But, after being released on bail on 6 May, she resumed contact with the agent - after which she was arrested and remanded in custody at Holloway Prison.

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Ill-tempered and alcoholic, she gambled, incurred huge debts, spent three months in Holloway prison after a conviction for fraud, and told her daughter that she was better-born than her.

ECONOMIST: She was as highly regarded as W.B. Yeats and T.S. Eliot

The technical high point is a terrific scene in which Holmes, arrested for a murder he did not commit, escapes from Holloway Prison not, as is first supposed, in a dead prisoner's coffin but disguised as the orderly accompanying it.

WSJ: Book Review: The House of Silk