Page:Houdini - The Right Way to Do Wrong An Expose of Successful Criminals.djvu/43

Rh husband's seat in the Highlands, the jewelry being securely packed in one of her numerous trunks. These were duly placed in the luggage van, which was locked, and only opened by the guard at the two or three places where the express stopped. No one save the railway servants entered the van or left it, neither had the doors been opened while the train was in motion. But when the trunk in question was unlocked far away in Scotland, the jewel case was gone, and from that day to this not the slightest clue has been found as to its disappearance. Here was a case for a Sherlock Holmes or a Martin Hewitt, but either these gentlemen were not forthcoming, or they totally failed to solve what is, perhaps, the most mysterious railway robbery of recent days.

"Let me lift the veil and show how the little job was worked. Two men, both of whom are still making a very comfortable income as railway thieves, got to know of the lady's proposed journey, and discovered the train by which she intended to travel. Accordingly, they also traveled north by that train, though they did not go as far as Scotland. On the contrary, they only booked to Leeds. Their luggage consisted of two portmanteaus and a massive wooden trunk, strongly hooped and padlocked. It was an honest, straightforward-looking trunk, but any one who examined it very