Read Online The Devil's Dozen by Katherine Ramsland - Free Book Online

Island police were notified about the incident and given a description of both. The man, in his late fifties, had called himself Frank Howard, although it was expected that this name could be an alias. He was five-foot-six, with gray hair, blue eyes, and a trimmed mustache. Of average weight, he had a bowlegged gait. When he arrived at the Budd home, he was wearing a blue suit and, by some reports, driving a small blue sedan.
    This was the man’s second visit to the residence of Albert and Delia Budd at 406 West Fifteenth Street. The first had been six days earlier, in response to an ad placed by their eighteen-year-old son, Edward, who sought work in the country. Howard arrived, saying he was seeking a hired hand for his chicken farm in Farmingdale, Long Island, and he offered quite a bit of information about himself, including that he took religion seriously and had six children (although he was currently separated from his wife). He seemed so open and honest that Albert and Delia believed their son would be well employed by this man, who agreed to pay fifteen dollars a week. He also agreed to hire Edward’s friend, and said he would come back on Saturday to pick them up. However, he was delayed, so he sent a telegram announcing his arrival on June 3.

    Cannibal killer Albert Fish. AP/Worldwide Photos
    He came, as promised, with strawberries and a can of pot cheese. Asking for his telegram back, he slid it into his pocket. Edward was away, so the Budds sent one of their four other children to fetch him. Ten-year-old Grace came into the room, dressed in a white Communion dress and glowing with little-girl charm. Howard was delighted with her and took her on his lap. He mentioned that he was going to a birthday party for his niece at 137th Street and Columbus Avenue. He thought Grace might like to come. Delia was hesitant, but Albert observed that Grace didn’t often get treats on his salary as a porter, so he granted permission. They liked the kindly, unassuming old man and believed their daughter would be safe. He promised to bring her back later, at which time he would give instructions to Edward for starting work.
    However, Howard did not bring Grace back that evening, so the Budds spent an agonizing night before they sent Edward to the police. They soon learned that the address the old man had given was fictitious. Clearly, he had kidnapped their child. Little Grace Budd was described in the papers as having blue eyes and brown hair. At four feet tall, she weighed about seventy pounds and had been treated recently at New York Hospital. She wore white stockings, a white dress, a blue hat, and a gray coat.
    Once again, an elusive killer would lead the police on a difficult chase, although this investigation would last so many years its solution would seem pointless to many on the team. Yet one investigator never gave up. Because of that attitude, he remained alert for news and clues.

The Search
    Only a year before, the city had been rattled by another kidnapped child, Billy Gaffney, from Brooklyn. A boy who was with him at the time said the “bogeyman” had taken him. He described a thin elderly man with a mustache. Billy was never found. Something similar had happened with an eight-year-old boy named Francis McDonnell on nearby Staten Island in July 1924. He was the son of a police officer and his mother had reported a stooped elderly man in the area. His body was found, naked from the waist down, beneath a pile of branches. He had been assaulted and strangled.
    Now the bogeyman had come for Grace. Police searched cellars, roofs, and hallways in the general area of the Budd home, but turned up nothing. When they checked in Farmingdale, they found no listing for a Frank Howard, and the locals there denied knowing anyone by that name. They got the same result in Farmingdale, New Jersey. But within a day, Joseph Sowley, fifty-nine, was arrested. This man liked to entice children into the hallway of his apartment