Muriel Manning, reporter on the "Evening Statesman," traces a mysterious murder case, for the solution of which her paper has offered a reward of $500, to Mrs. Martin Madison, wife of the president of the local trust company. Madison is on...See moreMuriel Manning, reporter on the "Evening Statesman," traces a mysterious murder case, for the solution of which her paper has offered a reward of $500, to Mrs. Martin Madison, wife of the president of the local trust company. Madison is on the point of foreclosing the $500 mortgage on Muriel's home, where she supports her old mother, and she is insanely anxious to win the money. She forces a confession from Mrs. Madison, who tells her in full the story of her early disgrace at the hands of Howard Trimble, a gambler; his recent return from South America; how he threatened to blackmail her publicly except she gave him a huge sum of money, which she was unable to obtain; and how, in a desperate attempt to shoot herself in his rooms, she had inadvertently killed her persecutor. Muriel hurries home to write the story for the last edition. But visions of the woman in her terrible distress, of her two children and of her aged mother, are too much for the young reporter. When the last edition reaches Mrs. Madison it contains only a brief paragraph, referring to the murdered as "unknown." With trembling hands she puts away the pistol she has been holding in readiness. Meanwhile she has found on the floor where Muriel has dropped it, the letter concerning the mortgage. She persuades her husband to cancel the demand, charging the sum to her own allowance. Written by
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