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Show BROADWAY AND MAIN STREET ! Ghosts Haven't Ghost of a Chance in Manhattan R..f Thk Hnuntina Story Gave New Yorkers Pause By BILLY ROSE We men of Manhattan are an undaunted and unha unted lot or at least think we are and so ghost stones seldom stand a ghost of a chance in this town. v,i mmmf The other night, however, a real estate man buttonholed me coming out of "21" and told me a chiller about a deserted house In the Flushing section of Queens, and on the off-chance that your scalp can use a tingle or two, I'd like to pass it along .... On the night of the big snow three winters ago, a doctor in Queens answered an-swered his doorbell and found a smallish mnn in a faded mackinaw standing on the stoop. "My wife is very sick," he said. "I hate to ask you to come out on a night like this, but it's only a few blocks." The doctor followed fol-lowed him to a ip,..,., .1 JI.1LIJM t my , it's always been on my list, nobody's no-body's ever wanted it." "Do you think squatters might be living in it on account of the housing hous-ing shortage?" asked the doctor. "Could be, but I doubt it," said the agent. "There's been a lot of queer talk about that house, and the last family that moved in during the depression could only stand it for a few weeks. The husband and wife slept in the front room on the second floor, and to hear them tell it they were kept awake night after night by the sound of a woman coughing. It finally got so bad they packed and left." "I know its sounds absurd," said the doctor, "but I examined a sick woman there last night, and if you've got a key I'll walk over with you and prove it." When they got to the house, it took the agent quite a while to get the rusty lock open, and when they entered there wasn't a stick of furniture in sight. "I could have sworn I saw some chairs and a carpet down here last night," said the doctor. "Maybe you've got this house mixed up with another one," the agent suggested. "I still think it's the same place. Let's look upstairs." On the second floor they went into the front room. It was also empty. Empty, that is, except for a piece of paper on the window sill the prescription the doctor had written the night before. chief, and though the doctor went through the motions of an examination ex-amination he knew at once it was an advanced case of tuberculosis. "I can give her something to relieve re-lieve the congestion," he told her husband, "but she'll have to be moved to a hospital first thing in the morning." He then wrote out a prescription. "I'll get it filled right away," said the man, and showed the doctor to the door. Next morning, wondering how the woman was getting along, the physician stopped by the wooden house, but there was no answer when he rang the bell. Moreover, there were no tracks in the snow to indicate that an ambulance or any other vehicle had pulled up in front of the place. Puzzled, he went to the office of a real estate agent on the next street and asked if he could get some information about the residents resi-dents of the house. "THAT'S A FUNNY sort of question," ques-tion," said the agent. "There aren't any residents and there aren't likely like-ly to be any. The house hasn't been occupied in 15 years, and though large wooden house Billy Rose near the intersection intersec-tion of Vine street and Broadway, and when the man unlocked the door the physician could see by the glare of an unshaded droplight that the lower floor was empty except for a few kitchen chairs and a length of carpet. "THIS IS NO PLACE for a sick woman," he said. "You ought to have some heat in the house." The man led him up a creaky set of stairs to the second floor, and in the front room an emaciated emac-iated woman was lying in an old four-poster bed. She kept coughing cough-ing into a blood-flecked handker- |