It was close on midnight when I turned the corner, but the shop was still open. There were no customers in it, but through the open door I could see into the back parlour. An old man sat there alone, smoking his pipe and looking into the dying embers of the fire. The shop had changed hands twice since the murder. Country folks had taken it, ignorant of its history, had found out the terrible tragedy that had been enacted on the premises, and had left again. I wondered as I looked at the old man if he knew the story of his home. I have in my possession the letters the murderer wrote from the condemned cell to the mother of his child. They are well written, and convey a suggestion of refined feeling, which is remarkable when one remembers the brutal crime the man committed for a paltry profit. After the murder he remained alone in the house with his victims the long night through, and as soon as he had succeeded in removing the remains he set about to plan another crime of a similar character. He intended to murder a man whom he had lured to his house, then go to the shop where the intended victim's wife was alone, murder her, and take possession of the business in exactly the same way that he had taken possession of the little shop of his first victim. Whenever I look late at night into that shop window I am fascinated, for the whole scene reacts itself, and in fancy I see the man--whom I saw tried and condemned--sitting in the little parlour and planning the removal in the morning of the "sacks" through that little black door in the side street. A small, semi-detached house in a dull, deserted side street of Kentish Town. In the front a little grass plot; in the windows a few pots of ferns. A curtain is drawn aside and a young woman looks up at the sky. She is wondering, probably, if the weather is going to clear up and be fine for her afternoon walk. Two little boys come along and seat themselves on the doorstep. One has a mouth-organ and plays "At the Old Bull and Bush," while his small companion listens critically. A sleek black cat creeps through the railings, settles down on the little grass plot, and begins to perform an elaborate toilet. If I were to say that there is nothing in the scene to suggest tragedy, it would not be true. There is, at least, something in the neighbourhood, something in the street, something in the house that suggest mystery. And we are looking upon the scene of a tragedy which was a mystery for a time.