The Skeleton

Drama Of The Street Vaurigard, No. 58, In Paris—A Saving Mother-In-Law, And An Expensive Son-In-Law—The Widow Houet Mysteriously Disappears—Letters Received, Intimating That She Has Committed Suicide—Are They Forged?—An Able Detective, Mr. Chouard, Traces The Affair During Twelve Years Bastien’s Extortions—Robert, The Coward With An Unquiet Conscience—Gouvernant, The Noble Instrument Of Extortion—Arrested At Last—Condemning Evidence In The Criminal’s Pocket—Who Is The Murderer?—A Skeleton As A Witness In The Case—Startling Discoveries Of Science!—Phrenology Does Miracles—Murder Will Out!

by George McWatters

On the 13th of September, 1860, a woman, about seventy or seventy-eight years old, the widow Houet, had disappeared from her domicile, rue des Mathurins, in Paris.

The widow Houet, at the moment of her disappearance, possessed about 6,000 francs, interest; she had had her part in the inheritance of Mr. Lebrun, her brother, who possessed a capital of 43,000 francs. She had two children, a son who was an idiot, and a daughter who, in 1850, had married a certain Mr. Robert, a dealer in wine and engraver on crystal. The uncle Lebrun had given a dowry to this daughter.

From the very beginning of the marriage, mother and son-in-law did not agree; discussions about the property had made the widow Houet so afraid of her son-in-law, that she often said: “I am sure, he will be the death of me.”

On Thursday, the 13th of September, about six o’clock in the morning, Robert went to the widow Houet, and invited her to take breakfast with him and his wife, on that very morning. “I will come,” replied the widow. At seven o’clock, her housekeeper, Mrs. Ledion Jusson, came, and the widow reproached her… Read More