the disappearance.

"4. That the supposition that Mr. Jellicoe had committed the murder
rendered all the other circumstances of the disappearance clearly
intelligible, whereas on any other supposition they were quite
inexplicable.

"The evidence of the newspaper report, therefore, clearly pointed to the
probability that John Bellingham had been murdered by Mr. Jellicoe and
his body concealed in the mummy-case.

"I do not wish to give you the impression that I, then and there,
believed that Mr. Jellicoe was the murderer. I did not. There was no
reason to suppose that the report contained all the essential facts, and
I merely considered it speculatively as a study in probabilities. But I
did decide that that was the only probable conclusion from the facts
that were given.

"Nearly two years passed before I heard anything more of the case. Then
it was brought to my notice by my friend, Doctor Berkeley, and I became
acquainted with certain new facts, which I will consider in the order in
which they became known to me.

"The first new light on the case came from the will. As soon as I had
read that document I felt convinced that there was something wrong. The
testator's evident intention was that his brother should inherit the
property, whereas the construction of the will was such as almost
certainly to defeat that intention. The devolution of the property
depended on the burial clause--clause two; but the burial arrangements
would ordinarily be decided by the executor, who happened to be Mr.
Jellicoe. Thus the will left the disposition of the property under the
control of Mr. Jellicoe, though his action could have been contested.

"Now, this will, although drawn up by John Bellingham, was executed in
Mr. Jellicoe's office, as is proved by the fact that it was witnessed by
two of his clerks. He was the testator's lawyer, and it was his duty to
insist on the will being properly drawn. Evidently he did nothing of the
kind, and this fact strongly suggested some kind of collusion on his
part with Hurst, who stood to benefit by the miscarriage of the will.
And this was the odd feature in the case; for whereas the party
responsible for the defective provisions was Mr. Jellicoe, the party who
benefited was Hurst.

"But the most startling peculiarity of the will was the way in which it
fitted the circumstances of the disappearance. It looked as if clause
two had been drawn up with those very circumstances in view. Since,