True Stories of Crime From the District Attorney's Office by Arthur Train

could see so distinctly from my window. The name, too, did not have the customary Tombs sound–De Nevers? _De Nevaire_–I repeated it slowly to myself with varying accent. It seemed as though I had known the name before. It carried with it a suggestion of the novels of Stanley J. Weyman, of books on old towns and the chateaux and cathedrals of France. I wondered who the devil Charles Julius Francis de Nevers could be.

Of course, if one answered all the letters one gets from the Tombs it would keep a secretary busy most of the working hours of the day, and if one acceded to all the various requests the prisoners make to interview them personally or to see their fathers, mothers, sisters, brothers, sweethearts and wives, a prosecutor might as well run an intelligence office and be done with it. But as I re-read the note I began to have a sneaking feeling of curiosity to see what Charles Julius Francis de Nevers looked like, so I departed from the usual rule of my office, rang for a messenger and directed him to ascertain the full name of the prisoner from whom the note had come, the crime with which he was charged, and the date of his incarceration, also to supply me at once with copies of the indictment and the complaint; then I instructed him to have De Nevers brought over as soon as he could be got into shape.

I had almost forgotten that I was expecting a visitor when, a couple of hours later, an undersized deputy-sheriff entered my office and reported that he had a prisoner in his custody for whom I had sent to the Tombs. Glancing up from my desk I saw standing behind his keeper a tall and distinguished-looking man in fashionably cut garments, whose well shaped head and narrow face, thin aquiline nose, and carefully trimmed pointed beard seemed to bespeak somewhat different antecedents from those of the ordinary occupant of a cell in the City Prison. I should have instinctively risen from my chair and offered my aristocratic looking visitor a chair had not the keeper unconsciously brought me to a realization of my true position by remarking:

“Say, Counsellor, I guess while you’re talking to his nibs I’ll step out into the hall and take a smoke.”

“Certainly,” said I, glad to be rid of him, “I will be responsible for the–er–prisoner.”

Then, as the keeper hesitated in putting his suggestion into execution, I reached into the upper right-hand drawer of my desk, produced two of what are commonly known in the parlance of the Criminal Courts Building as “cigars” and handed them to him.

“Well,” said I, after the keeper had departed closing the door behind him and leaving the visitor standing in the middle of the office, “I have sent for you as you requested and shall be glad to hear anything you have to say. Of course any communication which you may see fit to make to me is voluntary and, in the event for your trial for–er–any crime with which you may be charged, may be used against you.” I had a certain feeling of embarrassment in making this customary declaration since the whole idea of this person being a criminal was so incongruous as to put a heavy strain on one’s credulity. However, I recalled that a certain distinguished Englishman of letters has declared “that there is no essential incongruity between crime and culture.” He acknowledged my remark with a slight smile of half-amused deprecation and with a courteous bow took the seat to which I motioned him.

“I wish to thank you,” he said in excellent English marked by the slightest possible suggestion of a foreign accent, “for your exceeding courtesy in responding so quickly to my request. I am aware,” he added, “that it is unusual for prisoners to seek interviews with the–what shall I say–_juge d’instruction_, as we call him, but,” he added with a smile, “I think you will find that mine is an unusual affair.”

I had already begun to think so, and reaching to the upper drawer on the left-hand side of my desk, I produced from the box reserved for judges, prominent members of the bar, borough presidents, commissioners of departments and distinguished foreigners, a Havana of the variety known in our purlieus as a “_good_ cigar,” and tendered the same to him.

“Ah,” he said, “many thanks, _merci, non_, I do not smoke the cigar. M’sieu’ perhaps has a cigarette? M’sieu’ will pardon me if I say that this is the first act of kindness which has been accorded to me since my incarceration three weeks ago.”

Somewhere I found a box of cigarettes, one of which he removed, gracefully holding it between fingers which I noticed were singularly white and delicate, and lighting it with the air of a diplomat at an international conference.

“You can hardly appreciate,” he ventured, “the humiliation to which I, an officer and a gentleman of France, have been subjected.”

I lighted the cigar which he had declined and with mingled feelings of embarrassment, distrust and curiosity inquired if his name was Charles Julius Francis de Nevers. I wish it were possible to describe the precise look which flashed across his face as he answered my question.

“That is my name,” he said, “or at least rather, I am Charles Julius Francis, and I am of Nevers. May I speak confidentially? Were my family to be aware of my present situation they would never recover from the humiliation and disgrace connected with it.”

“Certainly,” said I, “anything which you may tell me which you wish to be kept confidential I will treat as such, provided, of course, that what you tell me is the truth.”

“You shall hear nothing else,” he replied. Then leaning back in his chair he said simply and with great dignity, “I am by direct inheritance today the Duc de Nevers, my father, the last duke, having died in the month of February, 1905.”

Any such announcement would ordinarily have filled me with amusement, but that the gentleman sitting before me should declare himself to be a duke or even a prince seemed entirely natural.

“Indeed!” said I, unable to think of any more appropriate remark.

“Yes,” said De Nevers, “and M’sieu’ is naturally surprised that one of my distinguished position should be now a tenant of an American jail. But if M’sieu’ will do me the honor of listening for a few moments I will explain my present extraordinary predicament. I am Charles Julius Francois, eldest son of the late Oscar Odon, Duc de Nevers, Grand Commander of the Legion of Honor, and Knight of the Garter. I was born in Paris in the year 1860 at 148 Rue Champs Elysee; my mother, the dowager duchess, is now residing at the Chateau de Nevers in the Province of Nievre in France. My sister Jeanne married Prince Henry of Aremberg, and now lives in Brussells at the Palais d’Aremberg, situated at the corner of the Rue de Regence near the Palais de Justice. My sister Louise, the Countess of Kilkenny, is living in Ireland. My sister Camille married the Marquis of Londonderry and is residing in London at the present time. My sister Evelyn married the Earl of Dudley and is living in Dublin. I have one other sister, Marie, who is with my mother. My brother, Count Andre de Nevers is at present Naval Attache at Berlin. My brother Fernand is an officer of artillery stationed in Madagascar, and my youngest brother Marcel is also an officer of artillery attached to the 8th Regiment in Nancy. I make this statement by way of introduction in order that you may understand fully my situation. During my childhood I had an English tutor in Paris, and when I reached the age of ten years I was sent by my father to the College Louis le Grand where I took the course of Science and Letters and graduated from the Lycee with the degree of Bachelor on the 5th of August, 1877. Having passed my examination for the Polytechnic I remained there two years, and on my graduation received a commission as Sous-Lieutenant of Engineers, and immediately entered the Application School at Fontainebleau, where I was graduated in 1881 as Lieutenant of Engineers and assigned to the First Regiment of Engineers at Versailles–“

De Nevers paused and exhaled the cigarette smoke.

“M’sieu’ will pardon me if I go into detail for only in that way will he be convinced of the accuracy of what I am telling him.”

“Pray, go on,” said I. “If what you tell me is true your case is extraordinary indeed.”

“My first act of service,” continued De Nevers, “was on the 10th of August when I was sent to Tonkin. I will not trouble you with the details of my voyage on the transport to China, but will simply state that I was wounded in the engagement at Yung Chuang on the 7th of November of the same year and had the distinction of receiving the Cross of the Legion of Honor therefor. I was immediately furloughed back to France, where I entered the Superior School of War and took my Staff Major brevet. At the same time I seized the opportunity to follow the course of the Sorbonne and secured the additional degree of Doctor of Science. I had received an excellent education in my youth and always had a taste for study, which I have taken pains to pursue in whatever part of the world I happened to be stationed. As a result I am able to converse with considerable fluency in English, as perhaps you have already observed, as well as in Spanish, Italian, German, Russian, Arabic, and, to a considerable extent, in Japanese.

“In 1883 I was sent to Berlin as Military Attache, but was subsequently recalled because I had violated the rules of international etiquette by fighting three duels with German officers. The Ambassador at this time was Charles de Courcel. You will understand that there was no disgrace connected with my recall, but the necessity of defending my honor was incompatible with the rules of the service, and after fifteen months in Berlin I was remanded to Versailles with the rank of First Lieutenant, under Colonel Quinivet. Here I pursued my studies and was then ordered to the Soudan, whence, after being wounded, I was sent to Senegal. Here I acted as Governor of the City of St. Louis. As you are doubtless aware, the climate of Senegal is exceedingly unhealthy. I fell ill with a fever and was obliged to return to France where I was assigned to the office of the General Staff Major in Paris. At the opening of the war with Dahomey in 1892, I was sent in command of the Engineers of the Corps Expeditional, and on the 17th of November of that year was severely wounded at Dakar in Dahomey, having received a spear cut through the lungs. On this occasion I had the distinction of being promoted as Major of Engineers and was created an Officer of the Legion of Honor on the battle field. The wound in my lungs was of such a serious character that Colonel Dodds sent me back once more to France on furlough, and President Carnot was kind enough to give me his personal commendation for my services.

“I was now thirty-three years old and had already attained high rank in my profession. I had had opportunity to pursue studies in chemistry, medicine and science, and my only interest was in the service of my country and in qualifying myself for my future duties. My life up to that time had been uniformly happy; I was the eldest son and beloved both of my father and mother. My social position gave me the entree to the best of society wherever I happened to be. As yet, however, I had never been in love. At this time occurred the affair which in a measure changed my career. The wound in my lungs was slow in healing, and at the earnest invitation of my sister, Lady Londonderry, I went to London. At that time she was living in Belgravia Square. It was here I met my first wife.”

De Nevers paused. The cigarette had gone out. For the first time he seemed to lose perfect control of himself. I busied myself with some papers until he should have regained his self possession.

“You will understand,” he said in a few moments, “these things are not governed by law and statute. The woman with whom I fell in love and who was in every respect the equal in intellectual attainments, beauty and charm of manner of my own people, was the nursery governess in my sister’s household. She returned my affection and agreed to marry me. The proposed marriage excited the utmost antipathy on the part of my family; my fiancee was dismissed from my sister’s household, and I returned to Paris with the intention of endeavoring by every means in my power to induce my father to permit me to wed the woman I loved. It is doubtless difficult for M’sieu’ to appreciate the position of a French officer. In America–Ah–America is free, one can marry the woman one loves, but in France no officer can marry without the consent of the Minister of War and of the President of the Republic; and more than that he cannot marry unless his intended wife possesses a dowry of at least fifty thousand francs which must be deposited with the Minister of War for investment.”

“In spite of the fact that I enjoyed the confidence and friendship of President Carnot the latter, at my father’s request, refused me permission to marry. There was no choice left for me but to resign my commission, and this I did. I returned to England and was married at St. Thomas’s Church, London, on the 21st of June, 1893.

“My education as an engineer had been of the most highly technical and thorough character, and I had every reason to believe that in America I could earn a comfortable living. My wife and I, therefore, sailed for America immediately after our marriage. I first secured a position in some iron works in South Boston, and for a time lived happily. A boy, Oscar, named after my father, was born to us while we were living in the town of Winchester near Boston. Another son was born a year later in the same place, and still a third in Pittsburgh, where I had gone to assume the position of general foreman of the Homestead Steel Works and assistant master mechanic of the Carnegie Steel Company. I rapidly secured the confidence of my employers and was sent upon several occasions to study new processes in different parts of the country. During one of my vacations we returned to England and visited my wife’s people, who lived in Manchester; here she died on the 17th of June, 1901.”

De Nevers paused again and it was some moments before he continued.

“After the death of my wife my father expressed himself as ready for a reconciliation, but although this took place I had not the heart to remain in France. I liked America and had attained distinction in my profession. I therefore expressed my intention of returning to continue my career as an engineer, but at the earnest solicitation of my father, left my three children with my parents. They are now living at the chateau of my mother at Nievre.

“I was sent to Chicago to study a new blast furnace, and two years later, when Mr. Schwab organized the Russo-American Company at Mariopool, South Siberia, he offered me the position of general manager, which I accepted. Here I remained until November, 1904, when all the American engineers were arrested and imprisoned on the order of General Kozoubsky of the Russian Engineers, who at the same time shot and murdered my assistant, Thomas D. McDonald, for refusing to allow him to remove pig iron from the storehouse without giving a receipt for it. Ambassador McCormick secured our immediate release, and we returned to the States. M’sieu’ has no idea of the power of these Russian officers. The murder of my assistant was of the most brutal character. Kozoubsky came to my office and demanded the iron, but having secured it, refused to sign the receipt which McDonald presented to him. McDonald said: ‘You shall not remove the iron if you do not sign the receipt.’ As he spoke the words the General drew his revolver and shot him down like a dog.

“I returned to America in January, 1905, and have since then been doing work as a consulting engineer. Last January I visited my parents in Paris at their home at 148 Champs Elysee. You have doubtless seen the mansion with its two gates and black railing of decorative iron. I had no sooner returned to America than I received a cable announcing the death of my father.”

De Nevers removed from his breast pocket a bundle of carefully folded papers from which he produced a sheet of heavy stationery with a deep border of mourning and a large black cross at the top, of which the following is a copy:

MM. Her Grace the Duchess Dowager of Nevers; his Grace the Duke Charles J. F. of Nevers and his children Oscar, Hilda and John; their Highnesses the Prince and Princess Henry of Aremberg; Captain the Count Andre of Nevers; Captain the Count Fernand of Nevers; the Earl and Countess of Kilkenny; the Marquis and Marchioness of Londonderry; the Earl and Countess of Dudley; the Countess Marie of Nevers; Lieutenant the Count Marcel of Nevers have the sorrow to announce the subite death at the family seat at Nevers (France), of His Grace Oscar Odon, Duke of Nevers, Grand Commander of the Legion of Honor, Knight of the Garter. Their husband, father, grandfather and uncle beloved.

Masonic burial shall take place at Nevers on Tuesday, February 21, 1905.

New York, February 20, 1905.

U. S. A.

The announcement was carefully engraved and was of an expensive character, and I read it with considerable interest.

“Does M’sieu’ care to see the photographs of my family? Here,” producing a photograph of a gentleman and lady and a group of children, “is my wife with the three children, taken in London just before she died.”

Another group, bearing the trade-mark of a Parisian photographer, exhibited a distinguished looking man surrounded by a group of many children of varying ages.

“These,” said De Nevers, “are my father and my brothers and sisters.”

Then came photographs of Lady Londonderry and the Earl and Countess of Dudley. My interest in my visitor’s story had for the moment completely driven from my mind the real object of the interview, which, ostensibly, was to explain the reason for his incarceration. His straightforward narrative carried absolute conviction with it; that he was the legitimate Duc de Nevers I accepted without hesitation; that he was a man of education, culture and many accomplishments, was self evident.

“You have had an extraordinary career,” I ventured.

“Yes,” he replied, “it has been a life of action and I may say of suffering. Permit me to show you the certificate of my general that what I have told you is accurate.”

And De Nevers unfolded from his pocket a document, bearing a seal of the French Ministry of War, which read as follows:

REPUBLIQUE FRANCAISE

MINISTERE DE LA GUERRE

CABINET DU MINISTERE

No. 195

PARIS, _October 24, 1901._

_To Whom It May Concern_:

I, George Andre, General of Division of Engineers, Minister of War of the French Republic, certify that the Lieutenant Colonel Charles Jules Comte Francois de Nevers, is connected with the French Army, since the 10th day of September, 1877, and that the following is a true copy of his record:

Born in Paris the 10th of June, 1859.

Graduated, Bachelor of Sciences and of Letters, from the Lycee, Louis le Grand, the 5th of August, 1877.

Received first as Chief of Promotion of the National Polytechnic School of France, the 10th of September, 1877.

Graduated with the greatest distinction from the above school the 1st of September, 1879.

Entered at the Application School of Military Engineers at Fontainebleau as Second Lieutenant, Chief of Promotion the 15th of September, 1879.

Graduated as Lieutenant of Engineers with great distinction, the 1st of August, 1881, and sent to the First Regiment of Engineers at Versailles.

Sent to Tonkin the 1st day of August, 1881.

Wounded at Yung Chuang (Tonkin) the 7th of November, 1881.

Inscribed on the Golden Book of the French Army the 10th of November, 1881.

Made Knight of the Legion of Honor the 10th of November, 1881.

Wounded at Suai Sing the 4th of January, 1882.

Sent to Switzerland in Mission where he was graduated at the Zurich Polytechnic University as Mechanical Engineer, 1884.

Sent the 2nd of January, 1885, to Soudan.

Wounded there twice.

Made Captain of Engineers the 3rd of June, 1885.

Called back to France the 6th of September, 1885, sent in Mission in Belgium, where he was graduated as Electrical Engineer from the Montefiore University at Liege. Made officer of Academy.

Sent in Gabon, the 2nd of May, 1887. Wounded twice. Constructed there the Military Railroad.

Sent to Senegal as Commander the 6th of July, 1888, to organize administration. Wounded once.

Called back and sent to Germany the 7th of December, 1889.

Called back from Germany and assigned to the Creusot as Assistant Chief Engineer.

Sent to Dahomey, the 1st of January, 1891. Wounded the 19th of November, 1892, at Dahomey. Made Major of Engineers on the battle field. Made Officer of the Legion of Honor, on the battle field.

By special decision of the Senate and the Chamber of Representatives the name of Commandant Charles Jules Comte Francois de Nevers is embroidered the 21st of November, on the flag of the Regiment of Engineers.

Called back and sent to Algeria, the 3rd of January, 1893.

Made Ordinance of the President Carnot, the 5th of February, 1893.

Sent to the Creusot the 1st of July, 1893, as director.

Sent to Madagascar the 2nd of April, 1894, in command of the Engineers.

Wounded the 12th of July, 1894, at Majungua.

Made Lieutenant Colonel of Engineers the 12th of July, 1894, on the battle field.

Proposed as Commander of the Legion of Honor on the same date.

Called back and sent as Ordinance Officer of the General in Chief in Command in Algeria, the 4th of March, 1896.

Sent to America in special mission to the Klondike the 7th of July, 1897.

Put on disponsibility _Hors Cadre_ on his demand the 1st of November, 1897.

Made Honorary Member of the National Defences. Commissioned the 28th of January, 1898.

Made Honorary Member of the Commission on Railroads, Canals, and Harbors, the 7th of July, 1899.

Made Honorary Member of the Commission on Bridges and Highways the 14th of July, 1900.

Made Corresponding Member of the Academy of Sciences, the 14th of July, 1901.

Made Commander of the Legion of Honor the 22nd of October, 1901.

I will say further that the Lieutenant Colonel Charles Jules Comte Francois de Nevers, is regarded as one of our best and most loyal officers, that he has the good will and best wishes of the government and of all his fellow officers, and is considered by everybody as a great worker and a thoroughly honest man. I personally will be pleased to do anything in my power to help him in any business he may undertake, and can recommend him to everybody as a responsible and trustworthy Engineer, knowing him for the last twenty-four years.

GEO. ANDRE,

_Minister of War_.

[Seal]

The document seemed in substance merely a repetition of what De Nevers had already told me, and I handed it back to him satisfied of its correctness. But public business is public business, and if the Duc de Nevers had anything to communicate to me in my official character it was time for him to do so.

“Well, Duke,” said I, not knowing very well how otherwise to address him, “do you desire to communicate anything to me in connection with your present detention in the Tombs?”

“Ah,” he said with a gesture of deprecation, “I can hardly understand that myself. Perhaps M’sieu’ has the papers? Ah, yes, I see they are on his desk. M’sieu’ will observe that I am accused of the crime of–what is it called in English? Ah, yes, perjury, but I assure M’sieu’ that it is entirely a mistake.”

I picked up the indictment and found that the Grand Jury of the County of New York accused one Charles de Nevers of the crime of perjury committed as follows:

That one William Douglas having been arrested by William W. Crawford, a member of the Police force of the City of New York, upon the charge of having violated the motor vehicle law of the State of New York [ordinance against speeding] he, the said Charles de Nevers, had then and there offered himself to go bail for the said Douglas, and did sign a certain written undertaking called a bond for the appearance of the said Douglas before the Magistrate, wherein he swore that he owned a certain house and lot situate at 122 West 117th Street, in the County of New York, which was free and clear of all incumbrances and of the value of not less than twenty thousand dollars,

Whereas in truth and in fact he the said Charles de Nevers did not own the said house and lot which did not then and there stand in the name of him the said Charles de Nevers, but was the property of one Helen M. Bent, and so recorded in the Registry of Deeds.

Which, said the grand jury, Charles de Nevers then and there well knew. And so they accused him of feloniously, knowingly, wilfully, corruptly, and falsely committing the crime of perjury against the form of the statute in such cases made and provided, and against the peace of the People of the State of New York and their dignity.

And this they did over the signature of William Travers Jerome, District Attorney.

“How did this happen?” I inquired, hardly believing my senses. “Was it a fact that you made this false statement to the Police for the purpose of securing bail for Mr. Douglas?”

De Nevers leaned forward and was about to answer when a messenger entered the room and stated that I was wanted in the court.

“Another time, if M’sieu’ will permit me,” said he. “I have much to thank you for. If M’sieu’ will give me another hearing it shall be my pleasure to explain fully.”

I rose and summoned the keeper. De Nevers bowed and offered his hand, which I took.

“I have much to thank you for!” he repeated.

As I hurried out of the room I encountered the keeper outside the door.

“Say, Counsellor, what sort of a ‘con’ was he throwin’ into you?” he inquired with a wink.

De Nevers was well inside my office, looking drearily out of my window towards the courtyard in the Tombs where his fellows were still pursuing their weary march.

“What do you mean?” I asked.

“Why, who did his nibs tell you he was?”

“The Duc de Nevers,” I replied.

“Say,” said O’Toole, “you don’t mean you swallowed that, do you? Do you know what the feller did? Why, one afternoon when a swell guy and his girl were out in their gas wagon a mounted cop in the park pulls them in and takes them over to the 57th Street Court. Well, just as me friend is taking them into the house along walks this Charley Nevers wid his tall silk hat and pearl handle cane, wid a flower in his buttonhole, and his black coat tails dangling around his heels, just like Boni de Castellane, and says he, ‘Officer,’ says he, ‘may I inquire what for you’re apprehending this gentleman and lady?’ says he. With that me friend hands him out some strong language for buttin’ in, and Charley is so much shocked at the insult to himself and the lady that he steps in before the Sergeant and offers to go bond for Douglas, just to go the cop one better, givin’ the Sergeant the same line of drip that he has been handin’ out to us in the Tombs, about his bein’ the son of Oscar, the Duc de Nevers, and related to all the crowned heads in Europe. Then he ups and signs the bail bond for a house and lot that he has never seen in his life. And here he is up agin it. An’ it’s a good stiff one His Honor will be handin’ out to him to my way of thinkin’, for these high fallutin’ foreigners has got to be put a stop to, and Charley Nevers is a good one to begin on.”

“I think you’re wrong, O’Toole,” said I. “But we can tell better later on.”

All that day my thoughts kept reverting to the Duc de Nevers. One thing was more than certain and that was that of all the various personages whom I had met during my journey through the world none was more fitted to be a duke than he. I was obliged to confess that during my hour’s interview I had felt myself to be in the company of a superior being, one of different clay from that of which I was composed, a man of better brain, and better education, vastly more rounded and experienced, a cultivated citizen of the world, who would be at home in any company no matter how distinguished and who would rise to any emergency. As I ate my dinner at the club the name De Nevers played mistily in the recesses of my memory. _De Nevers_! Surely there was something historic about it, some flavor of the days of kings and courtiers. Smoking my cigar in the library I fell into a reverie in which the Tombs, with its towers and grated windows, figured as a gray chateau of old Tourraine, and Charles Julius Francis in hunting costume as a mediaeval monseigneur with a hooded falcon on his wrist. I awoke to find directly in my line of vision upon the shelf of the alcove in front of me the solid phalanx of the ten volumes of Larousse’s “Grand Dictionaire Universe du XIX Siecle,” and I reached forward and pulled down the letter “N.” “Nevers”–there it was–“Capitol of the Department of Nievre. Ducal palace built in 1475. Charles III de Gonzagne, petit-fils de Charles II,” had sold the duchy of Nevers and his other domains in France to Cardinal Mazarin “par acte du Jul. 11, 1659.” So far so good. The cardinal had left the duchy by will to Philippe Jules Francois Mancini, his nephew, who had died May 8, 1707. Ah! _Julius Francis_! It was like meeting an old friend. Philippe Jules Francois Mancini. Mazarin had obtained letters confirming him in the possession of the Duchy of Nivernais and Donzois in 1720. Then he had died in 1768, leaving the duchy to Louis Jules Barbon Mancini-Mozarini. This son who was the last Duc of Nivernais, had died in 1798! “He was the last of the name,” said Larousse. I rubbed my eyes. It was there fast enough–“last of the name.” Something was wrong. Without getting up I rang for a copy of “Burke’s Peerage.”

“Londonderry, Marquess of, married Oct. 2nd, 1875, Lady Theresa Susey Helen, Lady of Grace of St. John of Jerusalem, eldest daughter of the 19th Earl of Shrewsbury.” Dear me! “Dudley, Earl of, married September 14, 1891, Rachael, Lady of Grace of the Order of St. John of Jerusalem, youngest daughter of Charles Henry Gurney.” I closed the book and began to think, and the more I thought the more I wondered. There really didn’t seem particular need of going further. If the fellow was a fraud, he was a fraud, that was all. But how in Heaven’s name could a man make up a story like that! That night I dreamed once more of the ducal palace of Nivernais, only its courtyard resembled that of the Tombs and many couples walked in a straggling line beneath its walls.

A day or two passed and I had heard no more of the Duc Charles Julius when one afternoon a lady called at my office and sent in her name as Mrs. de Nevers. She proved to be an attractive young woman a little over twenty, dressed in black, whose face showed that she had suffered more than a little. She explained that her husband was confined in the Tombs on a charge of perjury. But that was not all–he was worse than a perjurer. He was an impostor–_a bigamist_. He had another wife living somewhere in England–in Manchester, she thought. Oh, it was too terrible. He had told her that he was the Count Charles de Nevers, eldest son of the Duc de Nevers–in France, you know. And she had believed him. He had had letters to everybody in Montreal, her home, and plenty of money and beautiful clothes. He had dazzled her completely. The wedding had been quite an affair and presents had come from the Duke and Duchess of Nevers, from the Marchioness of Londonderry and from the Countess of Dudley. There were also letters from the Prince and Princess of Aremberg (in Belgium) and the Counts Andre and Fernand of Nevers. It had all been so wonderful and romantic! Then they had gone on their wedding journey and had been ecstatically happy. In Chicago, they had been received with open arms. That was before the death of the Duke–yes, her mourning was for the Duke. She smiled sadly. I think she still more than half believed that she was a duchess–and she deserved to be if ever any girl did. Then all of a sudden their money had given out and the Duke had been arrested for not paying their hotel bill. Perhaps I would like to see a newspaper clipping? It was dreadful! She was ashamed to be seen anywhere after that. She had even been obliged to pawn his cross of the Legion of Honor, the Leopold Cross of Belgium, and another beautiful decoration which he had been accustomed to wear when they went out to dinner. This was the clipping:

CHICAGO SOCIETY THE DUPE OF BOGUS COUNT

HOTEL AND SEVERAL WHILOM FRIENDS FILLED WITH REGRET–THE “COUNT” ARRESTED

Chicago, Jan. 29.–“Count Charles Julius Francois de Nevers” was in the Police court to-day for defrauding the Auditorium Annex of a board bill. The Count came to the French Consul, M. Henri Meron, amply supplied with credentials. He posed as Consulting Engineer of the United States Steel Corporation. He was introduced into all the clubs, including the Alliance Francaise, where he was entertained and spoke on literature.

He was accompanied by a charming young “Countess,” and the honors showered upon them and the adulation paid by society tuft-hunters was something they will never forget.

They returned the entertainments. The Count borrowed several thousand dollars.

President Furber, of the Olympic Games, said to-day of the “Count:”

“This man confided to me that he had invented a machine for perpetual motion, the chief difficulty of which was that it accumulated energy so fast that it could not be controlled. He asked me to invest in some of his schemes, which I refused to do.”

The fate of the Count is still pending and he was led back to a cell. He has been a week behind the bars. The “Countess” is in tears.

“The Countess is me,” she explained.

“Was he sent to prison?” I asked.

“Oh, no,” she answered. “You see they really couldn’t tell whether he was a Count or not, so they had to let him go.”

“He ought to be hung!” I cried.

“I really think he ought,” she answered. “You see it is quite embarrassing, because legally I have never been married at all, have I?”

“I don’t know,” I answered, lying like a gentleman. “Time enough to look that up later.”

“I found out afterwards,” she said, apparently somewhat encouraged, “that his first wife was a nurse maid in London.”

“Yes,” said I, “he told me so himself.”

Just then there came a knock at my door and O’Toole appeared.

“How are you, Counsellor,” he said with a grin. “You know Charley Nevers, well, av all the pious frauds! Say, Counsellor, ain’t he the cute feller! What do you suppose, now? I got his record to-day. Cast yer eye over it.”

I did. This is it:

No. 98

No. B 7721

The Central Office,

Bureau of Detectives,

Police Department of the City of New York,

300 Mulberry Street.

Name……………………Charles Francois

Alias…………………..Count de Nevers

Date of Arrest…………..1903

Place of Arrest………….London, England

Cause of Arrest………….False Pretenses

Name of Court……………Sessions

To what Prison…………..Penal Servitude

Term of Imprisonment……..Eighteen months.

REMARKS: Fraudulently obtained motor-car in London under pretense that he was Charles Duke de Nevers, son of Oscar, Prince de Nevers.”

“So he’s an ex-convict!” I exclaimed.

“He’s more than that!” cried O’Toole. “He’s a bir-rd!”

I turned to Mrs. de Nevers or whoever she legally was.

“How did he come to do such a foolish thing as to offer to go on the bail bond of a perfect stranger? What good could it do him? He was sure to be caught.”

“I don’t know,” said she. “He was always doing things like that. He wanted to seem fine and grand, I guess. We always travelled in style. Why, the afternoon he signed the bond he came home and told me how the police had been troubling a gentleman who had a lady with him in an automobile and how he was able to settle the whole affair without the slightest difficulty and send them on their way. He was quite pleased about it.”

“But why do you suppose be did it?”

“He just thought he’d do ’em a favor,” suggested O’Toole, “and in that way get in wid ’em an’ take their money later, mebbe!”

“Who is he? Do you know?” I asked the girl.

“I haven’t the vaguest idea!” she sighed.

A week later Charles Julius Francis stood at the bar of justice convicted of perjury. His degradation had wrought no change in the dignity of his bearing or the impassiveness of his general appearance, and he received the sentence of the Court without a tremor, and with shoulders thrown back and head erect as befitted a scion of a noble house.

“There’s just one thing for me to do with you, Charles Francis,” said the Judge rudely, “And that is to send you to State Prison for a term of five years at hard labor.”

Francis made no sign.

“There is one other thing I should like to know, however,” continued His Honor, “And that is who you really are.”

The prisoner bowed slightly.

“I am Charles Julius Francis,” he replied quietly, “Duc de Nevers, and Commander of the Legion of Honor.”

VIII

A Finder of Missing Heirs

The professional prosecutor is continually surprised at the insignificant amount of crime existing in comparison with the extraordinary scope of criminal opportunity. To be sure, the number of crimes actually detected is infinitesimal as contrasted with those committed, but even so the conviction constantly grows that the world is astonishingly honest when one considers the unlikelihood that any specific prospective offence will be discovered. How few dishonest servants there are, for example, out of the million or so composing that class of persons who have an unlimited opportunity to snap up not only unconsidered trifles, but personal property of great value. The actual honesty of the servants is probably greater than that of the masters–in the final analysis.

Men are not only “presumed to be innocent” in the eyes of the law, but are found to be so, as a matter of daily experience, so far as honesty in the ordinary affairs of life is concerned, and the fact that we rely so implicitly upon the truthfulness and integrity of our fellows is the principal reason why violations of this imperative social law should be severely dealt with. If it were possible adequately to determine or deal with any such issue mere lying should be made a crime.

It is matter of constant wonder that shrewd business men will put through all sorts of deals, when thousands of dollars are at stake, relying entirely upon the word of some single person, whom they do not in fact know. John Smith is looking for a house. He finds one he likes with an old lady, who says her name is Sarah Jones, living in it, and offers her forty thousand dollars for her real estate. She accepts. His lawyer searches the title and finds that Sarah Jones is the owner of record. The old lady is invited to the lawyer’s office, executes a warranty deed, and goes off with the forty thousand dollars. Now in a great number of instances no one really knows whether the aged dame is Sarah Jones or not; and she perhaps may be, and sometimes is, only the caretaker’s second cousin, who is looking after the house in the latter’s absence.

There are thousands of acres of land and hundreds of millions of money waiting at compound interest to be claimed by unknown heirs or next of kin. Even if the real ones cannot be found one would think that this defect could be easily supplied by some properly ingenious person.

“My Uncle Bill went to sea in ’45 and was never heard from again. Will you find out if he left any money?” wrote a client to the author. Careful search failed to reveal any money. But if the money had been found _first_ how easy it would have been to turn up a nephew! Yet the industry of producing properly authenticated nephews, heirs, legatees, next of kin and claimants of all sorts has never been adequately developed. There are plenty of “agents” who for a moderate fee will inform you whether or not there is a fortune waiting for you, but there is no agency within the writer’s knowledge which will supply an heir for every fortune. From a business point of view the idea seems to have possibilities.

Some few years after the Civil War a Swede named Ebbe Petersen emigrated to this country to better his condition. Fortune smiled upon him and he amassed a modest bank account, which, with considerable foresight, he invested in a large tract of unimproved land in the region known as “The Bronx,” New York City.

In the summer of 1888 Petersen determined to take a vacation and revisit Sweden, and accordingly deeded all his real estate to his wife. Just before starting he decided to take his wife and only child, a little girl of ten or twelve, with him. Accordingly they set sail from Hoboken Saturday, August 11, upon the steamer _Geiser_, of the Thingvalla Line, bound for Copenhagen. At four o’clock Tuesday morning, at a point thirty miles south of Sable Island and two hundred miles out of Halifax, the _Geiser_, in the midst of a thick fog, crashed suddenly into a sister ship, the _Thingvalla_, of the same line, and sank. The _Thingvalla_ was herself badly crippled, but, after picking up thirty-one survivors, managed to limp into Halifax, from which port the rescued were brought to New York. Only fourteen of the _Geiser’s_ passengers had been saved and the Petersens were not among them. They were never heard of again, and no relatives came forward to claim their property, which, happening to be in the direct line of the city’s development, was in course of time mapped out into streets and house lots and became exceedingly valuable. Gradually houses were built upon it, various people bought it for investment, and it took on the look of other semi-developed suburban property.

In the month of December, 1905, over seventeen years after the sinking of the _Geiser_, a lawyer named H. Huffman Browne, offered to sell “at a bargain” to a young architect named Benjamin Levitan two house lots adjacent to the southwest corner of One Hundred and Seventy-fourth Street and Monroe Avenue, New York City. It so happened that Browne had, not long before, induced Levitan to go into another real-estate deal, in which the architect’s suspicions had been aroused by finding that the property alleged by the lawyer to be “improved” was, in fact, unbuilt upon. He had lost no money in the original transaction, but he determined that no such mistake should occur a second time, and he accordingly visited the property, and also had a search made of the title, which revealed the fact that Browne was not the record owner, as he had stated, but that, on the contrary, the land stood in the name of “William R. Hubert.”

It should be borne in mind that both the parties to this proposed transaction were men well known in their own professions. Browne, particularly, was a real-estate lawyer of some distinction, and an editor of what were known as the old “New York Civil Procedure Reports.” He was a middle-aged man, careful in his dress, particular in his speech, modest and quiet in his demeanor, by reputation a gentleman and a scholar, and had practised at the New York bar some twenty-five years.

But Levitan, who had seen many wolves in sheep’s clothing, and had something of the Sherlock Holmes in his composition, determined to seek the advice of the District Attorney, and having done so, received instructions to go ahead and consummate the purchase of the property. He, therefore, informed Browne that he had learned that the latter was not the owner of record, to which Browne replied that that was true, but that the property really did belong to him in fact, being recorded in Hubert’s name merely as a matter of convenience (because Hubert was unmarried), and that, moreover, he, Browne, had an unrecorded deed from Hubert to himself, which he would produce, or would introduce Hubert to Levitan and let him execute a deed direct. Levitan assented to the latter proposition, and the fourteenth of December, 1905, was fixed as the date for the delivery of the deeds and the payment for the property.

At two o’clock in the afternoon of that day Browne appeared at Levitan’s office (where a detective was already in attendance) and stated that he had been unable to procure Mr. Hubert’s personal presence, but had received from him deeds, duly executed, to the property. These he offered to Levitan. At this moment the detective stepped forward, took possession of the papers, and invited the lawyer to accompany him to the District Attorney’s office. To this Browne offered no opposition, and the party adjourned to the Criminal Courts Building, where Mr. John W. Hart, an Assistant District Attorney, accused him of having obtained money from Levitan by means of false pretences as to the ownership of the property, and requested from him an explanation. Browne replied without hesitation that he could not understand why this charge should be made against him; that he had, in fact, received the deeds from Mr. Hubert only a short time before he had delivered them to Levitan; that Mr. Hubert was in New York; that he was the owner of the property, and that no fraud of any sort had been attempted or intended.

Mr. Hart now examined the supposed deeds and found that the signatures to them, as well as the signatures to a certain affidavit of title, which set forth that William R. Hubert was a person of substance, had all been executed before a notary, Ella F. Braman, on that very day. He therefore sent at once for Mrs. Braman who, upon her arrival, immediately and without hesitation, positively identified the defendant, H. Huffman Browne, as the person who had executed the papers before her an hour or so before. The case on its face seemed clear enough. Browne had apparently deliberately forged William R. Hubert’s name, and it did not even seem necessary that Mr. Hubert should be summoned as a witness, since the property was recorded in his name, and Browne himself had stated that Hubert was then actually in New York.

But Browne indignantly protested his innocence. It was clear, he insisted, that Mrs. Braman was mistaken, for why, in the name of common-sense, should he, a lawyer of standing, desire to forge Hubert’s name, particularly when he himself held an unrecorded deed of the same property, and could have executed a good conveyance to Levitan had the latter so desired. Such a performance would have been utterly without an object. But the lawyer was nervous, and his description of Hubert as “a wealthy mine owner from the West, who owned a great deal of property in New York, and had an office in the Flatiron Building,” did not ring convincingly in Mr. Hart’s ears. The Assistant District Attorney called up the janitor of the building in question on the telephone. But no such person had an office there. Browne, much flustered, said the janitor was either a fool or a liar. He had been at Hubert’s office that very morning. He offered to go and find him in twenty minutes. But Mr. Hart thought that the lawyer had better make his explanation before a magistrate, and caused his arrest and commitment on a charge of forgery. Little did he suspect what an ingenious fraud was about to be unearthed.

The days went by and Browne stayed in the Tombs, unable to raise the heavy bail demanded, but no Hubert appeared. Meantime the writer, to whom the case had been sent for trial, ordered a complete search of the title to the property, and in a week or so became possessed, to his amazement, of a most extraordinary and complicated collection of facts.

He discovered that the lot of land offered by Browne to Levitan, and standing in Hubert’s name, was originally part of the property owned by Ebbe Petersen, the unfortunate Swede who, with his family, had perished in the _Geiser_ off Cape Sable in 1888.

The title search showed that practically all of the Petersen property had been conveyed by Mary A. Petersen to a person named Ignatius F. X. O’Rourke, by a deed, which purported to have been executed on June 27, 1888, about two weeks before the Petersens sailed for Copenhagen, and which was signed with Mrs. Petersen’s mark, but that this deed had not been recorded until July 3, 1899, _eleven years_ after the loss of the _Geiser_.

The writer busied himself with finding some one who had known Mrs. Petersen, and by an odd coincidence discovered a woman living in the Bronx who had been an intimate friend and playmate of the little Petersen girl. This witness, who was but a child when the incident had occurred, clearly recalled the fact that Ebbe Petersen had not decided to take his wife and daughter with him on the voyage until a few days before they sailed. They had then invited her, the witness–now a Mrs. Cantwell–to go with them, but her mother had declined to allow her to do so. Mrs. Petersen, moreover, according to Mrs. Cantwell, was a woman of education, who wrote a particularly fine hand. Other papers were discovered executed at about the same time, signed by Mrs. Petersen with her full name. It seemed inconceivable that she should have signed any deed, much less one of so much importance, with her _mark_, and, moreover, that she should have executed any such deed at all when her husband was on the spot to convey his own property.

But the strangest fact of all was that the attesting witness to this extraordinary instrument was H. Huffman Browne! It also appeared to have been recorded _at his instance_ eleven years after its execution.

In the meantime, however, that is to say, between the sinking of the _Geiser_ in ’88 and the recording of Mary Petersen’s supposed deed in ’99, another _equally mysterious_ deed to the same property had been filed. This document, executed and recorded in 1896, purported to convey part of the Petersen property to a man named John J. Keilly, and was signed by a person calling himself Charles A. Clark. By a later deed, executed and signed a few days later, John J. Keilly appeared to have conveyed the same property to Ignatius F. X. O’Rourke, the very person to whom Mrs. Petersen had apparently executed her deed in 1888. And H. Huffman Browne was the attesting witness to both these deeds!

A glance at the following diagram will serve to clear up any confusion which may exist in the mind of the reader:

[Sidenote: (Not Recorded until 1899)]

O’ROURKE thus holds land through two sources.

Browne was the witness to both these parallel transactions! Of course it was simple enough to see what had occurred. In 1896 a mysterious man, named Clark, without vestige of right or title, so far as the records showed, had conveyed Ebbe Petersen’s property to a man named Keilly, equally unsubstantial, who had passed it over to one O’Rourke. Then Browne had suddenly recorded Mrs. Petersen’s deed giving O’Rourke the very same property. Thus this O’Rourke, whoever he may have been, held all the Petersen property by two chains of title, one through Clark and Keilly, and the other through Mrs. Petersen. Then he had gone ahead and deeded it all away to various persons, through one of whom William R. Hubert had secured his title. But every deed on record which purported to pass any fraction of the Petersen property was witnessed by H. Huffman Browne! And Browne was the attesting witness to the deed under which Hubert purported to hold. Thus the chain of title, at the end of which Levitan found himself, ran back to Mary Petersen, with H. Huffman Browne peering behind the arras of every signature.

O’ROURKE BROWNE,
to attesting witness. WILLIAM P. COLLITON

WILLIAM P. COLLITON
to BROWNE,
JOHN GARRETSON attesting witness.

JOHN GARRETSON
to BROWNE,
HERMAN BOLTE attesting witness.

HERMAN BOLTE
to BROWNE,
BENJ. FREEMAN attesting witness.

BENJ. FREEMAN
to BROWNE,
WILLIAM R. HUBERT attesting witness.

The Assistant District Attorney rubbed his forehead and wondered who in thunder all these people were. Who, for example, to begin at the beginning, was Charles A. Clark, and why should he be deeding away Ebbe Petersen’s property? And who were Keilly and O’Rourke, and all the rest–Colliton, Garretson, Bolte and Freeman? And who, for that matter, was Hubert?

A score of detectives were sent out to hunt up these elusive persons, but, although the directories of twenty years were searched, no Charles A. Clark, John J. Keilly or I. F. X. O’Rourke could be discovered. Nor could any one named Colliton, Freeman or Hubert be found. The only persons who did appear to exist were Garretson and Bolte.

Quite by chance the Assistant District Attorney located the former of these, who proved to be one of Browne’s clients, and who stated that he had taken title to the property at the lawyer’s request and as a favor to him, did not remember from whom he had received it, had paid nothing for it, received nothing for it, and had finally deeded it to Herman Bolte at the direction of Browne. Herman Bolte, an ex-judge of the Municipal Court, who had been removed for misconduct in office, admitted grumblingly that, while at, one time he had considered purchasing the property in question, he had never actually done so, that the deed from Garretson to himself had been recorded without his knowledge or his authority, that he had paid nothing for the property and had received nothing for it, and had, at the instruction of Browne, conveyed it to Benjamin Freeman. Garretson apparently had never seen Bolte, and Bolte had never seen Freeman, while William R. Hubert, the person to whom the record showed Freeman had transferred the property, remained an invisible figure, impossible to reduce to tangibility.

Just what Browne had attempted to do–had done–was obvious. In some way, being a real-estate lawyer, he had stumbled upon the fact that this valuable tract of land lay unclaimed. Accordingly, he had set about the easiest way to reduce it to possession. To make assurance doubly sure he had forged two chains of title, one through an assumed heir and the other through the owner herself. Then he had juggled the title through a dozen or so grantees, and stood ready to dispose of the property to the highest bidder.

There he stayed in the Tombs, demanding a trial and protesting his innocence, and asserting that if the District Attorney would only look long enough he would find William R. Hubert. But an interesting question of law had cropped up to delay matters.

Of course, if there was anybody by the name of Hubert who actually owned the property, and Browne had signed his name, conveying the same, to a deed to Levitan, Browne was guilty of forgery in the first degree. But the evidence in the case pointed toward the conclusion that Browne himself _was_ Hubert. If this was so, how could Browne be said to have forged the name of Hubert, when he had a perfect legal right to take the property under any name he chose to assume? This was incontestable. If your name be Richard Roe you may purchase land and receive title thereto under the name of John Doe, and convey it under that name without violating the law. This as a general proposition is true so long as the taking of a fictitious name is for an honest purpose and not tainted with fraud. The Assistant District Attorney felt that the very strength of his case created, as it were, a sort of “legal weakness,” for the more evidence he should put in against Browne, the clearer it would become that Hubert was merely Browne himself, and this would necessitate additional proof that Browne had taken the property in the name of Hubert for purposes of fraud, which could only be established by going into the whole history of the property. Of course, if Browne were so foolish as to put in the defence that Hubert really existed, the case would be plain sailing. If, however, Browne was as astute as the District Attorney believed him to be, he might boldly admit that there was no Hubert except himself, and that in taking title to the property and disposing thereof under that name, he was committing no violation of law for which he could be prosecuted.

The case was moved for trial on the twelfth of March, 1906, before Judge Warren W. Foster, in Part Three of the Court of General Sessions in New York. The defendant was arraigned at the bar without counsel, owing to the absence of his lawyer through sickness, and Mr. Lewis Stuyvesant Chanler, the later Lieutenant-Governor of the State, was assigned to defend him. At this juncture Browne arose and addressed the Court. In the most deferential and conciliatory manner he urged that he was entitled to an adjournment until such time as he could produce William R. Hubert as a witness; stating that, although the latter had been in town on December 14th, and had personally given him the deeds in question, which he had handed to Levitan, Hubert’s interests in the West had immediately called him from the city, and that he was then in Goldfields, Nevada; that since he had been in the Tombs he, Browne, had been in correspondence with a gentleman by the name of Alfred Skeels, of the Teller House, Central City, Colorado, from whom he had received a letter within the week to the effect that Hubert had arranged to start immediately for New York, for the purpose of testifying as a witness for the defence. The prosecutor thereupon demanded the production of this letter from the alleged Skeels, and Browne was compelled to state that he had immediately destroyed it on its receipt. The prosecutor then argued that under those circumstances, and in view of the fact that the People’s evidence showed conclusively that no such person as Hubert existed, there was no reason why the trial should not proceed then and there. The Court thereupon ruled that the case should go on.

A jury was procured after some difficulty, and the evidence of Mr. Levitan received, showing that Browne had represented Hubert to be a man of substance, and had produced an affidavit, purported to be sworn to by Hubert, to the same effect, with deeds alleged to have been signed by him. Mrs. Braman then swore that upon the same day Browne had himself acknowledged these very deeds and had sworn to the affidavit before her as a notary, under the name of William R. Hubert.

Taken with the fact that Browne had in open court stated that Hubert was a living man, this made out a _prima facie_ case. But, of course, the District Attorney was unable to determine whether or not Browne would take the stand in his own behalf, or what his defence would be, and, in order to make assurance doubly sure, offered in evidence all the deeds to the property in question, thereby establishing the fact that it was originally part of the Petersen estate, and disclosing the means whereby it had eventually been recorded in the name of Hubert.

The prosecution then rested its case, and the burden shifted to the defence to explain how all these deeds, attested by Browne, came to be executed and recorded. It was indeed a difficult, if not impossible, task which the accused lawyer undertook when he went upon the stand. He again positively and vehemently denied that he had signed the name of Hubert to the deed which he had offered to Levitan, and persisted in the contention that Hubert was a real man, who sooner or later would turn up. He admitted knowing the Petersen family in a casual way, and said he had done some business for them, but stated that he had not heard of their tragic death until some years after the sinking of the _Geiser_. He had then ascertained that no one had appeared to lay claim to Mrs. Petersen’s estate, and he had accordingly taken it upon himself to adveritse for heirs. In due course Charles A. Clark had appeared and had deeded the property to Keilly, who in turn had conveyed it to O’Rourke. Just who this mysterious O’Rourke was he could not explain, nor could he account in any satisfactory manner for the recording in 1899 of the deed signed with Mary Petersen’s mark. He said that it had “turned up” in O’Rourke’s hands after O’Rourke had become possessed of the property through the action of the heirs, and that he had no recollection of ever having seen it before or having witnessed it. In the latter transactions, by which the property had been split up, he claimed to have acted only as attorney for the different grantors. He was unable to give the address or business of O’Rourke, Clark, Keilly or Freeman, and admitted that he had never seen any of them save at his own office. He was equally vague as to Hubert, whose New York residence he gave as 111 Fifth Avenue. No such person, however, had ever been known at that address.

[Illustration: With the exception of the upper left hand signature and the four immediately below it of H. Huffman Browne, these are all the signatures of imaginary persons invented by Browne to further his schemes. The upper right-hand slip shows the signatures to the Wilson bond, among which appears that of W.R. Hubert.]

Browne gave his testimony in the same dry, polite and careful manner in which he had always been accustomed to discuss his cases and deliver his arguments. It seemed wholly impossible to believe that this respectable-looking person could be a dangerous character, yet the nature of his offence and the consequences of it were apparent when the State called to the stand an old broom-maker, who had bought from Browne one of the lots belonging to the Petersen estate. Holding up three stumps where fingers should have been, he cried out, choking with tears:

“My vriends, for vifteen years I vorked at making brooms–me und my vife–from fife in the morning until six at night, und I loose mine fingern trying to save enough money to puy a house that we could call our own. Then when we saved eight hundred dollars this man come to us und sold us a lot. We were very happy. Yesterday anoder man served me mit a paper that we must leave our house, because we did not own the land! We must go away! Where? We haf no place to go. Our home is being taken from us, und that man [pointing his stumps at Browne]–that man has stolen it from us!”

He stopped, unable to speak. The defendant’s lawyer properly objected, but, with this piece of testimony ringing in their ears, it is hardly surprising that the jury took but five minutes to convict Browne of forgery in the first degree.

A few days later the judge sentenced him to twenty years in State’s prison.

Then other people began to wake up. The Attorney-General guessed that the Petersen property had all escheated to the State, the Swedish Government sent a deputy to make inquiries, the Norwegian Government was sure that he was a Norwegian, and the Danish that he was a Dane. No one knows yet who is the real owner, and there are half a dozen heirs squatting on every corner of it. Things are much worse than before Browne tried to sell the ill-fated lot to Levitan, but a great many people who were careless before are careful now.

It soon developed, however, that lawyer Browne’s industry and ingenuity had not been confined to the exploitation of the estate of Ebbe Petersen. Before the trial was well under way the City Chamberlain of New York notified the District Attorney that a peculiar incident had occurred at his office, in which not only the defendant figured, but William R. Hubert, his familiar, as well. In the year 1904 a judgment had been entered in the Supreme Court, which adjudged that a certain George Wilson was entitled to a one-sixth interest in the estate of Jane Elizabeth Barker, recently deceased. George Wilson had last been heard of, twenty years before, as a farmhand, in Illinois, and his whereabouts were at this time unknown. Suddenly, however, he had appeared. That is to say, H. Huffman Browne had appeared as his attorney, and demanded his share of the property which had been deposited to his credit with the City Chamberlain and amounted to seventy-five hundred dollars. The lawyer had presented a petition signed apparently by Wilson and a bond also subscribed by him, to which had been appended the names of certain sureties. One of these was a William R. Hubert–the same William R. Hubert who had mysteriously disappeared when his presence was so vital to the happiness and liberty of his creator. But the City Chamberlain had not been on his guard, and had paid over the seventy-five hundred dollars to Browne without ever having seen the claimant or suspecting for an instant that all was not right.

It was further discovered at the same time that Browne had made several other attempts to secure legacies remaining uncalled for in the city’s treasury. In how many cases he had been successful will probably never be known, but it is unlikely that his criminal career dated only from the filing of the forged Petersen deed in 1896.

Browne made an heroic and picturesque fight to secure a reversal of his conviction through all the State courts, and his briefs and arguments are monuments to his ingenuity and knowledge of the law. He alleged that his conviction was entirely due to a misguided enthusiasm on the part of the prosecutor, the present writer, whom he characterized as a “novelist” and dreamer. The whole case, he alleged, was constructed out of the latter’s fanciful imagination, a cobweb of suspicion, accusation and falsehood. Some day his friend Hubert would come out of the West, into which he had so unfortunately disappeared, and release an innocent man, sentenced, practically to death, because the case had fallen into the hands of one whose sense of the dramatic was greater than his logic.

Perchance he will. Mayhap, when H. Huffman Browne is the oldest inmate of Sing Sing, or even sooner, some gray-haired figure will appear at the State Capitol, and knock tremblingly at the door of the Executive, asking for a pardon or a rehearing of the case, and claiming to be the only original, genuine William R. Hubert–such a denouement would not be beyond the realms of possibility, but more likely the request will come in the form of a petition, duly attested and authenticated before some notary in the West, protesting against Browne’s conviction and incarceration, and bearing the flowing signature of William R. Hubert–the same signature that appears on Browne’s deeds to Levitan–the same that is affixed to the bond of George Wilson, the vanished farmhand, claimant to the estate of Jane Elizabeth Barker.

IX.

A Murder Conspiracy[4]

William M. Rice, eighty-four years of age, died at the Berkshire Apartments at 500 Madison Avenue, New York City, at about half after seven o’clock on the evening of Sunday, September 23, 1900. He had been ill for some time, but it was expected that he would recover. On or about the moment of his death, two elderly ladies, friends of the old gentleman, had called at the house with cakes and wine, to see him. The elevator man rang the bell of Mr. Rice’s apartment again and again, but could elicit no response, and the ladies, much disappointed, went away. While the bell was ringing Charles F. Jones, the confidential valet of the aged man, was waiting, he says, in an adjoining room until a cone saturated with chloroform, which he had placed over the face of his sleeping master, should effect his death.

_Did_ Jones murder Rice? If so, was it, as he claims, at the instigation of Albert T. Patrick?

These two questions, now settled in the affirmative forever, so far as criminal and civil litigation are concerned, have been the subject of private study and public argument for more than seven years.

Mr. Rice was a childless widower, living the life of a recluse, attended only by Jones, who was at once his secretary, valet and general servant. No other person lived in the apartment, and few visitors ever called there. Patrick was a New York lawyer with little practice who had never met Mr. Rice, was employed as counsel in litigation hostile to him, yet in whose favor a will purporting to be signed by Rice, June 30, 1900, turned up after the latter’s death, by the terms of which Patrick came into the property, amounting to over seven million dollars, in place of a charitable institution named in an earlier will of 1896. It is now universally admitted that the alleged will of 1900 was a forgery, as well as four checks drawn to Patrick’s order (two for $25,000 each, one for $65,000, and one for $135,000, which represented practically all of Rice’s bank accounts), an order giving him control of the contents of Rice’s safe deposit vaults (in which were more than $2,500,000 in securities), and also a general assignment by which he became the owner of Rice’s entire estate. Thus upon Rice’s death Patrick had every possible variety of document necessary to possess himself of the property. Jones took nothing under any of these fraudulent instruments. Hence Patrick’s motive in desiring the death of Rice is the foundation stone of the case against him. But that Patrick desired and would profit by Rice’s death in no way tends to establish that Rice did not die a natural death. Patrick would profit equally whether Rice died by foul means or natural, and the question as to whether murder was done must be determined from other evidence. This is only to be found in the confession of the valet Jones and in the testimony of the medical experts who performed the autopsy. Jones, a self-confessed murderer, swears that upon the advice and under the direction of Patrick (though in the latter’s absence) he killed his master by administering chloroform. There is no direct corroborative evidence save that of the experts. Upon Jones’s testimony depended the question of Patrick’s conviction or acquittal, and of itself this was not sufficient, for being that of an accomplice it must, under the New York law, be corroborated.

In the confession of Jones the State had sufficient _direct_ evidence of the crime and of Patrick’s connection with it, providing there was _other evidence tending to connect Patrick with its commission_. This corroborative evidence is largely supplied by the facts which show that for a long time Patrick conspired with Jones to steal the bulk of Mr. Rice’s estate at his death. This evidence not only shows Patrick’s possible motive for planning Mr. Rice’s _murder_, but also tends to corroborate Jones’s whole story of the conspiracy.

Rice did not know Patrick even by sight. He had heard of him only as a person retained by another lawyer (Holt) to do “the dirty work” in an action brought by Rice against Holt, as executor, to set aside Mrs. Rice’s will, in which she assumed, under the “Community Law” of Texas, where Rice had formerly resided, to dispose of some $2,500,000 of Rice’s property. If Rice was a _resident of Texas_ she had the legal right to do this,–otherwise not. Holt employed Patrick to get evidence that Rice still was such a resident. Rice knew of this and hated Patrick.

Patrick’s connection with the Rice litigation had begun four years before the murder, which was not planned until August, 1900, His first visit to Rice’s apartment was made under the assumed name of Smith for the purpose of discovering whether the valet could be corrupted into furnishing fictitious proof of Rice’s intent to reside in Texas. He flattered Jones; told him he was underpaid and not appreciated, and, after a second visit, at which he disclosed his right name, persuaded him to typewrite a letter on Rice’s stationery addressed to Baker, Botts, Baker & Lovett (Rice’s attorneys), in which he should be made to say that he had lost hope of winning the suit against Holt, was really a citizen of Texas, and wanted to settle the litigation. Patrick said that he could arrange for the signing of such a letter and was willing to pay Jones $250 for his help. Jones agreed.

Patrick now learned that Mr. Rice was living with no companion except Jones; that he held little communication with the outside world; that the valet was in his confidence and thoroughly familiar with his papers, and that the will made in 1896 disinherited natural heirs in favor of an educational institution which he had founded in Texas. He also learned that while Mr. Rice was 84 years of age he was in possession of all his faculties, conducted his own business, and might live for years. Possessed of these facts Patrick’s evil mind soon developed a conspiracy with Jones to secure the whole estate.

Mr. Rice’s pet charity was the William M. Rice Institute “for the advance of science, art and literature,” of Texas, which he had founded in 1891. He had donated to it more than a million and a half dollars. By the will of 1896 only small legacies were bequeathed to relatives, while the bulk of his fortune was left to the Institute.

About a month after Patrick’s first visit to the Berkshire Apartments, that is, in December, 1899, while he and Jones were examining Rice’s private papers, they stumbled upon the will. Patrick saw his opportunity. By the forgery of a new will which would increase the legacies of those mentioned in the will of 1896 and leave legacies to every person who might have any claim upon the estate, it would be for the interest of those persons to sustain and carry into effect the forgery. The whole scheme was based upon the belief that “every man has his price.” He told Jones that he thought the will unjust; that he did not think it right to leave so little to relatives, and later he brought to Jones a rough draft of a will which could be substituted for the genuine one. Patrick was to get half the estate, the relatives were to receive double or three times the amount provided in the 1896 will, and what was left was to be given to the Rice Institute. He proposed that Jones should typewrite this will, and guaranteed to arrange for the witnessing and signing of it, and promised that Jones should get whatever he wanted. Jones at first objected, but was finally won over. Rewritten many times to include new ideas of the conspirators, the document finally reached the form of the will of June 30, 1900, in which Patrick substituted himself for the Rice Institute and made himself one of the executors.

An ingenious part of the conspiracy was the decision to leave the 1896 will in existence. If Patrick had destroyed it and the relatives had succeeded in overthrowing the will of 1900, the estate would have been left without testamentary disposition and the relatives would have got more than was provided by either will. With the will of 1896 in existence, however, the relatives would get less if they overthrew the forgery. By retaining it, therefore, Patrick figured that the relatives would have selfish reasons for accepting the forgery as genuine.

The preparation of this bogus will occupied about a month, and the next question was the procurement of witnesses. It was desirable to get the same persons who witnessed the former will. These were Walter H. Wetherbee and W. F. Harmon, clerks for many years at Swenson’s banking house. On the assumption that Wetherbee had been injured by Rice and was therefore hostile to him, Jones practically unfolded the scheme. He told Wetherbee that one of Mr. Rice’s bonds had disappeared and that Rice had accused Wetherbee of stealing it. He wound up with the suggestion, “I will get one witness and you can get another, and the thing is done.” But Wetherbee indignantly declined to join in the conspiracy.

Morris Meyers, who had been employed in Patrick’s office, and David L. Short, a friend of both, were the false witnesses finally selected.

They were clothed with the appearance of honesty and were brought into contact with Rice by Jones at various times: Meyers as a notary public, and Short as commissioner of deeds for the State of Texas, an appointment procured for him by Patrick probably for this specific purpose.

The date of the forged will, June 30, 1900, was selected to correspond with the date of three genuine papers which Rice acknowledged before Short on that date.

[Illustration: Last page of the forged will of 1900, showing the forgery of Rice’s signature, and the false attestation of Short and Meyers.]

The next step was to obviate the absurdity of Patrick’s being selected as the residuary legatee at a time when he was engaged in bitter litigation against Rice. The best way out was for Patrick to pose as a lawyer who had brought about a settlement of this expensive litigation and thus won Rice’s regard. Patrick first tried to accomplish this by getting friends to visit Rice and urge a settlement. But Rice rebuffed them all. Accordingly, Patrick again resorted to forgery, and in August, 1900, manufactured an instrument of settlement, dated March 6, 1900.

But such an agreement would not explain the paradox of a man whom Rice hated and despised and did not know by sight turning up as the principal beneficiary under his will. It was necessary to manufacture evidence to be used after Rice’s death in support of his claim of close relations. The idea of a personal meeting with Rice had been abandoned on Jones’s advice, and Patrick therefore caused the valet to prepare twenty-five or thirty forged letters addressed to him and purporting to come from Rice. These referred to current business matters and conveyed the impression that it was Rice’s custom to seek the lawyer’s advice. One instructed Patrick as to the terms of the will of 1900. Carbon copies were made for filing in Rice’s letter book after his death.

To make assurance doubly sure and to secure immediate possession of Rice’s securities a general assignment to Patrick of all Rice’s estate was forged, and an order giving him access to and possession of the securities on deposit in Rice’s safety vault.

But Patrick did not stop here. He procured from Jones three checks signed by Mr. Rice in the regular course of business, one payable to Jones for his July salary and the other two for the July and August salary of an employee of Rice’s in Texas named Cohn. These three checks Patrick kept as models, forwarding to Cohn two forged checks filled out by Jones upon which Rice’s signature had been traced, and returning to Jones a substitute check with Rice’s signature traced upon it. All three checks passed through the banks unsuspected. Traced signatures were also substituted for genuine ones upon letters dictated by Rice to his Texas correspondents. Thus Patrick secured the circulation of five copies of Rice’s signature which, if occasion demanded, he could produce as standards of comparison to correspond with his other forgeries. The principal preparations were complete. But title under the will might long be delayed and perhaps even eventually fail. Patrick was poor and in no condition to conduct adequately a serious litigation. The moment Mr. Rice died a large amount of cash would be necessary. For the procurement of this Patrick and Jones looked to the current balance of Rice’s bank account, which amounted to some two hundred and fifty thousand dollars on deposit at Swenson’s private bank and at the Fifth Avenue Trust Company. With this they felt reasonably secure of success. For even if the will should be set aside as fraudulent they had a second line of defense in the general assignment of the estate and the orders to Rice’s two million five hundred thousand dollars of securities.

While the evidence affords a motive for Patrick to desire the death of Mr. Rice, it does not of itself, up to this point, indicate the slightest intention on the part of Patrick to do away with the old gentleman. It was therefore conceded by the prosecution that, upon Jones’s own testimony, the conspiracy to murder was not formed until about seven weeks before the event. The first evidence which points to an intent to murder is the famous “cremation letter,” dated August 3d.

The cremation letter from Mr. Rice, authorizing Patrick to cremate his body, shows that Patrick intended to do away with Rice in such a way that an autopsy must, if possible, be prevented and the evidence of murder destroyed. That Patrick forged such a letter was evidence that his connection with the murder was premeditated and deliberate. To cremate the body before an autopsy it was necessary to procure a physician’s certificate that Rice had died from natural causes. He therefore made preparation to secure such a certificate, and then upon the strength of the cremation letter to give directions for the immediate destruction of the body.

Patrick, with the view of having at hand a physician who would be unsuspicious, and who would issue a certificate of death from natural causes, induced Jones to send for Dr. Curry, his own friend and physician, on an occasion when the valet was ill. This was in March, 1900. Dr. Curry came, and Jones, acting under Patrick’s advice, cautioned him not to mention the lawyer’s name to Rice. In course of time he saw Rice, gained his good opinion and became his attending physician. But Rice did not die, and curiously enough it was he himself who suggested to Jones the instrumentality of death which was finally employed, for he read an article dealing with the dangers of chloroform as an anaesthetic, and discussed it with the valet. This suggestion was conveyed to Patrick, who asked Dr. Curry whether chloroform left any traces discoverable upon an autopsy. Dr. Curry rather carelessly replied that it left but slight traces if administered only in the quantities which would be fatal to a man with a weak heart. Patrick told Jones, so Jones alleges, to procure some chloroform and this he did, sending to Texas for two bottles of two ounces each. From Dr. Curry’s remarks it was manifest that a weakened condition of the patient was an important element, and as Jones was taking some mercury pills (prescribed for him by Dr. Curry), the valet induced his master to take some of them. The old gentleman was benefited, however, rather than weakened. This was _before_ the forgery of the cremation letter. It was clear that larger doses of mercury would be necessary, and accordingly Patrick furnished Jones with pellets containing the drug in such quantities that Jones, experimenting with one of them, became ill.

They had now the means to effect gradual death, but as mercury leaves traces discernible at an autopsy, it was decided that the body must be cremated promptly. Hence the cremation letter. It was hoped that Rice might drop off at any moment, owing to his weakened condition, and in anticipation of death Patrick discontinued his visits to the apartment in order to establish a satisfactory alibi. Jones also frequently absented himself from the apartment in the evenings after the old man had fallen asleep.

[Illustration: The famous letter forged by Patrick, which requests the cremation of the remains of the supposed writer, old Mr. Rice.]

On September 16th Rice had an attack of acute indigestion, which might have resulted seriously had it not been for the mercurial pills which promptly relieved him. The reader should observe that practically all of this testimony comes from Jones. There is no extraneous evidence that Patrick induced the giving of the mercury. Patrick, however, spread false rumors as to Rice’s general health and also as to his financial condition and intentions, namely, that Rice was only worth seven hundred and fifty thousand dollars, and that those who expected he was going to leave his money to the Institute were doomed to disappointment. But neither his statements about Rice’s condition nor his remarks as to the disposition and extent of his property are inconsistent with a mere _hope_ that he would die and thus leave Patrick free to enjoy the fruits of his forgeries.

There now occurred, however, an event which may well have played a part in inducing Patrick to supplement forgery by murder. On Sunday, September 16th, the plant of the Merchants’ and Planters’ Oil Company of Houston, Texas, of which Rice owned seventy-five per cent. of the capital stock, was destroyed by fire. The company being without funds to rebuild, its directors telegraphed to Rice requesting him to advance the money. The amount needed was two hundred and fifty thousand dollars–and if Rice consented, all the available funds on deposit in the New York banks, upon which the conspirators relied to accomplish their object, would be exhausted. Jones endeavored to dissuade the old man from advancing the money, but without effect, and Rice sent a letter to Houston agreeing to supply one hundred and fifty thousand dollars and more in instalments of twenty-five thousand dollars each. This was on September 18th, after he had wired to the same effect on September 17th. Patrick and Jones suppressed a telegram that Rice would advance two hundred and fifty thousand dollars, and on September 19th the old man received word that the first draft in conformity with his telegram of September 17th had been drawn and would arrive in New York on the 22d. Jones says that on showing this to Patrick the latter announced that Rice must be put out of the way as soon as possible. Accordingly, on September 20th and 21st, Jones administered larger doses of mercury than usual, which, while weakening and depressing him, failed to cause his end. Saturday, September 22d, the draft was presented at Rice’s apartment. The old man was not confined to his bed, but Jones told the bank messenger, after pretending to consult him, that Rice was too ill to attend to business that day and to return on Monday. That night Jones and Patrick met, and it was agreed (according to Jones) that Rice must not be allowed to survive until Monday. They still hoped that he might die without any further act upon their part, but Jones was informed by Dr. Curry that, although the old man seemed weak and under a great mental strain, he nevertheless thought that he would recover. This Curry also told to Patrick, the latter calling at the doctor’s house about five o’clock in the afternoon.

“You think Mr. Rice will be able to go down Monday morning?” Patrick asked.

“You had better wait until Monday morning comes,” replied Dr. Curry.

“Do you think he will be able to go down town next week?” persisted the lawyer.

The doctor answered in the affirmative.

That night Mr. Rice slept quietly until eight o’clock Sunday morning. Dr. Curry called and found him in excellent condition, having eaten a hearty breakfast. His heart was a trifle weak, but it was sound. His organs were all working normally; he felt no pain. The doctor left without prescribing any medicine, stating that he would not return unless called, and expressing his opinion that the patient would recover. This was about eleven o’clock, and Jones immediately hastened to Patrick’s house and reported the conversation.

It was clear that Rice’s death would not occur before Monday morning. He might live to pay over the two hundred and fifty thousand dollars; long enough to give further testimony in the Holt litigation, and thus expose the whole fraudulent scheme of pretended settlement and of friendly relations with the lawyer, and finally, perhaps, even to make a new will. The success of the conspiracy demanded that Rice should die that night. Did he die naturally? Was his death caused by any further act of the conspirators? Did Jones kill him by means of chloroform?

Jones’s story is that Patrick supplied him with some oxalic acid which was to be mixed with powdered ammonia and diluted in water, on the theory that it was preferable to chloroform since it would not require Jones’s presence in the room at the moment of death. Jones said that he endeavored to administer the mixture to the old man, but that he refused to take it. Jones had already procured the chloroform from Texas, as has been stated, and had turned it over to Patrick. He says that that afternoon he procured this from Patrick, who told him how to administer it. This was a few moments after six o’clock. Rice was sleeping soundly. The colored woman who did the housework was absent for the day and the rooms were deserted. He saturated a sponge with chloroform, constructed a cone out of a towel, placed the sponge in the cone, put the cone over the sleeping man’s face and ran out of the room and waited thirty minutes for the chloroform to complete the work. Waiting in the next room he heard the door bell ring, and ring again, but he paid no attention to the summons. In point of fact he was never quite sure himself whether the bell was not the creation of his own overwrought brain. At the end of half an hour he returned to the bedroom, removed the cone from Rice’s face and saw that he was dead, then after burning the sponge and the towel in the kitchen range he opened the windows, straightened the rooms out, called the elevator man, asked him to send for Dr. Curry, and telephoned to Patrick that Rice was dead.

Jones had no sooner telephoned Patrick that Rice was dead than the lawyer hastened to Dr. Curry’s, and within forty minutes appeared with him in Rice’s apartments, assuming complete charge. Summoning an undertaker and having the cremation letter at hand, he gave orders for speedy cremation. But he now discovered the principal mistake in his calculations. He had omitted to investigate the length of time required to heat the crematory. This he now discovered to his horror to be twenty-four hours. But the body must be destroyed. The undertaker suggested that the body might be embalmed while the crematory was being heated, and Patrick at once seized upon the suggestion and gave orders to that effect, although the cremation letter sets forth specifically that one of the reasons why Rice desired cremation was his horror of being embalmed. The body was embalmed at the apartments that night, Dr. Curry innocently supplying the certificate of death from “old age and weak heart,” and “as immediate cause, indigestion followed by collocratal diarrhoea with mental worry.”

Having arranged for the cremation at the earliest possible moment, Jones and Patrick rifled the trunk in which Rice kept his papers, and stuffed them in a satchel which Patrick bore away with him.

The funeral was to be held early Tuesday morning and the ashes conveyed by Jones to Milwaukee, to be interred near the body of Rice’s wife, while the relatives should not be notified until it should be too late for them to reach New York.

The next step was to secure the two hundred and fifty thousand dollars which Rice had on deposit. Patrick had already forged Rice’s name to blank checks on Swenson and the Fifth Avenue Trust Company. Early Monday morning Jones, with Patrick looking over his shoulder and directing him, filled out the body of the checks, which covered all but ten thousand dollars of Rice’s deposits. These consisted of one for twenty-five thousand dollars and one for sixty-five thousand dollars on Swenson, one for twenty-five thousand dollars and another for one hundred and thirty-five thousand dollars on the Trust Company. They were all made payable to the order of Patrick and dated September 22d, the day before Rice’s death. One of the drafts on the Fifth Avenue Trust Company was cashed for him by a friend named Potts early Monday morning, and was paid without suspicion.

But now came the second error, which resulted in the exposure of the conspiracy and conviction for murder. Jones, in filling out the twenty-five thousand dollar check on Swenson, had in his nervousness omitted the “l” from Patrick’s Christian name, so that the check read “Abert T. Patrick,” and Patrick in his excitement had failed to notice the omission or attempt to obviate it by extra indorsement. This twenty-five thousand dollar Swenson check was intrusted to David L. Short for presentation to Swenson & Sons for certification. When he presented it, Wallace, the clerk, recognized Jones’s handwriting in the body of it, and thought the signature looked unnatural. He took it to a rear office, where he showed it to Wetherbee, who was the person whom Jones had approached nine months before with a request that he join the conspiracy to manufacture a bogus will. Wetherbee compared the signature on the check with genuine signatures in the bank, and returned it to Short without any intimation that he regarded it as irregular, but assigning as the reason the defect in the indorsement. Short thereupon returned the check to Patrick, who supplied the necessary supplementary indorsement and telephoned to Jones what had occurred, instructing him to say that the check was all right in case the Swensons should inquire.

Half an hour later Short returned to Swenson’s, where the check was examined by one of the firm. Rice’s apartments were then called up, and Jones said that the checks were all right. But this did not satisfy Mr. Swenson, so he instructed Wallace to call up the apartment again and insist on talking to Mr. Rice. Jones delayed replying to Wallace and in the afternoon called up Patrick on the telephone, inquiring what he should say. Patrick replied that he would have to say that Rice was dead. And in accordance with this Jones informed Swenson that Rice had died at eight o’clock the previous evening. It was thus clear to Swenson that although the maker of the check was dead, Patrick, a lawyer, cognizant of that fact, was seeking to secure payment upon it. For Jones had told Swenson that he had reported Rice’s death to the doctor and to Rice’s lawyer, Patrick.

Patrick, accompanied by Potts, went immediately to the bank, where Swenson informed him that the check could be paid only to the administrator. Patrick replied that there would be no administrator; that Rice had left no property in this State, and informed Swenson that he had an assignment by Rice to himself of all Rice’s securities with Swenson. He also invited Swenson to the funeral.

Later in the day Patrick attempted to obtain possession of Rice’s securities in the Safety Deposit Company and in the Fifth Avenue Trust Company, by presenting forged instruments of transfer and the orders heretofore referred to; but after some delay the trust companies declined him access. The conspiracy had begun to go to pieces. The two mistakes and the failure to secure funds placed Patrick in a dangerous position.

Two o’clock on Monday afternoon, eighteen hours after the death, Jones, at Patrick’s direction, began to notify the relatives that Rice had died the evening before, and that the funeral would take place the following morning. The telegrams to Baker and to Rice, Jr., in Texas, were in the following extraordinary form:

Mr. Rice died eight o’clock last night under care of physicians. Death certificate, “old age, weak heart, delirium.” Left instructions to be interred in Milwaukee with wife. Funeral 10 A. M. to-morrow at 500 Madison Avenue.

It is significant that care was used to convey the information that the death was a natural one with a physician in attendance; that the body was to be interred in Milwaukee, without reference to the cremation. This may well have been so that if any suspicions of foul play should arise, the recipients, realizing that they could not reach New York in time to arrest matters there, might hasten to Milwaukee to intercept the body, where they could be met by Jones with the cremation letter in his pocket and his urn of ashes under his arm.

But the telegram did arouse suspicion, and Baker and Rice immedately wired Jones as follows:

Please make no disposition of Rice’s remains until we arrive. We leave to-night, arrive New York Thursday morning.

Baker also instructed N. A. Meldrum, a Texan then in New York, to co-operate with Jones in preserving everything intact.

In the meantime, however, Swenson had notified his attorneys, who in turn had informed the police and the District Attorney’s office, and that evening at about eleven o’clock James W. Gerard, accompanied by a detective, who posed as the lawyer’s clerk, interviewed Patrick at his home. Patrick informed Gerard that he had an assignment of all Rice’s property and also a will of Rice’s of which he was executor. This was the first reference to the will of 1900. He also informed Gerard that he would not receive a cent under its provision. To have explained the real terms of the will would, under the circumstances, have excited too much suspicion. Yet he was eager to let the Swensons know that as executor he was in a position to control the profitable banking business that would arise from the settlement of the estate. In the meantime four Headquarters’ detectives, representing themselves as lawyers, visited the apartments.

Patrick hurried to 500 Madison Avenue, where he learned of Meldrum’s presence in town. Things were turning out far from the way in which he had expected. He then hastened to his office down-town, which he reached about half-past one in the morning, and, alone, destroyed great quantities of paper, attempting to dispose of them through the toilet bowl, which was so clogged that the water flowed out upon the floor, necessitating an apology to the janitor. In the silence of the night misgivings came upon him. He lost his nerve, and at two o’clock in the morning called up the undertaker and revoked the signed order for cremation which he had given. Leaving the office at about five in the morning he first visited Meyers, thence proceeded to his own boarding-house, and from there went to the apartments, which he reached at eight o’clock. Here he found the detectives who had been on guard since early morning to forestall any attempt to remove the body.

At the funeral itself he attempted to conciliate adverse interests and to win witnesses for his purpose. He had begun to do this the very night that Rice had died, when he told the elevator man that he was remembered in Rice’s will. He had also informed Wetherbee that he had a five thousand dollars’ legacy. At the funeral were Blynn, one of Rice’s nephews, who had come on from Massachusetts, and two ladies, to each of whom he stated that they had legacies which would soon be available provided there was no contest of the will.

[Illustration: Four forged signatures of W.M. Rice, which bisected and rearranged haphazard fit exactly, thus showing that they were made from the same model. This would be an utter impossibility in the case of four genuine signatures.]

[Illustration: Forged assignment of vault at the New York Safe Deposit Co. from Rice to Patrick.]

The detectives now informed Patrick that he was wanted at Headquarters, and Patrick invited Potts to accompany him, informing the latter that the police suspected that there was something unnatural in the cause of death, but that he could explain satisfactorily. As a matter of fact no such intimation had been made to him by the police or anyone else. At Police Headquarters after an interview with Inspector McClusky he was permitted to go his way.

Patrick returned to Rice’s apartments, sent for Short and Meyers, and conferred with them there. He took this occasion to tell Maria Scott, the colored woman who worked in the apartment, that she was suspected of having poisoned Rice, and that she had better say nothing about his death. Jones told her that she was remembered in the will and that it would be worth her while to stand by himself and Patrick, who would see that she was taken care of. Meanwhile the coroner had sent the body to the morgue for autopsy.

The autopsy was performed on Tuesday, forty-three hours after death occurred, by Dr. Donlin, a coroner’s physician, in the presence of Dr. Williams, also a coroner’s physician, and of Professor R. A. Witthaus, an expert chemist. The two physicians testified at the trial that the organs of the body, except the lungs, were normal in condition, save as affected by the embalming fluid. They and Professor Witthaus agreed in their testimony that the lungs were congested. Dr. Donlin spoke of their being “congested all over”; while Dr. Williams characterized it as “an intense congestion of the lungs–coextensive with them.” Outside of the lungs they found no evidence of disease to account for death, and beyond the congestion these showed nothing except a small patch of consolidated tissue about the size of a twenty-five cent piece. They testified, in effect, that nothing save the inhalation of some gaseous irritant could have produced such a general congestion, and that the patch of tissue referred to was insufficient to account for the amount of congestion present. Dr. Donlin could not testify what the proximate cause of death was, but was firm in his opinion that no cause for it was observable in the other vital organs. In this Dr. Williams concurred. He was of the opinion that chloroform would act as an irritant upon the lungs and cause precisely that general congestion observable in the case of the deceased. Professor Witthaus testified that his analysis revealed the presence of mercury, obtained as calomel, and while the amount was not sufficient to cause death, its presence indicated that a larger quantity had existed in life. The embalming fluid had contained no mercury, and he and Dr. Donlin agreed that the embalming fluid would have no effect upon the lungs beyond a tendency to bleach them. In other words, the People’s evidence was to the effect that no cause of death was observable from a medical examination of the body save the congestion stated to exist in the lungs, and that this might have been caused by chloroform.

Thursday morning Mr. Baker and F. A. Rice, the brother of the deceased, arrived in New York. Patrick showed them the cremation letter, and, inasmuch as they took a neutral position in the matter, ordered the cremation to proceed, and accordingly it took place that very day. He also endeavored to win the confidence of Baker, but succeeded in accomplishing little. He finally gave the latter a copy of the 1900 will and the original will of 1896. He also informed Baker that he had taken a large number of papers from Rice’s apartments, and turned over to him a considerable number of them. He also surrendered on Friday the two Swenson checks.

After considerable discussion Baker told Patrick flatly that he would never consent to the probate of the 1900 will; that he was satisfied that the ’96 will was the last will of Rice, and that he would insist upon its being probated, to which Patrick replied, that so far as he was concerned he did not know but that the probate of the ’96 will would suit him just as well as the probate of the 1900 will; that it was a matter of indifference to him, and that so far as the Rice Institute was concerned he was prepared to give Baker from three to five million dollars for it, or any other sum Baker might name. These negotiations and conferences continued until the fourth of October, Patrick yielding step by step, until he had divested himself of all control of the documents and securities.

Meantime sufficient evidence having been secured, Patrick and Jones were arrested on a charge of forgery and held for the Grand Jury. Bail was fixed at ten thousand dollars each, but was not forthcoming.

On October 21st, Mr. House, Patrick’s lawyer, visited Patrick and Jones in the Tombs. Jones says that after Patrick had talked to Mr. House the former called Jones to one corner of the room and told him that House insisted on knowing definitely whether a crime had been committed and directed Jones to tell House that a murder had been committed, but that he (Patrick) was not concerned in it. This Jones declined to do without implicating Patrick. The two prisoners then returned to House and Jones says that he informed House that he had killed Rice by chloroform, and gave him the “same story which he told on the witness stand.” After this Jones apparently lost his nerve and told Patrick that he intended to commit suicide. This idea Patrick encouraged, agreeing that they should both do it at about the same time.

On the 26th of October Jones made a statement to Assistant District Attorney Osborne which was in large part false, and in which he endeavored to exonerate himself entirely from complicity in any of the crimes, and in which he charged the actual administration of the chloroform to Patrick. Four days later Osborne sent for him and told him he had lied, upon which Jones became confused, continued to persist in some of his statements, qualified others and withdrew still others. He was completely unnerved and that night attempted, by means of a knife which Patrick had supplied him, to cut his throat. The attempt was a failure, and he was removed to Bellevue Hospital, where he remained until November 12th. He then finally gave the statement which corresponded with his testimony upon the trial and which jibed with all the circumstances and evidence known to the District Attorney.

Did Patrick conspire with Jones to murder Rice? What corroboration is there of Jones’s story that he killed Rice under Patrick’s direction? First: What proof is there that murder was committed?

Roughly, that Jones so swore; that Rice died at the time alleged; that he did not die from disease, but that he died from a congestion of the lungs which could have occurred only in the case of a living organism by the administration of some such irritant as chloroform; that some one, therefore, must have killed him, and that Jones alone had the opportunity.

Second: What proof is there that Patrick directed the murder?

Evidence of an elaborate conspiracy, as briefly heretofore set forth, which contemplated the _death_ of Rice. Of course Patrick wanted Rice to die. If Patrick was not implicated in the killing, what motive had Jones to commit the deed? Why did Rice die at the precise psychological moment which would enable Patrick to prevent two hundred and fifty thousand dollars on deposit being diverted to Texas? And finally, why did Patrick prepare a forged cremation letter for the destruction of the body? If the conspiracy contemplated a _natural_ death, nothing could be of greater value to the two parties concerned than the means of proving that the death was _not_ unnatural.

This, in the most abbreviated form, is the case against Patrick. Space forbids any reference to his elaborate and ingenious defense, which was based entirely on an alleged complete failure of corroboration of Jones’s testimony. Starting with the premise that the word of a self-confessed murderer and thrice-perjured scoundrel was valueless as proof, he contended that there was no adequate evidence that Rice’s death was felonious, and that the congestion of the lungs could have been and was caused by the embalming fluid and was only attributed to the chloroform after Jones had given his final version of how the murder was accomplished. Technically the case against Patrick was not a strong one. Dramatically it was overwhelming. His own failure to testify and his refusal to allow his lawyer, Mr. House, to relate what passed between them in the Tombs, remain significant, although not evidence proper for a jury to consider. Wherever lawyers shall get together, there the Patrick case will be discussed with its strong points and its weak ones, its technicalities and its tactics, and the ethics of the liberation of Jones, the actual murderer, now long since vanished into the obscurity from which he came. On the one hand stands a public convinced of Patrick’s guilt, and on the other the convicted “lifer” pointing a lean finger at the valet Jones and stubbornly repeating, “I am innocent.”

[Footnote 4: In 1906 the Governor of New York commuted the death sentence of Albert T. Patrick to life imprisonment, and the most extraordinary struggle in the legal history of the State on the part of a convicted murderer for his own life came to an end. The defendant in

True Stories of Crime From the District Attorney’s Office by Arthur Train (page 3)