Evan Hunter - Lizzie

She came into the dining room, went out in the kitchen and took an ironing board, and placed it on the dining-room table and commenced to iron. Meantime, I was washing the last window in the dining room.

She said, “Maggie, are you going out this afternoon?”

I said, “I don’t know. I might and I might not. I don’t feel very well.”

She said, “If you go out, be sure and lock the door, for Mrs. Borden has gone out on a sick call, and I might go out, too.”

“Who’s sick?” I said.

“I don’t know,” Miss Lizzie said. “She had a note this morning. It must be in town.”

She was ironing handkerchiefs. Her flats she was ironing with were in the stove, in the kitchen. When I finished my windows, I went into the kitchen, washed out the cloths that I had washing the windows, and hung them behind the stove. As I got through, Miss Lizzie came out and said, “There’s a cheap sale of dress goods at Sargent’s this afternoon, at eight cents a yard.” I don’t know that she said “this afternoon”, but “today”. And I said, “ I’m going to have one,” and went upstairs to my room...

My name is Mark P. Chase. I’m a hostler, formerly a patrolman on the police force. My place of business is right opposite Dr. Kelly’s, on Second Street. The New York and Boston Express barn. I have charge of it, right opposite the Kelly house. I was at the barn all morning on the day Andrew J. Borden was murdered.

At about eleven o’clock, I saw a carriage standing right by a tree, right front of Mr. Borden’s fence. An open buggy, a box buggy. It was a high top seat, high back. A man with a brown hat and black coat was in it. Sitting in the carriage, back to me. I should say this was about five to ten minutes of eleven. I’d never seen such a buggy as that around there before. Never saw that man around there before. I could see the man from his shoulders up to the top of his head. The side of his face. I didn’t recognize him as anybody I knew.

... When I got up in the bedroom, I laid down in the bed. I heard the bells outdoors ring, the City Hall bell, as I suppose it was, and I looked at my clock, and it was eleven o’clock.

My name Hymon Lubinsky.

I peddle ice cream. Ice-cream peddler. I work for Mr. Wilkinson. I peddle by team. I keep my team on Second Street. Charley Gardner’s stable. Near the corner of Second and Rodman Street. Near Morgan Street, too. Between Rodman and Morgan. Up a little from the Borden house. That morning, I get my team from the stable and drive toward Second Street, by the Borden house. It was after eleven, a few minutes after eleven.

I saw a lady come out the way from the barn right to the stairs back of the house — the northside stairs, from the back of the house. She had on a dark-color dress, I can’t tell what kind of color it was, nothing on her head. She was walking very slow, toward the steps. I don’t know if she went in the house, I couldn’t tell this, I was in the team. I didn’t stop the team, I just trotted a little, not fast.

The woman I saw was not the servant. I have delivered ice cream to the servant, oh, two or three weeks before the murder. The woman I saw the day of the murder was not the same woman as the servant.

I am sure about that.

... I was lying in the bed, I know I wasn’t drowsing or sleeping, and up to that time, I heard no noise, heard no sound of anybody, heard no opening or closing of the screen door. If anybody goes in or out and is careless and slams the door, I can hear it in my room.

The next thing that occurred, Miss Lizzie hollered, “Maggie, come down!”

I said, “What’s the matter?”

“Come down quick!” she said. “Father’s dead! Somebody came in and killed him!”

This was ten or fifteen minutes after the clock struck eleven, about as far as I can judge. I ran downstairs. I had not changed any of my clothing or taken off any clothing at all. When I came downstairs, the first person I saw was Miss Lizzie. She was standing at the back door, standing at the door that was leading in, a wooden door. The door was open. She was inside the threshhold, standing with her back to the screen door. I went around to go right in the sitting room, and she said, “Oh, Maggie, don’t go in! I’ve got to get a doctor quick! Go over! I’ve got to have the doctor!”

I went over to Dr. Bowen’s right away. I guess I ran, I don’t know whether I did or not. But I guess I went as fast as I could. His wife came to the door, and I told her that Mr. Borden was dead. I think that’s what I told her. And she said the doctor wasn’t in, but she expected him along any time, and she would send him over...

“Mrs. Churchill, you testified earlier that on the morning of August fourth, 1892, at about nine o’clock, you saw Mr. Borden standing on the walk by the steps. On the side of his house toward the barn, is that so?”

“That’s so, yes.”

“At any time on that morning, did you leave your house and go upon some errand?”

“Yes, sir.”

“About what time did you leave the house?”

“I don’t know. Somewhere near eleven o’clock, I should think.”

“Where did you go to?”

“I went to M. T. Hudner’s market.”

“On what street is that?”

“South Main Street.”

“How far from your house?”

“Just a little ways. Nearly opposite our house, only a little north.”

“Nearly opposite your house on a parallel street?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Did you do any business there?”

“Yes, sir.”

“What was the general nature of it?”

“I got three articles for dinner. Something for dinner.”

“Did you delay in the shop there after you bought the articles?”

“I asked my brother, who worked there, to send a telephone message for a woman who was at our house.”

“Had some brief conversation?”

“Yes.”

“Then what did you do?”

“I went right home.”

“When you reached the neighborhood of your house, did you notice anything?”

“Bridget Sullivan was going across the street from Dr. Bowen’s house to the Borden house. She looked very white, and I thought someone was sick. She was going fast.”

... When I came back to the house, I said, “Miss Lizzie, where were you ? Didn’t I leave the screen door hooked?”

“I was out in the back yard,” she said. “And heard a groan. And came in, and the screen door was wide open.”

She wanted to know if I knew where Alice Russell lived, and I said I did.

“Go and get her,” she said. “I can’t be alone in the house.”

So I stepped inside the entry and got a hat and shawl that was hanging inside the entry and went down to Miss Russell.

At that time, no outcry or alarm had been given to any of the neighbors...

“You saw Bridget Sullivan going from Dr. Bowen’s house back to the Borden house...”

“Yes, sir.”

“Then what did you do, Mrs. Churchill?”

I went right in the north side of our house, in the back door, passed through the dining room into the kitchen, and laid my bundles on a long bench. And I looked out the window, and I saw Miss Lizzie at the inside of the screen door. She looked as if she was leaning up against the east casing of the door, and she seemed excited or agitated to me, as if something had happened, and I stepped to the other window — the other kitchen window, the east window — and I opened the window and said, “Lizzie, what’s the matter?”

She said, “Oh, Mrs. Churchill, do come over! Someone has killed father!”

I shut down the window, passed right through the kitchen and dining room into the front hall, and went right out the front door over to Mr. Borden’s. I didn’t see Bridget there when I arrived. I stepped inside the screen door and Miss Lizzie was sitting on the second stair, at the right of the door. I put my right hand on her arm and said, “Lizzie, where is your father?”