Show 04 M adventurers 14 0 CLUB ti t I 1 1 7 I am a dead alan r by FLOYD GIBBONS famous headline hunter 1 AND AND shake hands with former corpse leo brown leo says he had haa 1 athe the rare privilege of committing suicide and living to tell about it he be heads his story as we do the column with 1 I am a dead man and if you believe everything you see in the newspapers hes he right it happened in the summer of 33 the morning of july 17 found him suffering from a strange premonition ile he says he be had had a bad dream in the th bight he dreamed that he was pulling his own hair and anyone knows a k dream like that might mean anything leo says he was too busy during the day to look up the significance of the dream but the foreboding that something was wrong persisted aji through the day it was a hot sultry day and he was glad to get through work and start for home ue ile watched hla his step very carefully on the way home theres no use taking unnecessary chances when youve had a warning dream so leo stepped care fully out of the way of speeding cars and made up his mind that he would tool fool pate how it feels to discover youre dead he bought an evening paper at the corner and atter after waiting for or the street car to fully stop got on and opened ills his paper he felt pretty safe on the car and breathed a sigh of relief but that sigh of relief boys and girls was premature instead of wing being safe and sound leo soon found that he was deada yes sir dead as a door nail I 1 there it was right on oa the front page of the paper leo spread the paper out with his cold hands and read it again with his sightless eyes nere here are the headlines ROXBURY MAN COMMITS SUICIDE leo brown cuts throat and dies in city hospital there it was in black and white I 1 leo looked around him curiously and wondered it if anybody could coald see his hl the dead mans description fitted leo form sitting there as though it were alive there was no mistaking the leo crown brown mentioned in the news item either it told a lot of nice things about leo that he had never known but it also quoted his own landlady at the place where he lived she said leo had gone to work as usual in the morning but had seemed strangely preoccupied ue he remembered the dream and began to wonder if the article were really true it if it were true the thing to do obviously was to find ills his own body so leo says he set out to do just that it looked like leo maybe it was he went right on out to the city hospital he thought there might be a possibility that the dead man was ills his brother whom he had not seen in a couple of weeks so he inquired anxiously no it his brother he learned from an atten attendant dauL but the attendant added significantly he looks just like you leo pinched himself his worst fears were realized he says he himself was the dead danl man now leo does not mention whether or not he took a couple of drinks to quiet his bis pounding nerves and maybe he but he did go looking for his body that body he found out had been removed to an undertakers establishment so leo went there next and asked to see his remains tough luck again the undertaker was out of town so leo rushed over to the pollee police station and excitedly explained matters two plain clothes men accompanied him back to the hospital they were sympathetic and tried to convince leo that he was the suicidal idel and they did convince him leo for the life of him remember cutting his throat but according to the information at the hospital that Is just what he had done the deal dead mans description fitted leo uke like a glove and his landlady had verified hla his address he begins to think about burying himself there was nothing left leo says but to bury himself but he be coul dAt find his body when he finally did locate his body he found that his relatives had already claimed it and were going ahead with the funeral arrangements it pleased him to see that they had chosen a pretty swell coffin but still he says he ha figured that something was wrong somewhere he examined the dead man closely and breathed another sigh of relief the dead man leo at all leo says lays it was just a case of mistaken identity the mans name narra was leo brown and he lived at leos boarding house but that was wa many years ago when leo was sure it was a mistake he had a lot of fun out of the whole thing first he walked in on his landlady and frightened that worthy person so 0 o much that she almost forgot to ask for her room rent ills his family next sot got the shock of their lives when leo appeared in person to collect for the swell coffin but the happiest person of them all was leo and no wonder he be had found his III own body and found it his I 1 |