A master hand : $b The story of a crimeDallas, Richard
General
A master hand : $b The story of a crime
Dallas, Richard
Detective and mystery stories; Murder -- Fiction; New York (N.Y.) -- Fiction
She corroborated Benton's testimony as to White's disturbed mental
condition and went so far as to testify that he cherished some bitter
feeling towards some one. She said that this much she had learned from
his own lips and was sure of, and also that his feeling in the matter
was becoming daily more acute, but she denied having any knowledge of
its cause, or of the identity of the person. She, too, when shown the
letter, was unable to say for whom it was intended, but she expressed
the opinion that its contents were suggestive of some of the things
White had said when talking of his trouble. Nothing more definite than
this could be obtained from her, as she disclaimed recollection of any
exact words used by him, and said it was all only an impression she had
gathered almost unconsciously from disconnected remarks which he had
dropped at different times. "He had been drinking a good deal before his
death," she added in explanation, "and was not always quite himself";
and Littell, having attained his object of enforcing upon the attention
of the jury these apparent secrets in White's life, did not pursue the
cross-examination further.
I had looked for him to question her regarding the presence of the
ulster at her house but he did not do so, and I concluded he was
satisfied that it would be to no purpose.
I was amused when Mrs. Bunce testified by the promptness with which she
acted upon the advice given her by Miles; in her anxiety to do so even
volunteering the information that she had found three fifty-dollar bills
in the pocket of the ulster; otherwise her testimony did not differ from
that formerly given. Littell, however, insisted upon knowing in what
condition she found the money, upon which she said that it was
carelessly stuffed in an outside pocket, and agreed to his further
suggestion that part of it might readily have fallen out.
Of the night-officer, when he had given his damaging testimony against
the prisoner, Littell asked first if Winters had the ulster, or any
bundle that could have contained it, when he saw him come out of the
vestibule; to which the witness gave a positive negative.
He then cross-examined him as to the reliability of his identification
of the man he saw clad in the ulster as Arthur White.
In reply to successive questions, it developed that the officer's
observation of the man had been made from the opposite side of a dimly
lighted street upon a dark night; that he wore the collar of the coat
turned up and the vizor of the cap pulled down, that he was in the act
of raising an umbrella, and that he walked rapidly, showing no signs of
intoxication.
The witness insisted, however, in spite of these facts and with every
sign of sincerity, that he was confident of his identification, and it
seemed very uncertain if much doubt as to it had been created with the
jury.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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