St. Paul daily globe. [volume] (Saint Paul, Minn.) 1884-1896, 1888-03-02

There was quiet little talk between
| the proprietor and the coroner that
may or may not have had its influence,
but, at all events, the jury returned a
verdict that Moses Isaacson
DIED OF HEART DISEASE.
After that room 80 stood empty for
some time, The proprietor of the house
even talked of mailing up the door, The
German waiter, Adolf, however, dis
suaded him.. not alone by argument
which he only ventured to offer in
| humble way-but by the practical DEM
onstration of himself sleeping in the
fatal chamber, night after night, for
nearly month. Then, as the house
was constantly crowded in all other
parts, Adolf was sent back to his little
room in the attic and No. 80, on the floor
beneath, was thrown open for guests
again, the proprietor reviling his own
stupid superstition in keeping it idle so
| long.
One of the first guests to occupy it
when it was again reOpened was Mrs.
Fanny Mountjoy, lady of middle age
and very pronounced individuality, who
| for many years ant2gOniZed III Clncln-
| natl, Memphis and Louisville the exist
| ing laws for control Of what is politely
known as t'the social evil"
boarding house" in each of the three
cities, and there was no question of her
| having abundant sugar in the kick
or, as it is styled to-day, "b0Odle',-
when she travelled. AT this particular
time she had no house in Cincinnati,
and, for some reasons best known to
| herself, went to Gilliland's. Had not
| the house been SO crowded, a room
lower down would have been accorded
| to lady of such social distinction, and
it was unfortunate T her that such a
necessity existed, as it was simply fatal.
She went to her bed in in Room 80 one
night and has never yet arisen. Her
| death was not allowed to slip by as
triviality. By this time there was a
a good deal of popular excitement over
| the seemingly inevitable fate of persons
who slept in Room 80, and a woman
like Fanny Mountioy was not to be al
| lowed to pass out of life's game without
people asking "Why?" and 'How?"
But, ask as much as they might, no
answers seemed forthcoming. The lady
was dead without any external indica-
ton of having suffered any violence,
and when the doctors made
AN AUTOPSY,
The best conclusion they could arrive
| at was that she had been sutfOcated.
But how? She certainly had not blown
out the gas. Nobody could have gone
in the room to smother her and gone out
again, leaving all the internal fasten-
ings of the windows and door secure, as
they were found. And an ugly feature
of the case was that beyond all POSSIBLE
ity of question Fanny had been robbed.
The clerk of the hotel had changed
one hundred dollar bill for her little
oh hoI MI -,
doing so had seen that she had roll of
such bills ''aS thick as mules leg" as
he expressed it. AS was aScertained.
she had come up from Memphis ex-
pressly to furnish and open another
maiSon de iOie in Cincinnati, and had
the means to do so, in cold cash, with
her that last night of her life. Further
more, she wore handful of costly jew
! elry-gOld diamonds, rubies and emer-
alds-not an atom of which had been
left by the spoiler, whoever he was.
The coroner's inquest upon Fanny was
not so hastily conducted as the others
had been, but its result was simply
finding that she "came to her death at
the hands of person or persons I'M
known"
Gilliland's was getting bad name.
There were not wanting then, any
more than there would be now, cranks
who lad theories about the crimes in
Room 80 having been the work of de-
mon, projected by some unknown mat
ter of evil, and other crankS who shut
ting their mental eyes to the rObberies,
held that the deaths were caused by
sewer gas.
A detective named Tom Randall
scoffed at both those theories. He had
very practical materialistic views, and
had made up his mind that he would
unravel the mystery. SO he took pos
session of No. 80, which was now known
as 1.-The haunted room," with the avOwed
intention of sleeping there week or
two, if nesSary, to catch the midnight
assassin.
TO begin with. he made thorough
examination of the room. 1t was a
rather small apartment, with two WIN
dows and closet. That closet had evil
IDENTIFY at one time afforded way of
ingress and egress by means of door
communicating with a narrow back
stairway, but now that door was fast
tened by at least dozen big nails
driven through its edges into the frame,
making it
NO THOROUGHFARE.
He pulled out several of the nails and
saw that they we're stout ones, good
three and half inches long, driven in
up to their heads. Furthermore he OBJ
served that there were cobwebs in such
positions as to show cOncluSively that
the door could not have been opened for
a long time. And the door between the
closet and the room had stout lock
upon it, with key in the lock that
worked perfectly. Clearly, an oc-
cupant of the room could have
no fear of an attack from
that side. Nevertheless he explored
that stairway beyond the closet. 1t ran
up to the attic-where the servants
rooms were-and there was boxed in
and closed by door that was nailed
fast. He drew the nails, opened the
door and went down the stairs. At the
fast, which upon being opened gave out
to a small iron balcony whence formerly
a bridge ran to another wing of the
building that had been destroyed by fire
and not rebuilt. Tom nailed up the
doors that he had opened, set that all
down as "a blind lead' and passed ON
to other Investigations. He took up the
carpet of the haunted room-the closet
had none-and searched the floor and
sounded the walls for trap-dOor.
There was none. When he made his
report to his superior officers he frankly
admitted that he was puzzled.
Nothing remained for him, that he
could see, but to take possession of his
haunted room and await Developments
SO he occupied it every night; not to
sleep, however. All his sleeping was
done in the day time. The night
through he laid awake, watching. Ten
nights of constant vigils he thus passed
and nothing happened.
The morning after the eleventh night
he did not come down stairs at the usual
hour, fact that awoke immediate
alarm. The worst fears instantly
evoked were unhappily realized to the
fullest extent. Poor Tom Randall was
found dead. He was not undressed,
but lay, with all his clothes on, upon
the bed. His fine gold watch was gone,