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In spite of the evidence against her, police could not believe that a woman who was accessory to the murder of her husband could have had a hand in the murder of her peremor.

The Riddle of the Grinning Skull

By Frederick O. Schulze, police reporter, Detroit Free Press. A grinning human skull, yellow and moldy with age, lay under a bright light on the desk of Inspector John P. Smith, head of the homicide squad of the Detroit Police Department.

The shades in the office had been drawn so that but little

of the light of the bright September day entered. The site was ghastly, almost supernatural.

Inspector Smith was standing near his desk, one hand grasping the right arm of a prisoner.

In the room also were Edward H. Cox, Chief of Detectives,

Detective Lieutenant's Paul Wensel and Frank L. Collins, and myself.

Chills were running up and down my spine.

The scene somehow reminded me of the grave-digging in Hamlet. In my eight years as police reporter, I had never seen anything with the dramatic setting of this.

The prisoner, a woman, had her bloodshot eyes riveted on the skull, and her face was deathly white.

It seemed to us who were looking at her that she was about to faint and sink to the floor.

Nothing was said for more than a minute while the little company remained in tense silence.

Presently, she began to writhe as though pierced with red-hot needles.

But it was her mind that was being tortured, and was worse than any physical pain could be,

the torture of a guilty conscience. Finally, Inspector Smith spoke,

Mrs. Tarak, we dug where you told us, and here is the skull of your former husband,

Joseph Podolsky. No, no, it isn't my husband, it's Peter Zydeco, take it away. Don't let it look at me like that, cried Mrs. Tarak.

She clawed out as though to push it from her sight.

But before anyone could restrain her, she had fainted.

Inspector Smith exchanged glances with the others. Gentlemen, it looks as though we have unearthed two murders,

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