THE BOOT TRUNK MYSTERY.

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume XXVI, Issue 8424, 24 January 1899, Page 3

THE BOOT TRUNK MYSTERY.

DilVKi.oi'MFNTti in connection with the boot box horror caused a tremendous sensation in Melbourne. Tod, who wus well-known in business circles, and was a popular young man of a . respectable family, in bis confession thus . describes how the body was taken to the d river : — c "I plnccd the bnv in front of the buyny. s taking it out by the side entrance. This 11 was about 10 p.m. -Miss Jamieson and I then drove down Williams-road, as near • as possible to the selected spot. After ■ tying the horse up we carried the box to 0 some scrub near the river, and then I made c a sPiirch of the place, and discoveied a couple sit! ing on the bank close to the f selected spol. This being so, we returned . to the scrub, and watched for half-an-hour 3 till the couple went. Being frightened r that there might be others about, we 1 decided to drive home and return at a , later hour. We then covered the box well with branches of trees, and drove back to 3 the livery stable. We returned to Madame i Olga, in Osborne-street, and told her of our • proceedings. Mis 3 Jainieson and I then i walked back again to the scrub, and, find- ; ing the box all right, we made another ; search all along the river. Believing that , we were alone, we earned the box to the ; edge of the water, and there fixed a slone, -, and rolled the whole into the water. It • just then struck 1 o'clock of the morning , of the 15th December. We saw that the box floated, but in about a minute it sank, and we hurried back to Osborne-street.". The widow lady, at whose house Tod was lodging, says that they had frequently discussed " theboot-box tragedy," and he had treated thematter rjuitc unconcernedly. When aportraitof the head was published, he gave the opinion that the original must have been a very ugly woman, and that she was probably a Chinese. When he stayed away all night, at, the time of the woman's death, he had explained the next, morning that he spent the nifjlit with some friends. It is stated that Tod was about to he married to a young lady in a country town, and that he had mentioned the matter frequently to his landlady, a date in February being fixed. Some other person, however, had evidently received attentions from him, as a young woman became hysterical in a crowd in front of his oitice, and expressed surprise at his being mixed up in the case, after the way she had stuck to him. Tod's acquaintances describe him as a " lady's man." "If Toil is guilty," remarked one who knew him slightly, "he is a remarkably cool customer. Since the discovery of the body in the boot trunk I have heard his partner say to him in a jocular way, ' That's Mabel you've put in that trunk all right,' and Tod never moved a muscle.