Evan Hunter - Lizzie

“What was the time when your father came home?”

“He came home after I came downstairs.”

“You were not upstairs when he came home?”

“I was not upstairs when he came home. No, sir.”

“What was Maggie doing when your father came home?”

“I don’t know whether she was there or whether she’d gone upstairs. I can’t remember.”

“Who let your father in?”

“I think he came to the front door and rang the bell. And I think Maggie let him in. And he said he’d forgotten his key. So I think she must have been downstairs.”

“His key would have done him no good if the locks were left as you left them,” Knowlton said.

“But they were always unbolted in the morning,” Lizzie said.

“Who unbolted them that morning?”

“I don’t think they’d been unbolted. Maggie can tell you.”

“If he hadn’t forgotten his key, it would have been no good.”

“No. He had his key and couldn’t get in. I understood Maggie to say he said he’d forgotten his key.”

“You didn’t hear him say anything about it.”

“I heard his voice. But I don’t know what he said.”

“I understood you to say he said he’d forgotten his key.”

“No. It was Maggie said he said he’d forgotten the key.”

“Where was Maggie when the bell rang?”

“I don’t know, sir.”

“Where were you when the bell rang?”

“I think in my room upstairs.”

“Then you were upstairs when your father came home.”

“I don’t know sure. But I think I was.”

“What were you doing?”

“As I say, I took up these clean clothes, and stopped and basted a little piece of tape on a garment.”

“Did you come down before your father was let in?”

“I was on the stairs coming down when she let him in.”

“Then you were upstairs when your father came to the house on his return.”

“I think I was.”

“How long had you been up there?”

“I had only been upstairs long enough to take the clothes up and baste the little loop on the sleeve. I don’t think I’d been up there over five minutes.”

“Was Maggie still engaged in washing windows when your father got back?”

“I don’t know.”

“You remember, Miss Borden — I will call your attention to it so as to see if I have any misunderstanding, not for the purpose of confusing you. You remember that you told me several times that you were downstairs, and not upstairs, when your father came home. You’ve forgotten, perhaps.”

“I don’t know what I’ve said,” Lizzie answered, shaking her head violently from side to side. “I’ve answered so many questions, and I’m so confused I don’t know one thing from another!” She took a deep breath. Her eyes met his again. “I’m telling you just as nearly as I know,” she said.

“Calling your attention to what you said about that a few minutes ago,” he said calmly, “and now again to the circumstance, you’ve said you were upstairs when the bell rang, and were on the stairs when Maggie let your father in. Which — now — is your recollection of the true statement of the matter? That you were downstairs when the bell rang and your father came?”

“I think I was downstairs in the kitchen.”

“And then you were not upstairs.”

“I think I was not. Because I went up almost immediately... as soon as I went down... and then came down again and stayed down.”

“What had you in your mind when you said you were on the stairs as Maggie let your father in?”

“The other day, somebody came there and she let them in, and I was on the stairs. I don’t know... whether the morning before or when it was.”

“You understood I was asking you exactly and explicitly about this fatal day?”

“Yes, sir.”

“I now call your attention to the fact that you had specifically told me you’d gone upstairs, and had been there about five minutes when the bell rang, and were on your way down, and were on the stairs when Maggie let your father in that day.”

“Yes, I said that. And then I said I didn’t know whether I was on the stairs or in the kitchen.”

“Now how will you have it?”

“I think... as nearly as I know... I think I was in the kitchen.”

He knew he would not, at the moment, get more from her on that single important point. She seemed to have lost control back then, but only for the briefest instant, and she’d recovered again almost at once. The most telling thing about her testimony, he realized all at once, was that from the very start she had adopted an adversary position. Small wonder when Mayor Coughlin had bluntly and inadvisedly told her, on the very day they’d put her father and stepmother in the ground, that she herself was suspected of having committed the murders. But given this advance warning, as it were, should she not now have been more eager to assist, in every way possible, toward finding a solution that pointed to someone other than herself? Why had she adopted this oddly belligerent posture — the stubborn set of mouth and jaw, the pale fire in her gray eyes — unless she herself was indeed the “maniac” the Reverend Jubb had described?

“How long was your father gone?” Knowlton asked, his voice softer. There was no sense bullying her now. She was composed again, and she would only resist such an approach.

“I don’t know, sir. Not very long.”

“An hour?”

“I shouldn’t think so.”

“Will you give me the best story you can, so far as your recollection serves you, of your time while he was gone?”

“I sprinkled my handkerchiefs. And got my ironing boards. And took them in the dining room. And left the handkerchiefs in the kitchen on the table, and... whether I ate any cookies or not, I don’t remember. Then I sat down looking at the magazine, waiting for the flats to heat. Then I went in the sitting room and got the Providence Journal and took that into the kitchen. I don’t recollect of doing anything else.”

“What did you read first? The Journal or the magazine?”

“The magazine.”

“You told me you were reading the magazine when your father came back.”

“I said in the kitchen, yes.”

“Was that so?”

“Yes. I took the Journal out to read, and hadn’t read it. I had it near me.”

“You said a minute or two ago you read the magazine awhile, and then went and got the Journal and took it out to read.”

“I did. But I didn’t read it. I tried my flats then.”

“And went back to reading the magazine?”

“I took the magazine up again, yes.”

“When did you last see your mother?”

“I didn’t see her after... when I went down in the morning and she was dusting the dining room.”

“Where did you or she go then?”

“I don’t know where she went. I know where I was.”

“Did you or she leave the dining room first?”

“I think I did. I left her in the dining room.”

“You never saw her or heard her afterwards?”

“No, sir.”

“Did she say anything about making the bed?”

“She said she’d been up and made the bed up fresh, and had dusted the room and left it all in order. She was going to put some fresh pillow slips on the small pillows at the foot of the bed, and was going to close the room because she was going to have company Monday and she wanted everything in order.”

“How long would it take to put on the pillow slips?”