Marion Marlowe's Cleverness, or, Exposing a Bold Fraud — page 28: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

26 It was proven conclusively that he was not !'rederic Stanton’s nephew, nor any relation at all to the pompous Englishman. Mrs. Gregg, his mother, was a full-blooded Italian, whose marriage to an Englishman helped to obliterate many of her natural char- acteristics. Away back in her youth, Frederic Stan- ton had jilted her, and the vindictive blood in her veins had not allowed her to forget it. During her life in London she learned much of his family, and when she came to He was rich and had forgotten her—it was her opportunity for vengeance. America, a widow, she sought him out. The vicious woman was not slow to de- velop her plans, and in almost no time at all she was installed in The Norwood. ° Then began the plan to rob him of his money. It was a bad one, indeed but the woman was desperate. | Frederic Stanton had nephews that he had never seen, and it was easy for her to in- struct her own son in the family history of the Stantons and then palm him off on the not over-clever man as the youngest son of a younger brother, whom she happened to know had married an Italian. | Frederic Stanton never corresponded with the members of his family, but he was not averse to his handsome nephew’s overtures. This young man, with his striking face, would create a furor in society, and Mr. Stanton would have sacrified every virtue he possessed on that altar. It was Edmund who supplied the most of the information, For over a month he had been cabling frequently to England, His information was reserved until the last, but when it was given it was overwhelmingly convincing. Pat it was Nannie’s confession that fixed the actual burden of crime and corroborated MY QUEEN. She swore that she saw. Mrs. Gregg leave the murdered man’s room at one o'clock in the morning of that terrible night, and that there were fresh stains of blood upon her hands and clothing. The horror of the sight had nearly turned her brain, but she was only about half-witted, and Mrs. Gregg soon frightened her into silence. Then Marion came upon the scene, and discovery followed. She revealed the das- tardly plot, which was almost unrivalled in boldness. No one quite understood Howard Ever- ett’s exact position in the matter, but it was apparent to Marion that he had helped to place himself under suspicion for no other reason than to give her time to search the premises and to keep the real culprit as free from fear as possible. “T did not intend that he should get ner- vous if I‘could help it,” he told her, laugh- ingly. that we wished to accomplish, and sg long as we could not clip the wings of our bird, we thought it advisable not to scare him.” Then he told her the story of his friend Arden’s affection for the young girl whom the Italian had married and ill-treated. Marion listened with the light of indigna- tion in her eyes, but she never repeated, even to Everett, that ardent love scene in the “You see there were several things library. + On the next day following, Frederic Stan- ton was buried. Thanks to his niece, his body was not placed in the ground until after his assassin was safely in custody. It was a clever bit of work for all of the avengers, but a stupid blunder on the part of | the wicked Italian woman. The hiding of the forged will was the fatal act, yet, had it not been for Marion’s sharp eyes, it might never have been discovered. : im (e(0) IOOKS mie (E(0) : ‘