The Congressman’s Family
By EDWARD LAWSON
WHAT HAS HAPPENED: Bent out to In
terview 'ioprenentative Paul Lucas. Con
gressman from Mississippi. I discover two
persons working frantically over his dead
body, removing it from an easy chair and
placing it on a bed. One is a man
named Hutchinson, the Congressman’s
butler, and the other a middle-aged, white
haired, fairly beautiful wom:.i who de
scribed herself as Lucas’s housekeeper.
I call the police to handle the case and
give the ara&aing story to my paper.
Hutshinson tries to escape by leaping
through the window while the police are
on the way, but I hold him until they
Arrive.
The two servants ascribe the man’s
death to an attack of heart disease, but
the police doctor, after examination, de
clares that Lucas has been murdered by
poisoning.
A thorough search of tile apartment
reveals only one clue, a typewritten note
bearing no signature, written by some one
obviously unfamiliar with a typewriter.
The note says: "Better stick to your high
society ladies or you’ll regret it." The
author of this note cannot be found, but
a detective establishes the fact that it
was written on the dead man’s own type
writer.
The housekeeper then tells her story,
disclosing that the Representative is a
Negro and that she is his common-law
wife. She also discloses the fact that he
had been having an affair with a Wash
ington woman, a white widow, since his
Arrival In the capital city.
NOW GO ON WITH THE STORY:
CHAPTER ni
“So he threatened to kill you, did
he?” Inspector Paine stroked his
chin thoughtfully. "Well, that cer
tainly makes the thing more inter
esting. First of all we'll have to get
hold of this mysterious white wo
man, and then we’ll have to corral
Lucas’s son. Is he in town, lady?”
“Yes, he’s stopping at the White
law."
“All right. Jones and Wilson, you
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get busy and bring this woman in.
Hardy and Johnson, you dig up this
woman’s son. Make it snappy, ail
of you. I want to talk to both of
them.”
The four detectives left the room.
Inspector Paine turned to Hutchin
son, the butler.
“What do you know about this—
this murder?” he snapped.
Hutchinson shook his head slow
ly, sadly.
“All I know,” he said, “is that we
found Mr. Lucas here in his room
this morning, seated in his easy
chair, looking as though he were
asleep. When he failed to wake
up in time to get to his downtown
office, I tried to aw^ren him, gently.
But then I notioed that something
was wrong. He didn't wake up. I
became alarmed and called Miss
Harmon here, the housekeeper. She
said that it was a heart attack, and
that he had them quite often. She
said the bsst thing to do was to
put him on his bed and loosen up
his clothes. We did that, and then
this man happened in.” He pointed
at me.
xvu naa xiexpea xix xus uxeax
fast this morning?”
“Yes, sir. I made the coffee in
the percolator. Miss Harmon did the
rest.”
"I see. And what became of the
coffee? Mr. Lucas drank it?”*
“No sir, he didn’t. At least, not
very much of it.”
“Then what became of it?”
“It was .pilled, sir.” He pointed
silently to a spot on the floor.
“Oh, I see.” The Inspector look
ed at the butler quizzically. “Do you
remember just who spilled it?” he
asked suddenly.
“I did, sir.”
“Ummm. You just knocked it off
the table, accidentally, to the floor?”
“Yes sir, while we were transfer
ring Mr. Lucas's body to the bed.”
The Inspector turned to me, “Did
you see him do that?”
“Spill the coffee on the floor, you
mean?”
‘'Yes."
“Yes, sir, I saw him.”
“Did it look like an accident to
you?”
“He just brushed against the table
and the coffee cup slid off. That
was all. He -didn’t knock it off.”
“It wasn't necessary bo brush
against the table in such a way as
to knock the cup off, was it?”
"No, but he just seemed to turn
that way without thinking and the
cup tumbled to the floor. But that’s
all this got to do with the case?”
“I have an idea,” the Inspector
said, “there was something more
“Just copy the words of the note down on this sheet of
paper,” said the Inspector.
in that cup than mere coffee.”
“You mean—poison?" I gasped.
“Exactly. ”
“But how can you find out? The
coffee’s all soaked into the rug now.”
“The department has chemical ex
perts who can smell poison a mile
away. They'll get it out of the rug
if there’s any there.” The Inspector
beckoned to two patrolmen who had
been standing behind him, listening
to the proceedings. “Get this rug up
off the floor and hustle it cut to
the Bureau of Standards in a scout
car just as fast as you can get it
there. Have them examine it—es
pecially that dark spot over there—
for traces of poison. Call me here
just as soon as they finish their
analysis.”
The two men saluted and went to
work, rolling up the heavy rug.
“Now,” said the Inspector, fac
ing the housekeeper and the butler,
who were sitting moodily together in
a corner, “it looks to me as though
this case of poisoning—this mur
der—lies between the two of you.
Miss Harmon, you say that you are
in reality Paul Lucas’s wdfe, work
ing as his housekeeper. You say
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that he refused to support you, and
that he threatened at one time to
kill you. Is all that true?”
The woman twisted her hands to
gether -in silence for a moment.
“Yes,” she said quietly, “that’s all
true. But I never held that against
him. I've always been fair-minded.
I could see his point of view as well
as my own. I never hold anything
against him. And I certainly
wouldn't have killed him: You see,
I still—still love him.”
The Inspector fumbled in his
pocket, and brought out a crumpled,
typewritten note. “Were you the one
who wrote this?” he asked.
The woman took the sheet of pa
per and read it quickly. “Better
stick to your high society ladies or
you’ll regret it,” the note said.
She shook her head. “No, of
course I didn't write this. I haven’t
the slightest idea what it moans.
I've never seen the thing before.”
She handed it back to the Inspector.
He turned to Hutchinson, the but
ler, and handed the note to him.
“Have you ever seen this before?”
Hutchinson took in the contents
of the scrap of paper at a glance.
I noticed, and I suppose the Inspec
tor noticed two, that his hand
trembled ever so slightly as he held
it.
“No sir,” he cried, “I never wrote
any such letter as that.”
“Are you—sure?”
“Absolutely sure.”
The Inspector smiled wanly.
“There is a way to tell,” he said
slowly, “just who it was that wrote
this note. You two come up into the
front office. I want to give you a
little test.”
He led the way into the Repre
sentative’s office room, followed by
the woman and man and a coterie
of detectives and reporters.
“Now,” he said, “here’s what I
want you to do. One of you. I be
lieve, sent this note to Representa
tive Lucas. It is very important to
me to know which one of you it
was. To discover that, therefore, I
want you to do this for me—I want
you to sit down here at this type
writer and copy the note on a clean
sheet of paper. Miss Harmon, you
may go first. Just copy the words
of the note down on this sheet of
paper.”
The woman seated herself at the
desk, and with quivering hand in
serted the sheet of paper into the
typewriter. She glanced at the
note, then began to type. In less
than five seconds she had copied off
the brief sentence, working expertly
and without the slightest difficulty.
"You see,” she said, “when I was
very young I was a stenographer.
That was bow I came to meet Paul.”
The Inspector took the newly
typewritten Sheet and compared It
with the note which he had found
cm Lucas's desk. The difference in
typing was immediately apparent.
The first note was poorly written,
the letters were not spaced properly,
the words were not aligned cor
rectly. The copy which the woman
had ir.fede was correctly done in ev
ery detail, the work of an expert
rather than that of an amateur.
Immediately I saw through the
Inspector's method. Having proved
that the housekeeper could not have
written the note which was the only
clue so far unearthed to the mur
derer, he would now turn to Hutch
inson, the butler. The chances
were 100 to 1 that Hutchinson would
do a bungling job on the typewriter,
perhaps making the same obvious
errors which were contained in the
original note. Would this not con
nect him directly to the note as its
author, and thus indirectly to the
murder of the Congressman?
“And now, Mr. Hutchinson,” the
Inspector said, "I want you to do
the same thing Miss Harmon—or
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