Excerpt: "“Help! Help!” This thrilling cry rang out upon the night air in one of the side streets of New York City. The few pedestrians in the bleak, storm-swept vicinity paused and instinctively looked for the cause of this blood-curdling appeal. Someone was in trouble. That was certain. But who was it and what was the nature of the trouble? As usual, no officer chanced to be within call. Two men who were on their way home from business, however crossed the street with long strides and plunged into a dingy area. It was illy lighted by a gaslight over the door of a wretched tenement. No person could be seen in the area, but one of the men, whose name was Mortimer Smith, bent over and cried: “My soul! This looks as if murder had been done! His companion, a merchant named Benjamin Hanks, echoed: “Murder beyond a doubt!” The snow in the area was trodden and saturated with blood. All the ghostly evidences of a crime save the body of the victim were there."
