Smothered in a Wardrobe

Feilding Star, Volume XI, Issue 104, 25 February 1890, Page 4

Smothered in a Wardrobe

The following strange history has boen whispered abroad concerning oneol the principal dressmakers of Paris, a woman whose taste and elegance of ! design in certain details of feminine costumes are well known. It appears that there exists in. Paris a law forbidding any house, that employs workpeople from forcing them to work after a stipulated hour,, which is, I think, ten o'clock. The pressure of orders, inevitable to the Exhibition season, temptod Madame X— — to break this law. Her work-rooms Were in full tide of operation one evening near midnight, •. when an ominous summons sounded at the door, followed by the dreaded mandate — " Open, in- the name of -the law." In an instant the goods and, sewing •implements were whisked out of sight, the lights were extinguished,* and the Workwomen were hidden away . here, there and; everywhere.. One girl, a delicate little creature, was hurriedly thrust into -a great wardrobe hung with dresoes, the • door closed and locked upon her, and the key removed. The visit of inspection of the police revealed nothing, and as soon as they had taken their departure the girls ; were released from their hiding-places. But when the wavdtohe door was un locked the corpse of the unhappy child who had been concealed there fell Upon the floor, • >he 'had died *'of •suffocation. TMb story had been hushed up, not a hint of it appearing in the Paris papers. /;