GAMBLE FOR LIFE.

Dominion, Volume 5, Issue 1431, 4 May 1912, Page 10

GAMBLE FOR LIFE.

RICH WIDOW'S SUICIDE ON THE VERDICT OF CAMS. Mrs. Blanche Carson, a San Francisco widow, having an independent fortune estimated at nearly •tfiOO.OGO, was arrested, on her own confession, for smuggling, onreturning from a trip round the world last night (says Ihe New York correspondent of the London "Daily Mail" under date of March 21). This morning, overwhelmed with shame at her predicament, she committed suicide in her hotel suite by hanging herself from the window with her trunk strap. Mrs. Carson arrived in the liner George Washington last night, and she declared a dutiable package of unstrung pearls, purchased in India, but the valuation she placed on them was so inadequate ihat tho officials followed her to the Hotel Hroztell, "Get niy hat over there," she said to the examiner who was questioning her in her rooms, "cut open the lining, and you will find a pair of diamond earrings which cost me a thousand pounds." Tho official opened the hat,, and found the diamonds sewn in between the brim and tho lining. Other jewels he found in the lady's corsets and skirt hems. She was formally arrested and taken before the United States Commissioner, but released on bail till Friday.

Mrs. CfU'scm returned to her hotel, ate a hearty dinner, and retired to her rooms. Late in the evening she telephoned to her solicitor lo ask if her arrest would bo in the' newspapers, and what lie thought would be her punishment, The solicitor 'confessed that she was liable to imprisonment. Mrs. Carson offered no comment, and nothing further was heard of her until, on the hotel manager breaking into her apartment this afternoon, he found her dead in her dressing gown, hanging to the window. A pack of cards which was laid out on the table beside the body 'indicated that she had played a game of solitaire with herself, with life as the stakes, and had succeeded all but for the final ace. The jewels which sho had not declared, avid which were seized, are valued. at about five thousand pounds'sterling.