CRIME: Hex & Hoax

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    The late Harry Houdini, famed magician, was noted for his honest exposes of fake "mediums." Anxious to establish the exact worth of seances, he told his wife that when he died he would endeavor to communicate with her and he showed her a message which he then locked in a secret vault. "After I am dead." he said, "I will try to send that message."

    Last week, lying sick in Manhattan. Mrs. Harry Houdini was visited by Medium Arthur Ford, who set out to deliver Harry Houdini's pre-arranged statement. Making a great effort he said:

    "Rosabelle . . . Answer . . Tell . . . Pray . . . Answer . . . Look . . .Tell. ... Answer . . . Tell. Is that right?"

    "Yes," whispered Mrs. Houdini.

    It soon appeared, however, that Mrs. Houdini, impatient for her husband's voice to reach her, had agreed to go touring with Medium Ford, treating the public to a spurious bit of spirit talk such as Harry Houdini spent the last years of his life in discouraging. The consensus, as reporters who had been under the bed at the seance, reporters who had been peeking at the windows, reporters who had later ambushed the medium with managing editors for witnesses, told their story, was that no message had been received from the other world at the Houdini-Ford seance.

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