Evan Hunter - Lizzie

“Yes, sir. I said, ‘You might as well’, or ‘Why don’t you’, something like that. That is what it meant. I can’t tell you the exact words.”

“Wasn’t ‘Lizzie, what are you going to do with that dress?’ the first thing said by anybody?”

“No, sir, I don’t remember it so.”

“Do you understand Miss Russell to so testify?”

“I think she did.”

“Do you remember whether that was so or not?”

“It doesn’t seem so to me. I don’t remember it so.”

“Why doesn’t it seem so to you, if I may ask you?”

“Why, because the first I knew about it, my sister spoke to me.”

“That’s what I thought you’d say. Now, you don’t recall that the first thing you said to her, the first thing that was said by anybody was, ‘What are you going to do with that dress, Lizzie?’ ”

“No, sir. I don’t remember saying it.”

“Do you remember that you did not say it?”

“I am sure I did not.”

“You swear that you didn’t say so?”

“I swear that I didn’t say it.”

“Did you see your sister burn the dress?”

“I did not.”

“Did you see Miss Russell come back again the second time?”

“I don’t remember. I think she was wiping the dishes and came back and forth, and I didn’t pay attention.”

“Did you hear Miss Russell say to her, ‘I wouldn’t let anybody see me do that, Lizzie?’ ”

“I did not.”

“And did you notice that for any reason your sister Lizzie stepped away after something was said by Miss Russell?”

“I didn’t see my sister at all after she left the stove.”

“Miss Russell,” Moody said, “you testified before the inquest, did you?”

“Yes, sir.”

“You testified at the preliminary hearing?”

“Yes, sir.”

“And you testified once and then again before the grand jury?”

“Yes, sir.”

“At either of the three previous times — at the inquest, at the preliminary, or at the first testimony before the grand jury — did you say anything about the burning of the dress?”

“No, sir.”

“Wait a moment,” Robinson said. “I don’t see how that’s at all material. The government isn’t trying to fortify this witness, I hope.”

“Well, I won’t press it,” Moody said. “If you don’t want it, I don’t care to put it in.”

“Oh, it’s not what I want,” Robinson said. “ You’re trying the Government’s case. I’m objecting.”

“I waive the question,” Moody said.

“I think it should be stricken out,” Robinson said.

“I agree that it may be stricken out,” Moody said.

“Miss Emma... who was Mr. Hanscomb?”

“A detective of the Pinkerton Agency in Boston.”

“Employed by whom?”

“By us.”

“ ‘Us’ means whom?”

“Why, my sister and I.”

“Miss Russell, do you know Mr. Hanscomb?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Did you see him at the Borden house on Monday morning, August the eighth?”

“Yes, sir.”

“I do not ask what he said to you or you to him, but did you have some conversation with him?”

“Yes, sir.”

“In what room?”

“The parlor.”

“In consequence of that conversation, what did you do? What did you do after the conversation with Mr. Hanscomb? Did you see anyone after that conversation?”

“I saw Miss Lizzie and Miss Emma.”

Miss Russell came to us in the dining room and said Mr. Hanscomb had asked her if all the dresses were there that had been there on the day of the tragedy, and she’d told him yes. “And of course, Emma,” she said, “that was a false...”

No, I’m ahead of my story.

She came and said she had told Mr. Hanscomb a falsehood.

And I asked her what there was to tell a falsehood about.

And then she said that Mr. Hanscomb had asked her if all the dresses were there that had been there on the day of the tragedy, and she had told him yes.

There was other conversation, but I don’t know what it was. That frightened me so thoroughly, I cannot recall it.

I know the carriage was waiting for her to go on some errand, and when she came back we had some conversation with her, and it was decided to have her go and tell Mr. Hanscomb that she had told a falsehood. She went into the parlor and told him, and in a few minutes she returned from the parlor and said she had told him.

We asked why she had told the falsehood to begin with, and she said, “The burning of the dress was the worst thing Lizzie could have done.”

And my sister said to her, “Why didn’t you tell me? Why did you let me do it?”

“Dr. Bowen,” Robinson said, “I asked you about the morphine that you were giving Miss Lizzie, and you told me on Friday you gave one-eighth of a grain — which is the ordinary dose, I understand, mild dose — and on Saturday you doubled it, gave it, sent it. Did you continue the dose on Sunday?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Did you continue it Monday?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Did she also have it on Tuesday, August ninth?”

“She continued to have it.”

“She had been given for several days this double dose of morphine?”

“Yes, sir.”

“I suppose physicians well understand the effect of morphine on the mind and on the recollection, don’t they?”

“Supposed to, yes, sir.”

“Is there any question about it?”

“No, sir.”

“Do you know whether she had ever had occasion before to have morphine prescribed for her, as far as you know?”

“I don’t remember that she had.”

“Does not morphine given in double doses somewhat affect the memory, and change and alter the view of things, and give people hallucinations?”

“Yes, sir.”

As Annie White took the stand, Lizzie recalled again the inquest in Fall River last August. Knowlton waiting to question her in the near-empty courtroom. The crowds outside as she approached in the hack, the driver cracking his whip to clear a path through the spectators. She had been aware of Knowlton standing at the upstairs window, looking down into the street as she got out of the carriage, but she had not so much as glanced up at him.

All the while they talked, Annie White took stenographic notes.

Annie White was now the Government’s prelude to admission of the inquest testimony.

Lizzie leaned forward.

In front of her, and slightly to her right, she saw Robinson lean forward as well, as though coiled to spring.

“What is your full name?” Moody asked.

“Annie M. White.”

“You are the official stenographer for Bristol County, are you?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Were you present at a proceeding at Fall River sometime in August of last year?”

“Yes.”

“Do you recall the date of it?”

“The inquest was August ninth.”

“Did you see Lizzie Borden? I am referring now to Tuesday, August the ninth.”

“I did.”

“And Mr. Knowlton, the district attorney?”

“Yes.”

“In what room were you present?”

“In the District Courtroom in Fall River.”

“Who was there beside those whom you have named?”

“Judge Blaisdell and Mr. Leonard, the clerk of the court. And Dr. Dolan. And Mr. Seaver was there part of the time. And Marshal Hilliard was there all of the time. And there was one or two persons came in there I didn’t know. Strangers.”

“Did they stay, or come in and go out?”

“No, I think they were there only one forenoon. One gentlemen, or two, that I was not acquainted with.”

“Now was there some conversation between Mr. Knowlton and Miss Borden at that time?”