Evening Star Newspaper, July 26, 1931, Page 64

2 who make a business of compromising married mén, but manage witholit ever creating a scandal, which would hurt them as much as their victim. As neat a piece of blackmailing work as the history of this branch of crime knows was accomplished in London during May last year. I pick it because it shows how different the real thing, as practiced by the astute pro- fessionls of international crookdom, is from the general run of blackmailing that comes up in the courts and gcts the criminal a well geserved 10 years. An American banker came over to stay three months in England and Europe. His wife had preceded him and was staying in Paris, in- tending to come to London for June and part of July. Her husbind, having business in London, left the boat at Southampton, intend- ing to stay a few days in London and then fly over to Paris. Now, on the boat he had met a most at- tractive “English wom=n. He first saw her in the dining saloon the first night out, several tables away, but ia a direct line with his eye, and he recollected that he had noticed her in the Palm Beach hoiel where hé had been staying two months before. It chanced then that he found tteir promenade deck chairs were alongeside one another. So causually, eas- ily and quite nicely, they met. She was traveled, sophisticated, not young— perhaps 35—a man’s woman; very well bred, but also most alluring; in short, the sort of woman a middle-aged banker would be at- tracted by. Her husband, she said, had gone up to Canada on a two-month hunting ex- pedition. These strenuous pastimes bored her, so she was coming bome. He thought there could be no harm in ask- ing her to dine with him and go to the opera when they got to town. She smilingly con- sented. Then she told him her car was meet- ing her at Southampton. Would he like to motor up with her? He would. The big car, the well trained chauffeur, the discfeet maid impressed the banker and con- firmed his general impressions of his new ac- quaintance. The first party was perfect. Another was arranged. She telephoned at the last moment she would not have time to get over for din- ner, and would he give her supper? Returning from the theater, she flinched on the threshold of the hotel's luxury restaurant. She had a headache. Perhaps she ought to have dined. Couldn't they find a quieter place without music and dancing? He made his mistake then—they always do! He suggested a quiet little supper and a bottle of champagne in the sitting room of his suite. Late at night. Cigarettes and liqueurs. A knock on the door. The lady calmly slid the single orchid-adorned strap of her frock off her shoulder and deftly disarranged her coif- fure. “That,” she said coolly, “is my husband, I expect.” The banker looked at her for a minute without speaking. He was & strong man, used to dealing with awkward situations. In that minute he saw exactly how he stood. He could fight, probably in court tear this woman to pieces. But—his wife in Paris, also his considerable position in the banking world. Supping alone with a female in his suite late at night. Hard to explain that away. He said it looked like being @an expensive party for him. She agreed, smiling, unruffied. “How much?” he asked. “Five thousand pounds,” she said, “and we can part as we met—sweetly.” He gave her his check. He shook hands with her. “You can get it back on the stock market,” she said, and lightly kissed him. ‘It was only when he came to talk the matter over with his London lawyer next day that the fly in the web understood that from the first moment in the Palm Beach hotel he had been marked down for a killing. He had noticed her because the lady and her distinguished looking “husband” had intended that he should. ONEmyhkeltrorgnntethhhm not the sole catch brought into the net of this pair of decorative and astute rogues as & result of their American trip. They would have made many contacts and laid many lines which they subsequently hoped to use. Nor must it be supposed that every coup they would pull off would necessarily be of a oriminal nature, Onmly your crude crook can- not see the honest (well, nearly honest) wood for the dishonest trees. There would be quite a number of opportunities for legitimate little business deals, almost always by way of =& commission on an introduction, whether for social, business of matrimonal reasons. - International crime specialists will tell you that, as a rule, women are easier game than men for the wiles of the spider (male species). But the male spiders do- not often play for very high stakes. They spin webs for many little flies and seldom land a big one. Not a pleasant type, these men who spin webs in which to catch gullible rich women, or women who have something to hide or a reputation to protect. One, an authentic corps at the Imperial Russian Court before he became an officer in one of the guard’s regi- ments of his imperial majesty. . After the revolution he got away with his skin and his papers, graduated as a gigolo in Paris and Riviera haunts, married a North American heiress (whose parents subsequently (some people gamble for the same reasons e “That,” she said coolly, was adroit and practiced in making such con- tacts. From the moment when the woman first noticed him to the moment when he bowed to her over their first apertif together not an hour had elapsed. When the Argentinian re- turmed the Russian gracefully retired and was once again aloof, inscrutable. Perhaps in Paris he had discovered her liaison of the moment and seen in it an opportunity; had begun to spin his little web there and had carried the threads to Deauville. Perhaps he saw the woman by chance and had an inspira- tion for a web. However that may be, he fol- lowed her back to Paris. She was bored with her Argentinian and he was her type. She could, and did, entertain them both, the one openly for money and the other surreptitiously. But the love affair was brief, for this Russian had given her quite a lot of jewelry and an The spider coolly let him- his own car. He returned and told the lady what he had done. The scene between them must have had considerable dramatic interest. He dared her inform the police. What the lady said to him is known only her intimate woman friends. All that mat- that, hard, ultra-sophisticated, cynical, astute, she still had to give in to this extraordi- rogue. However, the acts and inspirations of the spiders sometimes are unnecessarily fantastic, a characteristic which annoys the police, who, on principle, prefer the obvious erime and the motive as Joud as a brass band and as plain as a sky sign. CAP'I‘. Y, as & moneyed young English clubman, without much of a reputation to lose, and no ties, knew all about spiders and was as proof against the breed as a man well could be, Increased Game in Forest big game population of the country is on the increase, and in the National forests alone, now numbers more than 1,000,000 head, an increase over the previous year of almost 10 per cent. The increase is largely among deer, but elk also have shown considerable gain. The count of the animals, which is believed to be fairly accurate, was made by the Forest experts in the national forests. They have found that moose, mountain sheep, moun- tain goats and n.ntelope, although numerically few, have been included in the gain, but the bears have had a difficult time of it, especially the grizzly, brown and black types. The protective steps taken by the Federal agents have resulted in the preservation and increase of many herds, which just a few years threatened with extinction. There THE SUNDAY STAR, WASHINGTON, D. C, JULY 26, 1931. " “is my husband, I exlpe(.-l.” This man had been a mamma’s only boy. She had left him $3,000,000 two years before. He had spent a lot of that on cars, clothes, women and the high life. But he always had been a close buyer; no woman had yet contrived to collect from him. But in Paris one day two men, whom we will call X and Z, called on him with a hotel proposition. He kyew them casually, having met them around bars and restaurant lounges i They had an option on a well known It had been taken on just after the war couple of Americans who had made a g Bal i i fe 44 3 whole thing thoroughly before he mov or parted with a penny. Eventually was put through. Capt. Y held the controlling interest, with the two option holders as part- ners. It all looked good and water-tight. The moribund hotel was redecorated and partly reconstructed. The restaurant was en- 334 11111 come over on a long-term contract. A special luxury floor was a feature of the hotel side. Some of the suites therein looked like Cleo- Helium Record Set O efficient. has the Government's helium plant at Amarillo, Tex., become that omly one of the two units was used during March, and this one unit in a few hours over 22 days met the full needs of the Government for the gas during that month and at the same time set & record for production. The plant was established with an estimated production of 2,000,000 cubic feet per month. il e e S RS ST patra’s boudoir. Things were done well—so well that the captain had no qualms about the allure of the place, but began to wonder if it ever would pay. In its first season the hotel got quite a few rich Americans, some smart English people, a sprinkling of wealthy Germans, Greeks and South Americans. But from the first the place suffered from an epidemic of burglaries. They were kept as quiet as possible, but the talk got about. The police were puzzled. They were still more puszled when, toward the end of the season, while the luxury suites were all occupied, that entire floor was ransacked one evening, the burglars get- ! ting: clean away with a big haul of cash and jewels from the visitors’ cases. A completely planned affair, betraying uncanny knowledge of the occupants’ movements. The police made endless interrogations, but found no clues. There were no more burglaries and presently X and Ztold Capt, Y they wanted to sell out and get out. Capt. Y bought them out for ‘quite a small sum and was agreeably surprised. . X and Z shook the dust of France from their “boot soles. And a high police official called on " Capt. Y and advised him to get an architect and have certain alterations made in the layout of “the luxury floor and the disposition of an exterior fire escape serving it, and also to have the window catches of the rooms on that luxury floor changed. X and Z, who had brought over their own architect and had supervised the reconstruction work, had personally seep to such details. . y ~ Had they played any active part in the rob- beries? Unthinkable! But what they had done was to plan, doubtless in consultation with the head of a gang of international thieves, a hotel with a floor especially planned to facilitate the operations of the second-story men. Such a scheme needed finance and a cover and Capt. ¥ had provided both, The necessity for a Capt. Y seems a weak point‘in the spiders’ scheme, because without such a man it never would have been brought to fruition. But, in fact, Capt. Y would be an incidental detail from the spiders’ viewpoint. Capt. ¥s are made to fit a spider's web. Give a spider a bright idea in his particular line, and the business of going out and finding a man or woman with money from which they can be parted is only a trifling technical detail which seldom worries any spider worthy of that appellation. New Element for Industry NOTHER new element seems to be hovere ing on the verge of industrial activity, and, like so many others in the present age, seems likely to be transformed almost over night from a laboratory curiosity to an important factor mn the production of some of the modern miracles of invention. The new element, hafnium, the name of which is derived from the Latin name for Copenhagen, is almost prohibitive in price at present, largely because its production, although the metal is fairly abundant, is through an ex- pensive process. The present cost, however, is likely to be no bar to its use. Helium stands as an example of how science can so revolu- tionize production processes that a substance once almost priceless can be turned out in vast quantity at a very small fraction of its original cost Hafnium has two properties which will prob= ably make it highly valuable in electrical equipment. It 1 & high meiting point and electronic emissivity. Patents have already been taken out for its use in radio tubes and incandescent electric lamp filiments, and for the cathode surfaces of such devices as X-ray tubes and rectifiers, A study of hafnium, made by the Bureau of Mines, reveals that none of the metal is avall- able in the United States, but there are some oxides and salts to be had here at a cost of $25 a gram. ‘The various ores are {0 be found fairly gen- erally in various parts of the world, and such as is found in the United States seems to be g:sent in a widely distributed number eof tes. Port Inspections Thorough. O strict is the quarantine against certaim plants and plant products from foreign sources because of the danger of the intro- duction of new plant pests into the United States, the master of a British vessel arriving at Mobile, Ala., found himself haled before a United States commissioner because of the pres- ence of eight yams from Jamaica aboard his vessel. The worst of it was there was an obvious in- tention to smuggle the yams into this country and for this offense the master was fined $2Q. He and the steward had both stated that there was no plant life or plant product on the ship, but a plant quarantine inspector discovered a yam wrapped in burlap and re-wrapped in paper bearing an address in Mobile. Starting with this as a clue the inspector went over the whole vessel and hidden in the hold near the bow he found the other seven yams. The incident seems trivial on the face of it, but in reality it indicates the carefulness with which the Government's agents are going about their work of preventing plant life pests from gaining an entrance into the country. Virginia Cattle Raisers. Virginia cattle raiser is more or less the victim of unforttnate ecircumstances. He