He talks about taking her out for a day’s entertainment and then killing her. The writer actually provides ‘a real clue’ in saying that he was a regular at a certain public house. He ends with: ‘I have given you a chance for your money now, so do your best, but I am sure your manhunt will be in vain …’ There was indeed a manhunt, with bloodhounds, and the chase led from the Botanic Gardens to Lime Street station, where the dog, Czar, stared towards the railway route to the Midlands.

There was then a second inquest and the facts were examined again. Sergeant Blenkhorn provided some photographs and little Annie McGowan was questioned, telling the same story, that the man took Madge by the hands, and that Annie had refused to go with him. Another small boy saw the man and heard him ask the question; he had even waited in vain for Madge to come back. Masses of details then began to emerge, even to the fact that she had been seen in some cocoa rooms on Brownlow Hill. Janes Hughes said that she saw a little girl and man and that the girl was distraught; she was given tea and a cake. A number of other people came forward with reports of sightings.

What emerged was a picture of a mysterious man loitering in Pembroke Court; several people saw him, and one even noticed him climb over a roof. To add to the general air of menace and dark murderous intent by this man still free on the Liverpool streets, a witness said he had seen a man dressed as a woman at 13 Brownlow Street.

At the conclusion of the inquest, Dr Nathan Raw was sure that Madge’s death was not from natural causes; she had been killed. A verdict of wilful murder by person or persons unknown was given.

The melancholy coda to the story is that Madge’s father, David, died just two weeks after the second inquest. He was just thirty-eight, and had suffered such major trauma that he lost the will to live; he took to his bed. He had spoken again at the inquest, then after telling his sister that ‘This has finished me’ he went to what would become his death-bed. Romilly Street was packed with mourners on 3 October.

We have to feel a sense of relief and of black irony in the fact that, just a few weeks after this, the probably deranged murderer (if he was so) wrote again to the Liverpool police, this time from Dewsbury, West Yorkshire. On a letter adorned with the skull and crossbones and what the Mercury called ‘a rude drawing of a child’s face’, the ‘freak letter’ invited the law to catch him: ‘I dress in black and brown boots and cross the market every day at one o’clock.’

As David Canter has written in his study of profiling, ‘In order to decipher a criminal’s actions we need to know what narrative he is drawing upon.’ In this case, the narrative was clearly one of notoriety and attention-seeking; like Wearside Jack, whose identity we now know, this man was revelling in the fact that he had stirred such huge number of police officers into action and caused emotional mayhem in the streets of Liverpool. ‘Getting off’ on that was so pleasant for him that other letters followed.

We can only feel glad that David Kirby was in his grave and missed this further torture.