MYSTERY OF THE POISONED MILLIONAIRE.

Pukekohe & Waiuku Times, Volume 5, Issue 191, 14 July 1916, Page 3 (Supplement)

MYSTERY OF THE POISONED MILLIONAIRE.

DOCTOR'S USE OF DEADLY GERMS FORyHIS FATHER-IN-LAW.

America, the home of sensations, lias all that it can consume in that line just now. It lias, indeed, a sensation of sensations, a record case ot mystery and crime. Gradually the riddle is being work, ed out. The story is told below. In Grand Rapids, Michigan, lived an old man of seventy-twe and his wit, 1 . He was John E. Peck, and he had made a fortune of 1,500,000 dollars (£300,ooo) as a drug manufacturer. One tiling to note is that he never enjoyed particularly good health. Also living in Grand Rapids was Arthur "Warren Waite. He was born there, and passed from the local high school to Michigan University. •He shone brilliantly as a scholar. From Michigan he went to the Royal College of Surgeons at Edinburgh, and there continued his studies Later he went to South Africa, and practised as a dentist there. It is also said that for a short time he studied "in the University of London, - ' and at Harvard. When war broke out he returned to the United States.

John E. Peck had a daughter, Clara Louise Peck. From the marriage point of view all Grand Rapids knew that she was a good catch. Along went Dr. Arthur Warren Waite, and she fell in love with him. On September 9 last year they married. He was the successful Romeo of Grand Rapids.

From Grand Rapids the young couple went to New Y'ork. Colosseum Apartments, Riverside Drive, being a nice place, they went to live there. It ii one of the most expensive places ot residence in Mew York—an immense building, with a semi-circular front, standing at the corner of One Hundred and Sixteenth Street.

Peck allowed the young couple 250 dollars (£SO) a month, not much for "the most expensive quarter of New York." Tile mystery is developing.

HOW SUSPICION AROSE

Early in the present year nothing was more natural than that the young couple should invite Mrs. Peck to visit them. Clara was an only daughter, and had been all her days with her mother —a home girl, in fact. By January 30 Mrs. Peck was dead. Bright's disease, presumably, was the cause. But whatever it was it was never to bo known, except by revelation. Her body was cremated. Yet the doctor attending her had thought hhe would live. So the case stood for a few more weeks.

Came .March 12. Then old Jonn Peck himself was dead. This time heart disease was the presumed cause. His body, too, was shipped to Grand Rapids—to be cremated. But mystery was in the air. John Peck had* a son, Percy, his only other child after Clara. Suddenly he received this startling message : "Suspicions aroused. Demand autopsy. Examine body,—K. Adams, Colosseum Apartments, N.Y." But no "K. Adams" was known in Colosseum Apartments 1 What was the kev to the mystery?

"Quickly District Attorrey Swann and his men were at work. Already there was a suspect. He was watched night and day. and could not leave the city. For arsenic had been found in the old man's body. Ordinarily, there might have been nothing strange ;n that. His body had been embalmed, and the arsenic might have found its way into his stomach in the embalming liquid, though arsenic is forbidden bv United States law.

Not only in the stomach, but the poison was found in the tissues of the old man's brain ! There was the proof. He had been murdered, and presumably his wife had been murdered also. THIRD CRIME CONTEMPLATED. All New York and Grand Rapids began to ring with the mystery. Presumptive evidence began to grow apace that the murder of a third victim had been contemplated. With that life out of the way there would be nobody to stand between the murderer and the handling of the old millionaire's fortune.

Through all these grim developments, Dr. Arthur Warren Waite went his usual dai'y way. He did not drink, he did not smoke, he did not swear. "Ruth.-' lied." Miss Catherine Peek, sifter of the dead millionaire, proved that he was not an embodiment of all the virtues. He told her. and he told his young wife, that he spent his daytime in doing professional work for the hospitals in New York and elsewhere. "But I found that he did not spend his time as he said he did." grieved the elderlv ladv.

Perhaps, behind her lament was a recollection of 40,00(1 (€8000) which she had uiven to him to invest for her, she having '''great faith in his business ability."

Ktrange'y enough, it was Dr. Waite who set the cremation of the old millionaire in motion. The old man, in speaking of death, he said, had oxpressed a wish to be cremated when he died. Still more strange, he too, died at Riverside Drive, having been invited there for a change of scene and air after his wife died. Now begins the climax of this

'•'strange, eventful story." On March 23 the District Attorney ordered the arrest of Dr. Arthur Warren Waite, son-in-law of the dead millionaire and husband of the victim's daughter. Waite is only twenty-eight, while his wife is still only twenty-six. Miss Catherine Peek, the old man's sister, had said in an interview that her brother "might have jrono to Dr. Waite'* study, got a bottle of arsenic there, and so have taken a dose of it in mistake." When arrested. Waite was under the influence of drugs he had taken. But. more significant sti'l. books with information as to poison marked in them were found in Colosseum Apartment-.

Gradually tlie story around t!ie arretted mac. \ya« probed. Packets of strong chemicals wore found in bin pockets, a servant declared that she saw him pour "'medicine" into the old man's sonp and tea, and —another woman crept into the case. For the moment her identity was veiled, hut it camo to be linked with that of a woman with whom he had lived at the Plaza in tho name of Dr. and Mrs. A. W. Walter*. Already "a sensation of the age" was being prodieted. Though allowed only 2">o dollars (C-VV) a month by tho dead man. Waite's living expenses, it was found, must have tota'ted 50,000 dollar* (£10.0001! His devices for keeping bin double life secret from his wife began more and more to alworb the police noonle. He had given a false address in Fifth Avenue, and it was discover-

Ed that he had never studied in any ot the London University schools. Not less curious, it was found that a man had despatched the "K. Adams'' telegram ! Next the mystery took an acute turn. Under a recent will young Mrs. Waite left all her fortune to her husband. He agreed to make her his legatee in return.

By degrees Waite's " popularity with women'' was ascertained. He had been great in the tennis-courts, and had alwavs been ambitious.

Presently it was found that he had sent part bf the 40,000 dol'ars (£8000) entrusted to him by Miss Peck for deposit in a bank at Grand Rapids. So closely had he been watched that when he entered a telephone-box a detective flitted into the one adjoining it to overhear his conversation. All Grand Rapids had formed the notion that he was prospering. Waite's own account of things was that he had bought arsenic at the request of the old millionaire himself. He had become depressed, it seemed, after his wife's death —professed a wish to die. indeed. Did Waite tell Irs wife that fact 0

"No,"' he said, when asked. But presently he confessed that on March 0 iie bought the arsenic vhicli caused his father-in-law's death on March 12. He himself administered it. From suspicion, he was then charged with murder out and out, for l-y tl at time the drug stores where he bought the poison had been discovered. There were stories at ths point ot stuck speculations, and also evidence that Waite had "lived luxuriously without gainful occupation."

At last came "the woman in the case"—the "woman of mystery," as New York now calls her

Mrs. Margaret Horton she turned out to bo when found —"a young and beautiful contralto singer," who hoped one day to become a star at the Metropolitan Opera. She is the wife ot a Harry Mack Horton. an electrical engineer and "dealer in war supplies.' Without disguise, she admitted her connection with Waite. It was quite innocent, she declared, Waite having fitted up a "studio" at the Hotel Plaza, so that they "might study music and languages together."

"NOTHING TO CONCEAL

So far as that belief is concerned nothing could have been more amazing than the deve'opmonts that were going on at the very moment that "Mrs. Harrq," as she is called, was speaking. It was being discovered that in Grand Rapids Waite had expressed the opinion that his wife and her parents "had not long to live." Again, 10,000 dollars (£2000) that he sent to his brother Clyde, in Grand Rapids, is supposed to have been a part of the 40,0(H) dollars (£8000) entrusted to him by his wife's aunt.

Bo these things as they may, "Mrs. Harry" denied that she had concealed her connection with the case in order to shield Waite. Her sole idea had been "to spare herself and her husband." Waite was an accomplished pianist, she added, and'she was studying French, German, and Italian for grand opera.

There was no bed in the studio, and they never stayed there at night. An hour or two in the afternoon, sometimes longer, represented the daily programme.

When she heard of Dr. Waite's trouble, "Mrs. Harry" added, she left the hotel and sought out her friend, Dorothy van Palmcnberg. But what was more than curious was the fact that Horton himself, her approving husband, "did not know that the man with whom his wife was practising was the Dr. Waite under arrest for the death of the old millionaire."

OTHER DEATH-PLOTS SUGGESTED.

Meanwhile it was found that Waite had tried, through Raymond C. Schindler, a detsctive, to induce his maid, Dora Hillier, to say that she "saw him hand the packet (arsenic) to the old man" (Peck). But he did not know Schindlor was a detective! He actually signed an order for 1000 dollars (£200), to be given to the maid for an inducement to lie. 4'lien suspicion ot other " death-p'ots" began to develop. As to signs of collusion, more marvellous twisting in tins marvellous case tended to show that Waite himself was bring blackmailed. In any case, it was not until his brother Frank visited him in Bellevue Hospital that Waite made a clean breast of the poisoning of the old man without any kind of reserve. "I did give him arsenic myself,'' belaid. "The story I told of his wanting to commit suicide was a lie. 1 killed him, but I did not kill Mrs. Peck."

Within a few hours of his making this statement there was a fresh turn in the maze of mystery. The police had another arrest in view. Gradually it came to light that Waite had heard of suspicions against him from the undertaker who buried the dead man. Bribery began to creep in. Kane, an embahner, was offered 9000 dollars (CISCO) to i-av arsenic was in the embnlnline flufd. But 2a,000 dollars (t'oOOO) was mentioned.

Some days later the police were on the track again. The embalmer was io be arrested "on sight." Eventually, lie Jed them to Orient Point, L.1., where the sum of 9000 dollars (£1S00) was dug up. Then Waite himself confessed his crime in a letter to the "New York World" at the very moment when there seemed to be more mystery yet to come.