CHAPTER VIII. THE BENEFICENCE OF FIRE BELLS. The door opened, and the tall form of the police lieutenant appeared, attended by two patrolmen. The patrolmen, on entering, looked directly at the prisoner, and seemed to recognize him. The police lieutenant appeared to be pleased with his success in finding the witnesses, after a hunt through several station houses; but he was not aware what importance the testimony which they could give had suddenly acquired. The witnesses had been searched for at the suggestion of Fayette Overtop, with the vague hope of making them useful in some way. The coroner scowled at the witnesses, for he feared that they would prove the man innocent, who, in his opinion, was the murderer. Having adopted this theory at the outset, and staked the whole issue upon it, he felt a natural reluctance to give it up. The lieutenant explained to the coroner that the two officers could probably throw some light on the prisoner's movements, the night of the murder. The coroner administered the oath to both of them, as follows: "Holeup your ri't'an'. You swear to tell truth, th'ole truth, nothin' but truth, s'elpyeGod. Kiss the book." The men complied with these impressive formalities, and the coroner then proceeded to interrogate one of them--a strapping fellow with an intensely Irish face. "Name?" said the coroner. "Patrick O'Dougherty, yer Honor." The phrase "Yer Honor" produced its customary gracious effect. "Do you spell O'Dougherty with a 'k,'?" asked the coroner. "Hang me if I knows!" said the O'Dougherty. "I niver spilt it. Spill it to suit yezself, yer Honor." "Spell it in the usual way, with a 'k'" said the coroner, turning to the reporters. "Your residence, Mr. O'Dougherty?" "Me what?" "Your residence. Where do you live?" "Oh! it's fare I live yer want to know. In Mulberry street, near Baxter." "You belong to the perlice, I believe?" asked the coroner. "It's quare ye should ax me that!" replied the O'Dougherty, with an enormous smile. "Because you have the perliceman's hat, club, and badge? You forget," said the coroner, patronizingly, "that courts of justice doesn't know nothin' until it's proved to them. As a coroner, I shouldn't know my own grandmother, until she swore to herself." "'Tisn't that, yer Honor; but becos yer got me onto the perlice yerself. Don't yer 'member, on 'lection day, I smashed two ticket booths of t'other can'date, in the Sixth Ward, lickt as much as a dozen men who was workin' agen ye, an' din was put into the Tumes over night--bad luck to the Tumes, I say! Well, yer Honor, ye was 'lected coroner by a small vote; an', in turn for me services, ye got me 'p'inted--" "Ah! oh! I remember, now," said the coroner, somewhat confused. "I did not know you in the perliceman's dress. Well, Mr. O'Dougherty, did you see the prisoner on the night of the murder?"