The Penguin Book of Victorian Women in Crime

by Michael Sims

  Mr. Mortoun cross-examined the doctor:

  To this gentleman’s inquiries he answered willingly.

  “Do you think, Dr. Pitcherley, that no blood flowed externally?”

  “Of that I am quite sure.”

  “How?”

  “There were no marks of blood on the clothes.”

  “Then the inference stands that no blood stained the place of the murder?”

  “Certainly.”

  “Then the body may have been brought an immense way, and no spots of blood would form a clue to the road?”

  “Not one.”

  “Is it your impression that the murder was committed far away from the spot, or near the place where the body was found?”

  “This question is one which it is quite out of my power to answer, Mr. Mortoun, my duty here being to give evidence as to my being called to the deceased, and as to the cause of death. But I need not tell you that I have formed my own theory of the catastrophe, and if the jury desire to have it, I am ready to offer it for their consideration.”

  Here there was a consultation, from which it resulted that the jury expressed themselves very desirous of obtaining the doctor’s impression.

  [I have no doubt the following words led the jury to their decision.]

  The medical gentleman said:

  “It is my impression that this death resulted out of a poaching—I will not say affray—but accident. It is thoroughly well-known in these districts, and at such a juncture as the present I need feel no false delicacy, Mr. Petleigh, in making this statement, that young Petleigh was much given to poaching. I believe that he and his companions were out poaching—I myself on two separate occasions, being called out to nightcases, saw the young gentleman under very suspicious circumstances—and that one of the party was armed with the weapon which caused the death, and which may have been carried at the end of such a heavy stick as is frequently used for flinging at rabbits. I suppose that by some frightful accident—we all know how dreadful are the surgical accidents which frequently arise when weapons are in use—the young man was wounded mortally, and so died, after the frightened companion had hurriedly attempted to withdraw the arrow, only to leave the barb sticking in the body and hooked behind a rib, while the force used in the resistance of the bone caused the weapon to part company from the haft. The discovery of the body outside the father’s house can then readily be accounted for. His companions knowing who he was, and dreading their identification with an act which could but result in their own condemnation of character, carried the body to the threshold of his father’s house, and there left it. This,” the doctor concluded, “appears to me the most rational mode I can find of accounting for the circumstances of this remarkable and deplorable case. I apologize to Mr. Petleigh for the slur to which I may have committed myself in referring to the character of that gentleman’s son, the deceased, but my excuse must rest in this fact, that where a crime or catastrophe is so obscure that the criminal, or guilty person, may be in one of many directions, it is but just to narrow the circle of inquiry as much as possible, in order to avoid the resting of suspicion upon the greater number of individuals. If, however, any one can suggest a more lucid explanation of the catastrophe than mine, I shall indeed be glad to admit I was wrong.”

  [There can be little question, I repeat, that Dr. Pitcherley’s analysis fitted in very satisfactorily and plausibly with the facts of the case.]

  Mr. Mortoun asked Dr. Pitcherley no more questions.

  The next witness called was the police-constable of Tram, a stupid, hopeless dolt, as I found to my cost, who was good at a rustic publichouse row, but who as a detective was not worth my dog Dart.

  It appeared that he gave his flat evidence with a stupidity which called even for the rebuke of the coroner.

  All he could say was, that he was called, and that he went, and that he saw whose body it “be’d.” That was “arl” he could say.

  Mr. Mortoun took him in hand, but even he could do nothing with the man.

  “Had many persons been on the spot where the body was found before he arrived?”

  “Noa.”

  “How was that?”

  “Whoy, ’cos Toom Broown, the gard’ner, coomed t’him at wuncet, and ’cos Toom Broown coomed t’him furst, ’cas he’s cot wur furst coomed too.”

  This was so, as I found when I went down to Tram. The gardener, Brown, panic-stricken, after calling to, and obtaining the attention of the housekeeper, had rushed off to the village for that needless help which all panic-stricken people will seek, and the constable’s cottage happening to be the first dwelling he reached, the constable obtained the first alarm. Now, had the case been conducted properly, the constable being the first man to get the alarm, would have obtained such evidence as would at once have put the detectives on the right scent.

  The first two questions put by the lawyerlike juryman showed that he saw how important the evidence might have been which this witness, Joseph Higgins by name, should have given had he but known his business.

  The first question was——

  “It had rained, hadn’t it, on the Monday night?”

  [That previous to the catastrophe.]

  “Ye-es t’had rained,” Higgins replied.

  Then followed this important question:

  “You were on the spot one of the very first. Did you notice if there were any footsteps about?”

  It appears to me very clear that Mr. Mortoun was here following up the theory of the catastrophe offered by the doctor. It would be clear that if several poaching companions had carried the young squire, after death, to the hall-door, that, as rain had fallen during the night, there would inevitably be many boot-marks on the soft ground.

  This question put, the witness asked, “Wh-a-at?”

  The question was repeated.

  “Noa,” he replied; “ah didn’t see noa foot ma-arks.”

  “Did you look for any?”

  “Noa; ah didn’t look for any.”

  “Then you don’t know your business,” said Mr. Mortoun.

  And the juryman was right; for I may tell the reader that boot-marks have sent more men to the gallows, as parts of circumstantial evidence, than any other proof whatever; indeed, the evidence of the boot-mark is terrible. A nail fallen out, or two or three put very close together, a broken nail, or all the nails perfect, have, times out of number, identified the boot of the suspected man with the boot-mark near the murdered, and has been the first link of the chain of evidence which has dragged a murderer to the gallows, or a minor felon to the hulks.

  Indeed, if I were advising evil-doers on the best means of avoiding detection, I would say by all means take a second pair of boots in your pocket, and when you near the scene of your work change those you have on for those you have in your pocket, and do your wickedness in these latter; flee from the scene in these latter, and when you have “made” some distance, why return to your other boots, and carefully hide the tell-tale pair. Then the boots you wear will rather be a proof of your innocence than presumable evidence of your guilt.

  Nor let any one be shocked at this public advice to rascals; for I flatter myself I have a counter-mode of foiling such a felonious arrangement as this one of two pairs of boots. And as I have disseminated the mode amongst the police, any attempt to put the suggestions I have offered actually into action, would be attended with greater chances of detection than would be incurred by running the ordinary risk.

  To return to the subject in hand.

  The constable of Tram, the only human being in the town, Mortoun apart perhaps, who should have known, in the ordinary course of his duty, the value of every foot-mark near the dead body, had totally neglected a precaution which, had he observed it, must have led to a discovery (and an immediate one), which in consequence of his dullness was never publicly made.

  Nothing could be more certain than this, that what is called foot-mark evidence was totally wanting.

  The constable tak
ing no observations, not the cutest detective in existence could have obtained any evidence of this character, for the news of the catastrophe spreading, as news only spreads in villages, the rustics tramped up in scores, and so obliterated what foot-marks might have existed.

  To be brief, Mr. Josh. Higgins could give no evidence worth hearing.

  And now the only depositions which remained to be given were those of Dinah Yarton.

  She came into court “much reduced,” said the paper from which I gain these particulars, “from the effects of the succession of fits which she had fallen into and struggled out of.”

  She was so stupid that every question had to be repeated in half-a-dozen shapes before she could offer a single reply. It took four inquiries to get at her name, three to know where she lived, five to know what she was; while the coroner and the jury, after a score of questions, gave over trying to ascertain whether she knew the nature of an oath. However, as she stated that she was quite sure she would go to a “bad place” if she did not speak the truth, she was declared to be a perfectly competent witness, and I have no doubt she was badgered accordingly.

  And as Mr. Mortoun got more particulars out of her than all the rest of the questioners put together, perhaps it will not be amiss, as upon her evidence turned the whole of my actions so far as I was concerned, to give that gentleman’s questions and her answers in full, precisely as they were quoted in the greedy county paper, which doubtless looked upon the whole case as a publishing godsend, the proprietors heartily wishing that the inquest might be adjourned a score of times for further evidence.

  “Well now, Dinah,” said Mr. Mortoun, “what time did you go to bed on Monday?”

  [The answers were generally got after much hammering in on the part of the inquirist. I will simply return them at once as ultimately given.]

  “Ten.”

  “Did you go to sleep?”

  “Noa—Ise didunt goa to sleep.”

  “Why not?”

  “Caize Ise couldn’t.”

  “But why?”

  “Ise wur thinkin’.”

  “What of?”

  “Arl manner o’ thing’.”

  “Tell us one of them?”

  [No answer—except symptoms of another fit.]

  “Tut—tut! Well, did you go to sleep at last?”

  “Ise did.”

  “Well, when did you wake?”

  “Ise woke when missus ca’d I.”

  “What time?”

  “Doant know clock.”

  “Was it daylight?”

  “E-es, it wur day.”

  “Did you wake during the night?”

  “E-es, wuncet.”

  “How did that happen?”

  “Doant knaw.”

  “Did you hear anything?”

  “Noa.”

  “Did you think you heard anything?”

  “E-es.”

  “What?”

  “Whoy, it movin’.”

  “What was moving?”

  “Whoy, the box.”

  “Box—tut, tut,” said the lawyer, “answer me properly.”

  Now here he raised his voice, and I have no doubt Dinah had to thank the juryman for the return of her fits.

  “Do you hear?—answer me properly.”

  “E-es.”

  “When you woke up did you hear any noise?”

  “Noa.”

  “But you thought you heard a noise?”

  “E-es, in the——”

  “Tut, tut. Never mind the box—where was it?”

  “Ter box? In t’ hall!”

  “No—no, the noise.”

  “In t’ hall, zur!”

  “What—the noise was?”

  “Noa, zur, ter box.”

  “There, my good girl,” says the Tram oracle, “never mind the box, I want you to think of this—did you hear any noise outside the house?”

  “Noa.”

  “But you said you heard a noise?”

  “No, zur, I didunt.”

  “Well, but you said you thought you heard a noise?”

  “E-es.”

  “Well—where?”

  “In ter box——”

  Here, said the county paper, the lawyer, striking his hand on the table before him, continued—

  “Speak of the box once more, my girl, and to prison you go.”

  “Prizun!” says the luckless witness.

  “Yes, jail and bread and water!”

  And thereupon the unhappy witness without any further remarks plunged into a fit, and had to be carried out, battling with that strength which convulsions appear to bring with them, and in the arms of three men, who had quite their work to do to keep her moderately quiet.

  “I don’t think, gentlemen,” said the coroner, “that this witness is material. In the first place, it seems doubtful to me whether she is capable of giving evidence; and, in the second, I believe she has little evidence to give—so little that I doubt the policy of adjourning the inquest till her recovery. It appears to me that it would be cruelty to force this poor young woman again into the position she has just endured, unless you are satisfied that she is a material witness. I think she has said enough to show that she is not. It appears certain, from her own statement, that she retired to rest with Mrs. Quinion, and knows nothing more of what occurred till the housekeeper awoke her in the morning, after she herself had received the alarm. I suggest, therefore, that what evidence she could give is included in that already before the jury, and given by the housekeeper.”

  The jury coincided in the remarks made by the coroner, Mr. Mortoun, however, adding that he was at a loss to comprehend the girl’s frequent reference to the box. Perhaps Mrs. Quinion could help to elucidate the mystery.

  The housekeeper immediately rose.

  “Mrs. Quinion,” said Mr. Mortoun, “can you give any explanation as to what the young person meant by referring to a box?”

  “No.”

  “There are of course boxes at Petleighcote?”

  “Beyond all question.”

  “Any box in particular?”

  “No box in particular.”

  “No box which is spoken of as the box?”

  “Not any.”

  “The girl said it was in the hall. Is there a box in the hall?”

  “Yes, several.”

  “What are they?”

  “There is a clog and boot box, a box on the table in which letters for the post are placed when the family is at home, and from which they are removed every day at four; and also a box fixed to the wall, the use of which I have never been able to discover, and of the removal of which I have several times spoken to Mr. Petleigh.”

  “How large is it?”

  “About a foot-and-a-half square and three feet deep.”

  “Locked?”

  “No, the flap is always open.”

  “Has the young woman ever betrayed any fear of this box?”

  “Never.”

  “You have no idea to what box in the hall she referred in her evidence?”

  “Not the least idea.”

  “Do you consider the young woman weak in her head?”

  “She is decidedly not of strong intellect.”

  “And you suppose this box idea a mere fancy?”

  “Of course.”

  “And a recent one?”

  “I never heard her refer to a box before.”

  “That will do.”

  The paper whence I take my evidence describes Mrs. Quinion as a woman of very great self-possession, who gave what she had to say with perfect calmness and slowness of speech.

  This being all the evidence, the coroner was about to sum up, when the Constable Higgins remembered that he had forgotten something, and came forward in a great hurry to repair his error.

  He had not produced the articles found on the deceased.

  These articles were a key and a black crape mask.

  The squire being recalled, and the key shown to him, h
e identified the key as (he believed) one of his “household keys.” It was of no particular value, and it did not matter if it remained in the hands of the police.

  The report continued: “The key is now in the custody of the constable.”

  With regard to the crape mask the squire could offer no explanation concerning it.

  The coroner then proceeded to sum up, and in doing so he paid many well-termed compliments to the doctor for that gentleman’s view of the matter (which I have no doubt threw off all interest in the matter on the part of the public, and slackened the watchful-ness of the detective force, many of whom, though very clever, are equally simple, and accept a plain and straightforward statement with extreme willingness)—and urged that the discovery of the black crape mask appeared to be very much like corroborative proof of the doctor’s suggestion. “The young man,” said the coroner, “would, if poaching, be exceedingly desirous of hiding his face, considering his position in the county, and then the finding of this black crape mask upon the body would, if the poaching explanation were accepted, be a very natural discovery. But——”