CASTLE BROKEN INTO

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume LXXXII, Issue 19365, 23 July 1925, Page 7

CASTLE BROKEN INTO

IMPORTANT PAPERS MISSING. Just when it seemed that the mystery of the sudden death of Count Gerard de Montefiore, the young inillionafre sportsman and athlete, which took place after a motor-car ride with his fiancee in Paris, had been solved by the evidence of the medico-legal experts who stated that it was from natural causes, a new development has caused a great stir. The affair has been notable for many dramatic incidents. Two days after the count died a mysterious aeroplane, which has never been indentified, landed on one of the lawns in front of his castle at Dampierre, in the Aube department, and left before anyone was able to approach it. This incident was dismissed as a mere coincidence, but a much more puzzling discovery was made when rhe public prosecutor and the examining magistrate, who had been inquiring into the case, motored to the castle to remove their seals from the doors c.f-j all the rooms. The seals were found intact, but toj their astonishment, the magistrate and prosecutor discovered that the windows j of the count’s bedroom on the first floor, which had been left closed, were | wide open. The sill showed traces of | someone having climbed over it, and on the carpet of the room were footprints leading from the window to an ' antique chest of drawers.

The drawers contained all kinds of wearing apparel. These had not been touched, but two other drawers, which had contained family documents and private letters, have been broken open, and it is believed that some most important papers have been stolen. Dectives arc not certain whether the footprints are those of a man or a woman, but it is obvious that the mysterious intruder must have been well acquainted with the count’s habits. The magistrate took possession of a number of documents as well as of a small gold medallion belonging to the late count’s fiancee, which contained the photograph of a young man whose indentity the police are seeking to establish.

Bottles and a box of cubes containing strychnine, which were found in a medicine chest, were also taken away by the police.