I said this pretty confident that the swindling Mackintosh who had sold the fiddle to Cleffton would turn out to be the original thief, and took away the instrument and made preparations to secure him. I had before this made an arrangement whereby any one calling for the box at Linlithgow station should be detained and arrested; and the whole case now presented the curious spectacle of two robberies, two claimants, and two thieves. A telegram to England, according to arrangement, brought Mr Cleffton down in joy and ecstacy to claim his beloved fiddle, but only to be all but heart-broken with the intelligence that it was believed to be stolen property, and could not be given up till all claims had been fully investigated. The day after, I managed to run down to Newcastle. I easily found the little shop of Mackintosh, and considerably startled him by saying— “My name is M^cGovan, and I have come from Edinburgh about that affair of the Cremona. I want you to come with me.” The name appeared to be known to him, for he became ashy white before I had done speaking, and then with chattering teeth managed to say— “I can’t leave my business; but I’m willing to lose the money. I’ll pay Cleffton back the £40 out of my own pocket, if he gives me back the fiddle.” “Out of your own pocket?” I growled. “Man, don’t try that on me. The whole thing was a regular plant. But, as it happens, it’s not that part of the business that has brought me here. It’s the way you got the fiddle—it was stolen.” “Stolen? Then it wasn’t by me,” he cried, with fearful earnestness. “I can swear that with my hand on the Bible. I bought it from a broker in the Cowgate, in Edinburgh.” “That’s a common story—you’ll have a receipt, I suppose?” I answered, with a grin. “I have, and I’ll show it you,” and much to my surprise he very quickly produced a badly written and spelled receipt for £3, bearing a stamp, and signed “Patrick Finnigan.” “Now, be cautious what you say,” I returned, after a long look at the paper. “I happen to know Finnigan, and know him to be an honest man. You declare that you bought the fiddle from him—the fiddle which Cleffton bought from you for £40?” “I declare that solemnly.” “Then how did he get it?” “I don’t know; but it runs in my head that he said he bought it at a country auction sale. It was in two pieces when I got it—the neck was away from the body.” All this seemed probable enough, but I thought proper to take Mackintosh with me to the Newcastle Central, and have him locked up, while I returned to investigate his statements. Taking the fiddle and receipt with me, I called on Finnigan and asked him to try and recall the circumstances of the sale. That he managed to do when prompted by several statements of Mackintosh to me—particularly one as to the fiddle being in a broken state, and having hung in the back shop in a green bag, when Mackintosh asked to see it. Questioned then as to how it came into his possession, he said—