Mr. Martin had carried on a wine merchant’s business at 407, Praed Street, until fifteen years before. He had then moved to the Barbican, where he employed two clerks and a couple of packers. He had never married, and lived at a boarding house in Streatham. He had more than once gone away for the weekend without notice, and his absence had therefore caused no concern. He was not known to have any enemies, although more than once there had been some unsavoury rumours in circulation as to his dealings with girls whom he had engaged as his secretaries. His movements on Saturday morning were traced from the time he left his office to his reaching Aldersgate station. Finally, as a result of the hint contained in the letter signed John Lacey, the police had searched his office, and had found there certain papers which threw a flood of light upon a long sequence of jewel robberies extending back for the last twenty years.