Search Posts
"Father Murphy has the right of it, we should call the residents of the castle and make certain we announce ourselves for a visit, and make certain our tour includes the whole of it, so that we may see everything from stem to stern." "Apologies Kwan I meant no offense it seems in these lands hobbies is a turn for things thought trivial and of little import."
"I have visited a number of castles in Japan, yet none here." @Jake
Adjusts his katana...recalls how much work and detail it required to make it...
@Kwan
"So the recent events here are only related to people here and none of them have any ties to New York? What can you tell us about the series of unfortunate events here?" Steps a bit closer...
"Ah Translation, it can be a difficult task. I have several scrolls in Japanese. People often fail to realize the translations are so inaccurate. Hip for example...the word is actually this region."
"Oh yes what can you tell us about the recent events here?"
"The trap vial itself I understand a liquid that once broken becomes a gas that will kill any who stand within it. I have placed the glass vial within a metal tube and packed materials to prevent breakage and water within to quench the tube should it break. I plan to let the inspector know of this item and it's ties to the syndicate of evil that seems to be operating in the area."
Pulling out the bottom drawer you realize that it has a false bottom. The drawer itself is much heavier than you'd expect from a wooden drawer. There's no obvious way to open the false bottom but there is something that might be a keyhole underneath the drawer. Using his extensive knowledge of crafting Japanese puzzle boxes Caine searches for the portion that moves and might unlock the box......
Sorry for the disruption, this always reminds me of 1920's Cuthulu because it was an actual event that people followed in the news, much like the newspaper clippings that are used in this adventure. I thought someone might find the information interesting, and contrast it with the global instant news we are used to in the modern era.
DM Aubster
Scotland Yard had a few experimental radio trucks in operation, they were low frequency and used Morse code...... The radio in crime fighting was brought out first in 1910..... Doctor Crippen - The First "Radio Assisted" Arrest.
The guests - retired mime artist Paul Martinelli and his wife Clara - were not to know that their hosts, who called each other 'Peter' and 'Cora', were playing another, more lethal game. The latter were both American and born of shopkeepers: he in the Midwest; she, with the Polish maiden name of Mackamotzki, in Brooklyn tenements. As man and second wife since marrying in New Jersey when she was 19, they had little in common now in middle age. She was a 'theatrical' in her late 30s - a singer of ample bosom, medium stature and mediocre ability, who fostered her delusions by claiming her father was titled, collecting diamonds, indulging a taste for florid pink, acting as honorary treasurer of the Music Hall Ladies Guild, and consorting with available men. Her stage name was 'Belle Elmore'. Her husband, in his late 40s, was smaller and hen-pecked. Adopting the title of 'doctor', he was a homeopathic physician who had fallen to peddling quack remedies such as 'painless' dentistry and 'Baron Mackamotzki's cure for deafness'. Because of his philandering his wife had threatened to pocket their savings and leave. His name was Hawley Harvey Crippen. When the Martinelli's departed at 01:30, it was cold. "Don't come down, Belle," advised Clara, prophetically. "You'll catch your death" WHERE IS MRS CRIPPEN? Neighbours later claimed to have heard female screams, pleas for mercy, and a pistol shot - or perhaps a banging door. Whatever happened at No 39 after their guests, the Martinelli's, had left early in the morning of 1 February 1910, Crippen would not tell and his wife could never disclose. Unsurprisingly, perhaps, as the butt of her personal extravagance, domestic frugality and serial infidelity, Crippen seemed relieved. Instead of reporting her as missing and letting the police prove otherwise, he spent that night in their house with the lover whose miscarriage the year before had been the cause of their ultimate marital rift. She was Miss Ethel le Neve, his demure and attractive secretary, aged 27. The following day, he pawned some of Belle's jewels, and wrote two letters, purportedly from her, 'resigning' as honorary treasurer of the Music Hall Ladies Guild because "illness of a near relative" had called her suddenly to America. At a music hall ladies' ball that month, Ethel rather tactlessly wore one of Belle's brooches. In March, Ethel moved in with Crippen - as his 'niece', according to neighbours - at the same time as he gave their landlord three months' notice. He also told Clara Matinetti that Belle was seriously ill and unlikely to live, then sent her a telegram confirming Belle had died. As to where, he was vague: "in some little town near San Francisco, with a Spanish name I think;" .. "in Los Angeles." Another music hall friend made enquiries in California, found nothing, and informed Scotland Yard.
Living for romance after his unfulfilling marriage, Crippen took Ethel le Neve to France for Easter and brought back an au pair to teach her French. Parading his lover so brazenly appears to have been his cardinal error; once the suspicions of his wife's friends had been aroused and reported to Scotland Yard, his fate was sealed. "Have the doctor seen and shaken up by a chief inspector," noted the detective superintendent who, on 30 June 1910, was given the details to investigate. The case was assigned to Chief Inspector Walter Dew. On Friday 8 July, Dew called on Crippen at his office in New Oxford Street to "have a word" about the death of his wife. "I suppose I'd better tell you the truth," Crippen replied calmly. The 'truth' - that Belle was not dead at all but had decamped to Chicago with one of her men friends, a former prizefighter called Bruce Miller - had been too humiliating for him to admit. Though sceptical, Dew got on so well with his suspect that, in mid-statement, they went to an Italian restaurant for lunch. The same afternoon, with his detective-sergeant, he searched the house in Hilldrop Crescent, but found nothing. He was now almost persuaded. To contact the missing wife, he even helped her husband prepare a small advertisement to appear in an American newspaper! Even then, had Crippen but known it or kept his nerve, he might have been 'home and dry'. WHERE IS MRS CRIPPEN? Neighbours later claimed to have heard female screams, pleas for mercy, and a pistol shot - or perhaps a banging door. Whatever happened at No 39 after their guests, the Martinelli's, had left early in the morning of 1 February 1910, Crippen would not tell and his wife could never disclose. Unsurprisingly, perhaps, as the butt of her personal extravagance, domestic frugality and serial infidelity, Crippen seemed relieved. Instead of reporting her as missing and letting the police prove otherwise, he spent that night in their house with the lover whose miscarriage the year before had been the cause of their ultimate marital rift. She was Miss Ethel le Neve, his demure and attractive secretary, aged 27. The following day, he pawned some of Belle's jewels, and wrote two letters, purportedly from her, 'resigning' as honorary treasurer of the Music Hall Ladies Guild because "illness of a near relative" had called her suddenly to America. At a music hall ladies' ball that month, Ethel rather tactlessly wore one of Belle's brooches. In March, Ethel moved in with Crippen - as his 'niece', according to neighbours - at the same time as he gave their landlord three months' notice. He also told Clara Matinetti that Belle was seriously ill and unlikely to live, then sent her a telegram confirming Belle had died. As to where, he was vague: "in some little town near San Francisco, with a Spanish name I think;" .. "in Los Angeles." Another music hall friend made enquiries in California, found nothing, and informed Scotland Yard. THE ESCAPE For a supposed master criminal, the 'doctor' was 'shaken up' a bit too easily. Having almost convinced Dew of the Yard that his wife had run off with another man, he panicked, and on 9 July 1910, the day after their house had been searched with nothing found, he spoilt his chances by disappearing himself, with his beloved mistress in tow. The following week, Dew wished him to clarify some minor details and finding that Crippen had asked the office junior to buy some boy's clothes and taken indefinite leave of absence, returned to Hilldrop Crescent. As no-one answered, the police began a second, more thorough search, with spades and shovels. On Wednesday 13 July, beneath loose bricks in the coal cellar floor, they discovered a decaying human body: headless, limbless, and boneless. In the filleted remains were found traces of hyoscine, a poison Crippen was subsequently found to have ordered from a chemist before his wife's hasty 'departure'. On the Friday, a warrant for the arrest of Dr. Crippen was issued: 'Wanted for murder and mutilation of a woman.' Of Ethel le Neve, the official notice added: 'Will endeavour to leave country.' Dressed as a boy, with her hair cut short, and accompanied by her 'father', one 'John Robinson', she had in fact left without delay, and was now lying low at an hotel in Brussels, waiting to board a ship from Antwerp to Quebec. The captain of the ship they boarded was to prove their nemesis. THE DISGUISE When they boarded the Canadian Pacific steamer SS Montrose at Antwerp on 20 July 1910, Crippen and his mistress thought they had tickets to freedom. In reality they were as good as trapped already. At 39 Hilldrop Crescent, as the net tightened, there had at least been the comfort of space and privacy; Crippen and Belle had originally rented the house because it was large enough for them to have separate beds in separate rooms, and take in lodgers - which, some years earlier, he had caught her doing, rather too literally. As lovers since then, 'wedded' to each other with pet-names of 'Hub' and 'Wifie', he and Ethel had now booked themselves a four-berth cabin; and, being among the few of the 1,000 passengers not sleeping below decks on bunks in steerage, they were bound to be noticed. And noticed they were when, within hours of sailing, the ship's captain, Henry Kendall, glanced from his quarters and spied them as 'father' and 'son', holding hands a bit too affectionately behind one of the lifeboats. Kendall promptly checked the 'wanted' descriptions in his newspaper. Although the man no longer had moustache or spectacles and the 'boy', in low heels, looked shorter, the similarities were undeniable. Because his ship was one of the few fitted with wireless, Kendall was able to relay his suspicions to Scotland Yard immediately; and, because his safe transmission range was still no more than 150 miles (240km), he would have to do this soon. Meanwhile, he had to make doubly sure. CAPTAIN KENDALL'S SUSPICIONS Frightened though he must have been by the newspaper coverage, the 'wanted' posters and the British policemen watching the gangway in Antwerp, Crippen could scarcely fail to succumb to the deceptive flattery of Henry Kendall, captain of the SS Montrose. After all those years of being patronised by his penny-pinching wife, here on board ship he was being treated with respect - being asked with his 'son' to eat at the captain's table; being invited into the captain's personal quarters to fill in a form required before landing in North America; being gulled into laughter by the captain's jokes. Little did Crippen realise that, slipping into their cabin before lunch on the first day, this amiable fellow had seen the flannel torn from a female bodice, and ever since become a cold-blooded sleuth, stacking up evidence. Even the jokes had a purpose: to make Crippen bare his teeth. Contrary to description, they were his own and not false, but this was a minor discrepancy. His last doubts were banished when a gust of wind exposed the safety pin fastening the back of Ethel's trousers, split to accommodate her feminine curves. At 15:00 on Friday 22 July 1910, when the ship was 130 miles (208km) west of Poldhu, Kendall asked the Marconi operator to send a wireless message: 'Have strong suspicions that Crippen London cellar murderer and accomplice are among Saloon passengers. Moustache taken off growing beard. Accomplice dressed as boy. Voice manner and build undoubtedly a girl.' KENDALLS MESSAGE REACHES SCOTLAND YARD Steaming westwards, the SS Montrose fell out of range for transmission to Poldhu, Cornwall, soon after Kendall sent his message on Friday 22 July 1910. For listening and receiving, the range quadrupled to 600 miles (960km), which allowed a few days extra for direct response. Yet, as the two objects of his surveillance grew visibly into their police descriptions, no response was forthcoming. Kendall remained on tenterhooks until late on Sunday night, when his Marconi operator intercepted an urgent communication, seemingly relayed from a London newspaper to a reporter on board the White Star liner SS Laurentic: 'What is Inspector Dew doing? - Are passengers excited over chase? Rush reply.' By a circuitous path - landline telegraph from Poldhu to Canadian Pacific's managing director in Liverpool; Marconigram from the police there to Scotland Yard - Kendall's information about the fugitive suspects had taken five hours to reach Dew, but left him just enough time to dash to Liverpool by train and embark on the SS Laurentic, due to sail for Quebec next day. To the superior who gave him clearance, Dew explained simply: 'I want to go after them in a fast steamer.' The SS Montrose had three days' lead but its voyage would take 11 more, at a speed of 13 knots; the 15,000-ton SS Laurentic - newer, and faster by only four knots - would take a week exactly. The pursuit would be close-run, with the quarry unaware THE CHASE What the chase lacked in speed, it made up in duration - and in mounting excitement as, at a rate of 100 miles (160 kms) a day, the Laurentic on its more northerly Great Circle course overhauled the Montrose, trundling along a Great Circle 450 miles (720 kms) to the south. This was the first criminal manhunt sparked and fuelled by wireless and, in covering it, the world's Press spared no effort: 'Is it Crippen?' asked one newspaper, reporting with less than total accuracy that a 'clergyman' and his 'son' were on the Allan Line steamer Sardinian; 'Crippen Found', 'Wireless Telegraphy Gives Warning', 'A Race Across the Ocean', 'Identity Beyond A Doubt', headlined others. But towards the epicentre of this early media storm, information was more closely guarded. Whether they rumbled him or not, the passengers on the Laurentic were supposed to believe that Dew of the Yard was 'Mr Dewhurst'. On the Montrose, Captain Kendall did all he could to protect the fugitives from the truth of their predicament. From Monday 25 July 1910, his ship was out of receiving range from land, but via others fitted with wireless he could listen, and bounce updates of evidence back to Scotland Yard. This traffic increased, even though the Laurentic was still out of direct range when it passed him two days later. Crippen remained oblivious. On his deckchair in the sun as the aerial above him crackled with electricity, he remarked to Kendall: "What a wonderful invention wireless is!" CAPTURE! After the Laurentic overtook the Montrose on 27 July 1910, the ships passed Newfoundland the faster to the north and slower to the south - and their courses began converging in the estuary of the St Lawrence river. Via Canadian shore stations coming into range, wireless messages began converging, too. Most were from newspapers for Crippen, who had been getting more jumpy as land approached. But there was one sent on Friday 29 to Captain Kendall from Chief Inspector Dew, who had landed 200 miles (320 kms) upriver at Rimouski. "Will board you at Father Point. Please keep any information till I arrive there strictly confidential," he instructed. "What the devil do you think I've been doing?" Kendall snapped back, before taking control of the situation and signalling Dew that, as soon as the Montrose arrived there, he should come aboard disguised as a pilot - but only after ensuring the world's Press stayed well out of sight. Having lent Crippen a 'whodunnit' to calm him down, Kendall nonetheless feared he might resort to his gun, and such precautions appeared sensible. Dew concurred, and when the St Lawrence fog lifted just before 9 o'clock on the morning of Sunday 31 was one of several 'pilots' to board the Montrose. "Why so many?" asked Crippen. Within minutes, Dew removed his pilot's cap and shook Crippen's hand. The fugitive gulped in shock. "Thank God it's all over", he said - and meekly held out his wrists for the handcuffs. CRIPPEN'S FATE IS SEALED Subliminally, or by direct reference, every newspaper article about the Laurentic's pursuit of the Montrose and the sensational aftermath was an advertisement for wireless; within a year, the number of merchant ships equipped with it had increased immensely and popular demand for it to be made compulsory on all but smaller vessels had become unstoppable. Witnessed by Dew and Kendall, the chase's closing scenes were played on 31 July 1910, aboard the SS Montrose. In the captain's cabin, Canadian police officers arrested Crippen for the 'murder and mutilation' of his wife. As 'an accessory after the fact', his mistress was apprehended on her bunk, while engrossed in a romantic novel. On a signal of three blasts of the SS Montrose's siren, the ship was then over-run by journalists. In Quebec next morning, Crippen and le Neve were led off the ship to face extradition, a voyage back to Liverpool, and the ordeal of being tried separately at London's Central Criminal Court, the 'Old Bailey', before the Lord Chief Justice - and world's Press. On 22 October, after a five-day trial, having protested his innocence to the last, Crippen was found 'guilty of wilful murder'. The following week, his mistress was acquitted. Dressed in black with a black veil, and having changed her name to Allen, she sailed for New York on 23 November, the same day her 'hub' was hanged at Pentonville Prison - and took his adored 'wifie's' photograph and letters with him to the grave.
|
