Detroit evening times. (Detroit, Mich) 1921-1958, 1942-09-20

FTER numbering his former friend,
Phillip Peters at 1885 West Moncrieff
Place Denver, Theodore T.. Conveys
did something new in the annals of crime.
1t was so difficult and incredible that police
man tainted after enduring for Is minutes
what the killer had stood for more than nine
months No wonder they could hardly believe
his confession at first.
Resisting the natural impulse to flee from
the scene of the murder, Conveys remained
right there under the same roof with the
victims widow. overhearing the puzzled specu-
lation of the household and Of the police as
they searched the building
Between visits of the detectives. he kept
in touch with his own murder-mystery by
listening in on his secret radio.
Yet during that time, the presence of this
extra member Of the family made itself felt
occasionally by glimpses of a shadow passing
in the dark and Of footsteps on the ceiling
where only ghost could walk. Neghbors de-
tected foul smell issuing from a rain spout;
but ii was a window shade and the click Of
key in lock which finally betrayed the
spider man"
The spider" is six feet tall but only the
thinnest man on the Denver Police Force was
able 10 squeeze into the killers hideaway and
when the small cop tainted the others had TO
saw bigger hole in order to rescue him.
On October II, the body OF Peters, retired
railroad auditor was found on the floor of his
kitchen. He had been killed by blows on the
head, but. there were no fingerprints, nothing
had been stolen, except an old-fashioned
"Hoot-Owl" revolver. few spinters of hard
rubber. found on the floor, indicated that the
elderly auditor had been beaten to death
with that.
Mr.. Peters was alone in the house and the
killer evidently had plenty of time for Destroy
ing clues and getting away.
Detectives made a routine search Of the
premises for him and seeing trap door in
the top Of the closet 10 an unoccupied bed
room. did not investigate the shallow space
above twelve feet by four, under the rafters.
Their reasons were that the door was only
eight inches by fifteen, too small for a man
to get through. and because murderer
would be fool enough to trap himself in such
place.
They were wrong on both theories.
The house had been the one to which
Mr.. Peters had taken his bride 40 years ago,
and bride, bridegroom and house had grown
old together. Peters was a mandolin player
and in the early years Of their marriage, his
mandolin club often rehearsed there.
Among the youngest of the musicians was
Ted Conveys, an extremely thin youth but
better-dressed than the others and with
charming manner which was expected to take
him far along the road to success.
But Ted Conveys had been a spoiled child
and as a young man failed at one job after
another, finally running away to become
tramp, the hardest profession of all--
Early last Fall he came shutting back to
his home town TO find that nobody recognized
the gaunt, gray hobo as the once dapper thin
man"
Conveys now SO years old, had not come for
the ordinary tramps handout TO be eaten on
the back steps under the disappearing eye of
the family dog. He wanted TO make a good
sized touch in real money enough to buy
himself many square meals and get his teeth
fixed up.
He headed for the home of his old friend
Peters. But pride was not quite dead in the
tramp and IL stopped him in front of the house
How could he reveal TO the man he had once
almost patronized that he had fallen so low?
Just then Peters came out, talking
earnestly with a companion. Both glanced at
him as they might at farmers scarecrow
got into car and drove away.
Conveys, though a failure at everything
else, seems to have trained himself in the
tramp business well enough. He had picked up
the information that Mrs. Peters was in the