Leave Her to Heaven

by Ben Ames Williams

  ‘Any wrap or coat?’

  ‘Yes, she wore an old suède leather jacket she used to have. It was a sight to behold. She used to wear it on trips with Professor Berent. She’d had it made special, with pockets, because she always took along scissors and knives and cotton and things in case he collected a specimen.’

  ‘Plenty of pockets?’

  ‘Two big ones on each side in front, and another, a lot bigger, in the lining in back,’ Mrs. Freeman explained. ‘She used to get it all bloody and I’d have to wash it out for her. It was like chamois, and you could wash it in soap and water.’

  Pettingill considered, and he caught Quinton’s eye. ‘No more, I guess,’ he said, and Mrs. Freeman, dismissed by Quinton too, stepped down.

  Quinton recalled Leick, and he led him to tell of his long association with Harland, of their many excursions together, of their summers at Back of the Moon, emphasizing the man’s devotion. Then he came to the picnic on the shore.

  ‘Now with regard to the lobsters,’ he suggested. ‘Where did you get them?’

  ‘Out of my traps,’ Leick assured him. ‘Where would I?’

  ‘Who boiled them?’

  ‘I did.’

  ‘When they were ready, what happened?’

  ‘We opened some of them to get out the tamale for the sauce, and Mrs. Harland — ’

  ‘Which Mrs. Harland?’

  ‘Miss Ruth. She mixed the sauce.’

  ‘What then?’

  ‘Why, we et lunch.’

  ‘Did you have anything to drink?’

  ‘The three of them had coffee. I didn’t drink anything.‘

  ‘Do you remember anything that happened with regard to sugar for that coffee?’

  Leick said, half reluctantly: ‘She asked for the sugar, and Mrs. Harland gave it to her.’

  ‘Please refer to the ladies by their names at that time. Mrs. Ellen Harland asked for the sugar and Miss Ruth Berent gave it to her?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Was it in a container?’

  ‘In an envelope. She tore off the corner and poured some into her cup.’

  ‘Mrs. Harland did?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Did she later have another cup of coffee?’

  ‘I didn’t notice.’

  ‘What became of the envelope?’

  ‘When we were through eating, she folded the corner down so’s the sugar wouldn’t spill out, and put it back in the basket.’

  ‘Was it an envelope like this one?’

  ‘Near as I can tell.’

  Quinton changed his tone. ‘Now referring to the last summer of Mrs. Harland’s life, did she and Mr. Harland and the defendant take a trip together?’

  ‘They went fishing on the Miminegouche.’

  ‘That’s in Canada.’

  ‘Yes.’

  Quinton led him to describe the trip, and the forest fire which cut it short, and he asked: ‘Now, Leick, you took tents?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘What was the sleeping arrangement?’

  ‘Mrs. Harland and her had the big tent, and Mr. Harland and me had one, and the guides the other.’

  ‘The two ladies slept together, so that Mr. and Mrs. Harland did not share the same tent?’

  ‘No.’ That Leick spoke unwillingly was plain.

  ‘Referring to the summer Mr. and Mrs. Harland spent at Back of the Moon, were their relations that summer affectionate?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Were they equally affectionate during those days on the river?’

  ‘Why, with Tom Pickett and Sime Verity along, naturally they wouldn’t — — ’

  ‘You needn’t explain,’ Quinton said curtly. ‘Were they equally demonstrative?’

  ‘Allowing for the guides — — ’

  ‘Please let the jury make its own allowances. Were they less openly affectionate than they had been at Back of the Moon, or more so, or the same?’

  ‘Well, if you put it that way, less.’

  ‘You said you guided Mrs. Harland? How did you and she escape the fire?’

  ‘Went up river out of its way.’

  ‘Where were the others?’

  ‘Down river in the middle of it.’

  ‘When did you rejoin them?’

  ‘Why, when the fire burned down so we could travel, we started down river till we came to where they were.’

  ‘Where were they?’

  ‘On a gravel bar in the middle of the river.’

  ‘Awake or asleep?’

  ‘The guides were awake.’

  ‘Mr. Harland? Ruth?’

  ‘They were asleep.’

  ‘Did you see them asleep?’

  Leick looked helplessly at Harland. ‘Why yes, I did,’ he admitted.

  ‘What was their position?’

  ‘Curled up in the sand.’

  ‘How near each other were they?’

  ‘Why, it’d been a cold night. They was keeping warm.

  ‘How near each other were they?’

  ‘Right together.’ Leick’s lips were tight, his eyes dark with anger.

  ‘Describe their position.’

  Leick hesitated, then said in a rush of words: ‘Mr. Harland had his arms around her, keeping her warm.’

  Quinton half-smiled; he nodded, gave the witness to Mr. Pettingill, and the big man came slowly to his feet. ‘Ever sleep out on a chilly night, without blankets, Leick?’ he asked.

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  ‘Anyone with you?’

  ‘Sometimes there was.’

  ‘How did you sleep?’

  ‘Close together as we could get.’ There was relief in Leick’s tone. ‘It’s the only way to keep even half-way comfortable.’

  Mr. Pettingill nodded. ‘Before the fire that day, where were you and Ellen Harland fishing?’

  ‘Upstream from camp.’

  ‘Where were the other two canoes?’

  ‘Downstream.’

  ‘How did that happen?’

  ‘Why, Mrs. Harland — Miss Ruth — had found a sightly spot down river, and she wanted them all to go down there that day. The other one said she’d stay at camp. They tried to get her to go but she said for them to go without her.’

  ‘So it was at Ellen’s insistence that Ruth and Mr. Harland went downstream together.’

  ‘Yes, it was.’

  ‘I see. Now Brother Quinton has had you tell us twice about that envelope with sugar in it, but I want to go over it once more. Who poured the coffee?’

  ‘Mrs. Harland did.’

  ‘Miss Ruth?’

  ‘Yes.’ Ruth half-smiled, touched by Leick’s persistent refusal to speak of Ellen as ‘Mrs. Harland.’

  ‘Did she pour all the cups at once?’

  Leick frowned, trying to remember. ‘Why no, come to think of it, she said she wasn’t ready for hers.’

  ‘You mean Mrs. Ellen Harland said that?’ Mr. Pettingill was patient.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Was anything said about the sugar?’

  ‘Yes. She asked if Mrs. Harland had brought it, and Mrs. Harland took the envelope out of the hamper and gave it to her.’

  ‘Ellen asked for it and Ruth gave it to her?’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  ‘Was that after Ruth poured Ellen’s coffee?’

  ‘No, before.’

  ‘Do you remember what Ellen did with the envelope till shr was ready to use it?’

  Why yes, I mind she put it in her pocket.’

  ‘In her pocket?’

  ‘She had on an old leather coat with some big pockets.’

  ‘When she was ready to use the sugar, what then?’

  ‘She took the envelope and tore the corner off and poured some into her cup and put the envelope back into her pocket.’

  ‘You testified that she put the envelope back into the hamper. When did she do that?’

  ‘After she had all the coffee she wanted, when we were cleaning up the beach. We threw the lobster shells and th
e paper plates and napkins that we’d used and all that rubbish into the fire, and what they wanted to keep went into the basket.’

  Ruth listened in puzzled attention, wondering what was in Mr. Pettingill’s mind.

  ‘Who repacked the basket?’

  ‘I guess I did, much as anybody. Mrs. Harland and her went up and sat on the bank, and Mr. Harland and me set there talking some, and I scrubbed the wash boiler, and I scrubbed the forks with sand and put them in.’

  Quinton on redirect examination asked only one question. ‘But you saw Miss Berent give Mrs. Harland the envelope, and you saw Mrs. Harland put it in the basket?’ he insisted.

  ‘Yes,’ Leick assented, and Quinton let him go, and he called to the deputy at the door:

  ‘Simon Verity.’

  Ruth had not seen Sime since they left the river, and she almost smiled now at the difference in his appearance. In comfortable old clothes he had been at ease, his every movement inspiring confidence in his capacities; but now he wore a stiff suit and a white collar and he was shaved pink, his hair slicked down and then brushed up in a barber‘s curl above his left eye. She suspected that the strain of this elegance might at any moment prove too much for him, and she wondered how Quinton had persuaded him to come so far from home.

  Quinton drew from him the story of their days on the river; and at length he asked: ‘Now did you during those days see any affectionate gestures or caresses between Mr. and Mrs. Harland?’

  Sime said readily: ‘Sure. They’d kiss each other, most every morning.’

  ‘She kissed him? Or he kissed her?’

  ‘Well, I most generally tended to my own business, figured not to look. B’en my experience two’s enough for a kiss.’

  A murmur of amusement ran among the spectators, and Quinton said drily: ‘I suppose your experience has been a wide one.’

  ‘Well, wider than some folks, I judge,’ Sime retorted, and Judge Andrus rapped for order. Quinton asked:

  ‘What was the apparent relationship between Mr. Harland and Miss Ruth Berent?’

  ‘Friendly.’

  ‘During the forest fire, while Mrs. Harland and Leick were elsewhere, was Mr. Harland attentive to Miss Berent?’

  ‘He took care of her.’

  ‘Stayed near her?’

  ‘Yes. We all stuck together.’

  ‘Did you see him touch her?’

  ‘Why, she got pretty tired,’ Sime assented. ‘He sat and held her, the way anyone would.’

  ‘Never mind what anyone would do. What did he do?’

  ‘Being in the water so long takes it out of you,’ Sime explained.

  ‘She couldn’t hardly keep her head out of water, so he set behind her with his arms around her, kind of bracing her and holding her up.’

  ‘He held her in his arms?’

  ‘Yes, to keep her from drowning.’

  ‘The jury will judge for themselves his reasons. He did hold her in his arms?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘How long?’

  ‘Most all the last part of the time we was in the water.’

  ‘Now as to the night you all spent on the gravel bar, did you sleep?’

  ‘Why yes. We hadn’t had a chance to sleep for a long time.’

  ‘Where did Mr. Harland sleep with relation to Miss Berent?’

  ‘We scraped away the ashes and all from a patch of sand, and they slept there.’

  ‘How far from where you slept?’

  ‘Maybe a couple of rods.’

  ‘Who waked first in the morning?’

  ‘I did. Then Tom.’

  ‘When you waked, what was their position relative to each other?’

  ‘I sh’d judge she’d got cold during the

  ‘Never mind what you judged.’

  ‘He had her hugged up to him to keep her warm.’

  ‘You don’t know the reason. You say he had her hugged up to him. Describe their position.’

  ‘Why, they was both laying on their left sides, and she was backed up against him and he had his arms around her.’

  ‘Both arms?’

  ‘Yes.’

  Ruth, feeling the whispering interest of the crowded spectators, held her head high and steady; but she remembered Ellen’s coming in the morning, and the anger in Ellen’s eyes when she found them thus. Then Quinton turned to Mr. Pettingill. ‘Your witness,’ he said triumphantly.

  Pettingill leaned nearer Ruth. ‘Did Ellen see you that way?’ he asked.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Well,’ he decided, ‘we’d better get that in.’ He rose and led Sime to describe Ellen’s arrival, then let him go.

  Quinton called Tom Pickett. Tom, awkward and embarrassed, obviously friendly to Ruth as Sime had been, nevertheless told the same story. Him Mr. Pettingill allowed to go unquestioned.

  There were three more witnesses. Mrs. Huston, resentful and angry not only at Quinton’s questions but because he kept her under a curb, forever checking her runaway tongue, nevertheless admitted that during the months while Ellen waited for her baby, Harland left her alone almost every afternoon. ‘And why wouldn’t he?’ she demanded. ‘With her forever . . .’

  ‘Wait, Quinton warned her. ‘Just answer the questions, please. Now when was the baby expected to be born?’

  ‘The doctor said May; but if you ask me . . .’

  ‘The doctor said May. Did Mr. Harland in March and April spend more time at home?’

  ‘I tell you, she wouldn’t let him. And at the last of it, when she was trying to . . .’

  ‘How often did he leave her alone in April?’

  ‘Right along. She got rid of him because she was trying to . . .’

  ‘Twice a week? Four times? Everyday?’

  ‘She got him out of the house so she could paint, and run up and down . . .’

  ‘I’m asking you only what he did.

  ‘Well, I’m a-telling you what she did; and I ain’t told the half of it. Walking herself into . . .’

  Quinton interrupted, himself angry now. Harland understood completely what the old woman was trying to say; and he found himself for the moment on Quinton’s side, hoping the State Attorney would be able to silence her eager tongue.

  ‘You’ll tell me only what I ask you,’ Quinton insisted. ‘Nothing more.’

  ‘Sleep-walking my foot!’ the old woman exclaimed, and tossed her head, and Quinton said:

  ‘You leave it that up to the day the baby was stillborn, Mr. Harland left the house practically every day. Is that correct?’

  ‘I said so, didn’t I? But she . . .’

  Quinton said curtly: ‘That is all.’

  ‘You mean you ain’t going to let me . . .’

  ‘That is all,’ Quinton insisted, and looked at Mr. Pettingill, and the big man came to his feet. But before he could move away from the table, Harland caught his sleeve, and Mr. Pettingill turned back. Harland whispered:

  ‘Let her go.’

  Pettingill looked doubtful. ‘She’s trying to tell something. The jury wants to hear it.’

  ‘Let her go,’ Harland insisted. From this at least Ellen could be saved. ‘She blamed Ellen for losing the baby,’ he explained. ‘But don’t let her say so, please.’

  Pettingill caught Ruth’s eye, and she agreed. ‘Yes, let her go.’

  So Pettingill, though with obvious reluctance, said: ‘No questions.’ Mrs. Huston started to speak, but caught Harland’s eye and was silenced; and Quinton called:

  ‘Alice Murphy.’

  She was the maid who had served Ruth and Mrs. Berent in Boston, and she said Harland came regularly to see them, that he did not always see Mrs. Berent, saw sometimes only Ruth.

  Then Mr. Carlson, grunting and grumbling at the necessity of thus openly discussing the private affairs of his clients, took the stand to explain in detail how Professor Berent’s estate had come almost intact into Ruth’s hands.

  ‘Now, Mr. Carlson,’ Quinton asked at last. ‘When did you last see Mrs. Harland before
her death?’

  ‘August thirty, two years ago.’

  ‘Five or six days before her death?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Under what circumstances?’

  ‘She came to me on business.’

  ‘What was that business?’

  ‘To sign her will. Some other matters.’

  ‘Who was to be executor under her will?’

  ‘I was named executor.’

  ‘Did she have other instructions for you, not included in her will?’

  ‘She gave me a sealed envelope.’

  Quinton drew from him the story of that envelope and of what he eventually did with it; and he asked: ‘Did she give you any other instructions?’

  Mr. Carlson’s big chest filled; he seemed to sigh. ‘We had some further conversation,’ he admitted.

  ‘What was the purport of that conversation?’

  ‘She wanted to arrange for perpetual care of her mother’s grave at Mount Auburn. I said Ruth had already done that.’

  ‘Did she say anything else about the lot in Mount Auburn?’

  ‘She said she’d told Mr. Harland she wanted to be buried there.’

  ‘Where were you at the time of her death?’

  ‘Trout fishing in the Laurentians.’

  ‘When you returned and found she had been cremated, did you do anything?’

  ‘No. Mr. Harland had gone away around the world. It was too late to do anything. In any case, I’d not have interfered. She gave me no instructions on the point; simply said she had asked him to have her buried there.’

  ‘Asked him or told him?’

  ‘Told him,’ Mr. Carlson admitted. Quinton dismissed him, and Mr. Pettingill had no questions.

  Then Quinton called Mr. Pettingill to the bench; and the big man returned to the table to say with a chuckle: ‘Brother Quinton offered to prove that you two are married, but I said we’d admit that,’ he explained.

  Quinton, after a moment’s whispered conference with Mr. Shumate said: ‘That’s the State’s case, Your Honor.’ Judge Andrus recessed court for fifteen minutes.

  – IX –

  When Mr. Pettingill faced the jury after court reconvened, Ruth thought he looked more like a farmer than ever, shambling and awkward, humbly anxious to get at the truth, doubtful of his own powers; yet she felt in the crowded room liking for him, just as she had felt the rows of spectators disliking Quinton.

  He began in a groping and uncertain fashion. ‘Well, gentlemen,’ he said, ‘maybe you’re a little puzzled, so far, about this business. What we’ve all got to do is sift out the facts that nobody denies, and put them together, and see what sort of a picture they make.