Show A STRANGE CASE A Fire That May Be Incendiary and n Woman the Culprit At about 3 oclock yesterday afternoon some men who were near the boarding house kept by Lang at No 333 West First South street saw smoke issuing from one of the rooms A fire alarm was at once sent in and several men entered the place and commenced com-menced fighting the blaze The firemen were soon on the scene and in a few minutes min-utes the blaze was extinguished Chief Stanton then took D tour through the house and made a somewhat startling discovery Ho found that the bedding and carpets in every room except ono had been saturated with coal oil and there were other circumstances which clearly indicated that the fire was the work of an incendiary Everything about the place was in a chaotic condition The fire had evidently been started in three places at once and as soon as the chief satisfied himself that there was an African in the woodpile he placed Mrs Lang under arrest on the charge of arson The womans dross was sprinkled with coal oil and in the kitchen was found two empty coal oilcans cans cansI was learned that Mrs Lang was a widow and that a Mrs Decker holds a chattel mortgage on the furniture in the house The latter wont down to the place with a deputy sheriff yesterday morning and Informed Mrs Lang that she would have to foreclose The landlady became very angry at this and is credited with having said that Mrs Decker would get neither the money nor the furniture and the general belief is that she fred the place because she preferred seeing see-ing i go up in smoke than allow Mrs Decker to get the furniture She will have a hearing in the police court this morning Her version of the fire was that she had dressed herself after dinner for the purpose I pur-pose of going to see a lawyer concerning some of her boarders who had not settled j their board bills Before going there she stepped out to a butcher shop to purchase meat for supper When she returned she discovered the fire gave the alarm and I the department came and extinguished it She denies setting the fire The story which Mrs Lang told to different ones did not at all agree She said that nearly all her boarders owed her large sums of money her furniture was mortgaged and she was in straightened circumstances Some think she was made partially insane by her reverses and did an act for which she is not responsible |