The following is his story he told me as near as I can remember it: 

“One night I was in Johannesburg, South Africa, and stayed with Pat Crow in the same room.  I knew that it was Pat Crow and did not intend to have much to do with him, but he noticed me and I became interested in him, and he spoke to me about matters, and the millionaire’s boy being abducted, and the ransom that he received, and his escape to Africa.

“He remarked that I would realize from his name that he was an Irish Catholic, and stated that he had gone through the Catholic schools and was a ‘brother’ in the cloisters, and stated that this was his strong point in never being caught in his daring undertakings.

“He stated that when they received their $25,000 ransom from Cudahy that it was divided at the cottage where the crime was committed.  He stated that it cost him quite a sum of money to stay with friends a few days in Omaha, but that he soon disguised himself as an inmate of the Jesuit College, a school for Catholic boys.

“He stated that he traveled on a ‘permit’ as Father O’Connor to Kansas City, and stated that from there he went to St. Louis, disguised as a Catholic priest, and that the conductors on the train spoke to him as ‘How do you do, Father?’

“When I arrived in St. Louis I went to St. Anthony’s Church, where you can obtain most anything from that saint.  I rang the bell for confession.  I confessed all kinds of things.  I confessed to murder, robbery, kidnapping, and the Father Confessor was impressed with me because I was a ‘big fish’ in my line, and because I had done no harm to the millionaire’s boy.  I told the inmates of St. Anthony’s Church that I wanted to make confession and do penance the remainder of my life.

“A brother came with the scissors and I received the ‘tonsure’ for the third time, which left only a circle of hair around my head, and no Pinkerton detective, or even Bertillion himself could have identified me.

“In a short time I left this St. Anthony Church in a ’Catholic Habit,’ which disguised me as a Catholic official, and I went to Omaha and passed myself off as ‘Brother Clement from St. Louis.’

“When I reached Omaha I had no trouble in passing myself off as ‘Brother Clement.’

“After I had remained there awhile I excused myself and in my priestly robes I walked to the banks of the Missouri River and raised my buried treasure, as I had left a part of the money that I received from Cudahy buried near the river, and I took the train to St. Louis, and from there to New York, and from New York I took a German steamer to Southampton.

“I stayed in London two weeks and read in the papers all about Pat Crow.  London was not the place for a man like me, as I had been there before, and they knew me; so I sailed for the diamond fields of South Africa, where I am now free, by the system of ‘asylums’ (which are Catholic monasteries) of the Catholic Church.  Pat Crow wound up his story by telling me that if I ever needed to try this plan that I could do it, and stated that the Catholic Church was the refuge of criminals.”