It was apparent by this time, even apart from the fact that the body had
been discovered and the circumstances demonstrated that it was in the
catch-basin at the time Long's dispatches were filed, that his carefully
prepared story would not hold water.

Still the visitor persisted, and literally compelled the reporter to
drive him to the different points at which he claimed to have seen
Cronin, and over the route he followed him the first day. Long took him
to the Yong Street Arcade, thence to the Union Depot, thence up to King
and Ontario streets; thence to Adalaide and Toronto streets, where
Cronin was alleged to have taken a hack, and Long had taken another and
followed him. Pressed to give the name of the hackman, his number or his
description, Long said that he was in such a hurry that he paid no
attention to any of these details. He was reminded that Alexander Craig,
clerk at the Rossin House, had declared that no such guests as he, Long,
had described were ever at the hotel, that no one had turned up to say
that Long and Cronin had been seen in conversation, that the hackman had
faded into air, and that Starkey remained the only bulwark of the story.

"Make a clean breast of it," he was urged. "Tell the public the truth
rega