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Soundly beaten on the kind of story that Chicago dearly loves, the rival Tribune did its best to pooh-pooh it, even quoted Mrs. Moroney as saying: "My mother's instinct tells me that this is not my daughter." Mrs. Moroney flatly denied ever saying that. "I don't blame the Trib for making it up," said Reporter Wright. "What else could they do when we had the case all sewed up?" Actually, the case seemed far from sewed up. Chicago police records showed that as a baby Mary Agnes Moroney had an operation for a ruptured navel, and doctors said it would probably have left a lifetime scar. Mrs. McClelland has no such scar. The Richmond (Calif.) Independent printed a story saying that Mary's foster mother got her from a foundling home 2y½ears before the kidnaping, though she could produce no records to prove it. A California doctor thought he remembered delivering the child in Martinez, Calif., but also had nothing to prove it.
Nevertheless, Mrs. McClelland was staying in Chicago to get better acquainted with the Moroneys. Said Mrs. Moroney: "I would like to believe that this girl is Mary Agnes, but I just don't know." Added Mary: "I probably will never know for sure."