Between 10 and 11 p.m, Wednesday a middle-aged Chinese was done to death in a small room over a tobacconist's store at the corner of Chekiang Road and Avenue Edward VII. The full particulars of the tragedy have yet to be gleaned, but several Chinese who are supposed to have _knowledge of the circumstances leading up to the murder have been de-., tained by the police who were on the scene very quickly after the fatal quarrel.
It appears that the premises in which the murder took: place are used more as a gambling den than anything else. The flat is divided into two small rooms, and in one of these a large quantity of foreign and Chinese playing cards was discovered in addition to the usual sets Gominoes found in such haunts. The murdered man, according to the stories current last night, was alone with his assailant. "Tt is surmised, however, that a dispute had arisen over a gambling transaction and that the ensuing quarrel had resulted in the drawing of a knife by the attacker. The room, however, threw very little light on the tragedy for its contents had been but very slightly disturbed. It is therefore conjectured that the murderer was of stronger build than the deceased and had been able to hold him while inflicting the fatal wounds.
Chief Detective Officer Burnside, Insp. T Kerrigan and Det. J. A, Quayle were on the spot a few minutes after the alarm had been given along with Chinese detectives, A huge crowd of Chinese very quickly—gathered and remained in the district until long after midnight. By that time, however, the body of the dead man had been removed from the house. He was a man, apparently, of the middle-classes and, it is thought, between 35 and 40 years of age. No knife or instrument which could have been used in the attack was found in the room.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.