The Exploits of Elaine

“Walter, here’s a story I wish you’d follow up,” remarked the managing editor of the Star to me one evening after I had turned in an assignment of the late afternoon. He handed me a clipping from the evening edition of the Star and I quickly ran my eye over the headline: “The Clutch Hand Wins Again New York's Mysterious Master Criminal Perfects Another Coup City Police Completely Baffeld” “Here’s this murder of Fletcher, the retired banker and trustee of the University,” he explained. “Not a clue...except a warning letter signed with this mysterious clutching fist. Last week it was the robbery of the Haxworth jewels and the killing of old Haxworth. Again that curious sign of the hand. Then there was the dastardly attempt on Sherburne, the steel magnate. Not a trace of the assailant except this same clutching fist. So it has gone, Jameson...the most alarming and most inexplicable series of murders that has ever happened in this country. And nothing but this uncanny hand to trace them by.”