ithout a
ticket or that his ticket was lost."

To this elaborate and plausible hypothesis the answer of the police and
of the company was, first, that no such ticket was found; secondly,
that the slow train would never run parallel to the express; and,
thirdly, that the local train had been stationary in King's Langley
Station when the express, going at fifty miles an hour, had flashed
past it. So perished the only satisfying explanation, and five years
have elapsed without supplying a new one. Now, at last, there comes a
statement which covers all the facts, and which must be regarded as
authentic. It took the shape of a letter dated from New York, and
addressed to the same criminal investigator whose theory I have quoted.
It is given here in extenso, with the exception of the two opening
paragraphs, which are personal in their nature:

"You'll excuse me if I'm not very free with names. There's less reason
now than there was five years ago when mother was still living. But
for all that, I had rather cover up our tracks all I can. But I owe
you an explanation, for if your idea of it was wrong, it was a mighty
ingenious one all the same. I'll have to go back a little so as you
may understand all about it.

"My people came from Bucks, England, and emigrated to the States in the
early fifties. They settled in Rochester, in the State of New York,
where my father ran a large dry goods store. There were only two sons:
myself, James, and my brother, Edward. I was ten years older than my
brother, and after my father died I sort of took the place of a father
to him, as an elder brother would. He was a bright, spirited boy, and
just one of the most beautiful creatures that ever lived. But there
was always a soft spot in him, and it was like mould in cheese, for it
spread and spread, and nothing that you could do would stop it. Mother
saw it just as clearly as I did, but she went on spoiling him all the
same, for he had such a way with him that you could refuse him nothing.
I did all I could to hold him in, and he hated me for my pains.

"At last he fairly got his head, and nothing that we could do would
stop him. He got off into New York, and went rapidly from bad to
worse. At first he was only fast, and then he was criminal; and then,
at the end of a year or two, he was one of the most notorious young
crooks in the city. He had formed a friendship with Sparrow MacCoy,
who was at the head of his profession as a