The Leavenworth Case (Penguin Classics) Read online

  Upon being questioned in regard to the bodily health of Mr. Leavenworth, he replied that the deceased appeared to have been in good condition at the time of his death, but that not being his attendant physician, he could not speak conclusively upon the subject without further examination; and to the remark of a juryman observed that he had not seen pistol or weapon lying upon the floor, or indeed anywhere else in either of the above-mentioned rooms.

  I might as well add here what he afterward stated, that from the position of the table, the chair and the door behind it, the murderer, in order to satisfy all the conditions imposed by the situation, must have stood upon or just within the threshold of the passage-way leading into the room beyond. Also, that as the ball was small and from a rifled barrel, and thus especially liable to deflections while passing through bones and integuments, it seemed to him evident that the victim had made no effort to raise or turn his head when advanced upon by his destroyer; the fearful conclusion being that the footstep was an accustomed one, and the presence of its possessor in the room either known or expected.

  The physician’s testimony being ended, the coroner picked up the bullet which had been laid on the table before him, and for a moment rolled it contemplatively between his fingers, then drawing a pencil from his pocket, hastily scrawled a line or two on a piece of paper and calling an officer to his side, delivered some command in a low tone. The officer taking up the slip, looked at it for an instant knowingly, then catching up his hat left the room. Another moment, and the front door closed on him, and a wild halloo from the crowd of urchins without told of his appearance in the street. Sitting where I did, I had a full view from the window of the corner. Looking out, I saw the officer stop there, hail a cab, hastily enter it, and disappear in the direction of Broadway.

  CHAPTER 3

  Facts and Deductions

  Confusion now hath made his master-piece;

  Most sacrilegious murder hath broke ope

  The Lord’s anointed temple and stolen thence

  The life of the building.

  —MACBETH.

  Turning my attention back into the room where I was, I found the coroner consulting a memorandum through a very impressive pair of gold eye-glasses.

  “Is the butler here?” he asked.

  Immediately there was a stir among the group of servants in the corner, and an intelligent-looking though somewhat pompous Irishman stepped out from their midst and confronted the jury. “Ah,” thought I to myself as my glance encountered his precise whiskers, steady eye and respectfully attentive though by no means humble expression, “here is a model servant who is likely to prove a model witness.” And I was not mistaken. Thomas, the butler, was in all respects one in a thousand—and he knew it.

  The coroner, upon whom, as upon all others in the room, he seemed to have made the like favorable impression, proceeded without hesitation to interrogate him.

  “Your name, I am told, is Thomas Dougheity?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Well, Thomas, how long have you been employed in your present situation?”

  “It must be a matter of two years now, sir.”

  “You are the person who first discovered the body of Mr. Leavenworth?’”

  “Yes, sir; I and Mr. Harwell.”

  “And who is Mr. Harwell?”

  “Mr. Harwell is Mr. Leavenworth’s private secretary, sir; the one who did his writing.”

  “Very good. Now at what time of the day or night was it that you made this discovery?”

  “It was early, sir; early this morning, about eight.”

  “And where?”

  “In the library, sir, off Mr. Leavenworth’s bedroom. We had forced our way in, feeling anxious about his not coming to breakfast.”

  “You forced your way in; the door then was locked?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “On the inside?”

  “That I cannot tell; there was no key in the door.”

  “Where was Mr. Leavenworth lying when you first found him?”

  “He was not lying, sir. He was seated at the large table in the center of the room, his back to the bedroom door; leaning forward, his head on his hands.”

  “How was he dressed?”

  “In his dinner suit, sir, just as he came from the table last night.”

  “Were there any evidences in the room that a struggle had taken place?”

  “No, sir.”

  “Any pistol on the floor or table?”

  “No, sir.”

  “Any reason to suppose that robbery had been attempted?”

  “No, sir. Mr. Leavenworth’s watch and purse were both in his pockets.”

  Being asked to mention who was in the house at the time of the discovery, he replied: “The young ladies, Miss Mary Leavenworth and Miss Eleanore, Mr. Harwell, Kate the cook, Molly the upstairs girl, and myself.”

  “The usual members of the household?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Now tell me whose duty it is to close up the house at night.”

  “Mine, sir.”

  “Did you secure it as usual, last night?”

  “I did, sir.”

  “Who unfastened it this morning?”

  “I, sir.”

  “How did you find it?”

  “Just as I left it.”

  “What, not a window open nor a door unlocked?”

  “No, sir.”

  By this time you could have heard a pin drop. The certainty that the murderer, whoever he was, had not left the house, at least till after it was opened in the morning, seemed to weigh upon all minds. Forewarned as I had been of the fact, I could not but feel a certain degree of emotion at having it thus brought before me; and moving so as to bring the butler’s face within view, searched it for some secret token that he had spoken thus emphatically in order to cover up his own dereliction of duty. But it was unmoved in its candor, and sustained the concentrated gaze of all in the room like a rock.

  Being now asked when he had last seen Mr. Leavenworth alive, he replied. “At dinner last night.”

  “He was, however, seen later by some of you?”

  “Yes, sir; Mr. Harwell says he saw him as late as half-past ten in the evening.”

  “What room do you occupy in this house?”

  “A little one on the basement floor.”

  “And where do the other members of the household sleep?”

  “Mostly on the third floor, sir; the ladies in the large back rooms, and Mr. Harwell in the little one in front. The girls sleep above.”

  “There was then no one on the same floor with Mr. Leavenworth?”

  “No, sir.”

  “At what hour did you go to bed?”

  “Well, I should say about eleven.”

  “Did you hear any noise in the house either before or after that time, that you remember?”

  “No, sir.”

  “So that the discovery you made this morning was a surprise to you?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  Requested now to give a more detailed account of that discovery, he went on to say that it was not till Mr. Leavenworth failed to come to his breakfast at the call of the bell, that any suspicion arose in the house that all was not right. Even then they waited some time before doing anything, but as minute after minute went by and he did not come, Miss Eleanore grew very anxious, and finally left the room saying she would go to see what was the matter, but soon returned looking very much frightened, saying she had knocked at her uncle’s door, and had even called to him, but could get no answer. At which he and Mr. Harwell had gone up and together tried both doors, and finding them locked, burst open that of the library, when they saw Mr. Leavenworth as he had already said, sitting at the table, dead.

  “And the ladies?”

  “Oh, they followed us up and came into the room and Miss Eleanore fainted away.”

  “And the other one, Miss Mary I believe they call her?”

  “I don’t remember anything about he
r. I was so busy fetching water for Miss Eleanore, I didn’t notice.”

  “Well, how long was it before Mr. Leavenworth was carried into the next room?”

  “Almost immediate, as soon as Miss Eleanore recovered and that was as soon as ever the water touched her lips.”

  “Who proposed that the body should be carried from the spot?”

  “She, sir. As soon as ever she stood up she went over to it and looked at it and shuddered, and then calling Mr. Harwell and me, bade us carry him in and lay him on the bed and go for the doctor, which we did.”

  “Wait a moment; did she go with you when you went into the other room?”

  “No, sir.”

  “What did she do?”

  “She stayed by the library table.”

  “What doing?”

  “I couldn’t see; her back was to me.”

  “How long did she stay there?”

  “She was gone when we came back.”

  “Gone from the table?”

  “Gone from the room.”

  “Humph! When did you see her again?”

  “In a minute. She came in at the library door as we went out.”

  “Anything in her hand?”

  “Not as I see.”

  “Did you miss anything from the table?”

  “I never thought to look, sir. The table was nothing to me. I was only thinking of going for the doctor, though I knew it was of no use.”

  “Whom did you leave in the room when you went out?”

  “The cook, sir, and Molly, sir, and Miss Eleanore.”

  “Not Miss Mary?”

  “No, sir.”

  “Very well. Have the jury any questions to put to this man?”

  A movement at once took place in that profound body.

  “I would like to ask a few,” exclaimed a weazened-faced, excitable little man whom I had before noticed shifting in his seat in a restless manner, strongly suggestive of an intense but hitherto repressed desire to interrupt the proceedings.

  “Very well, sir,” returned Thomas.

  But the juryman stopping to draw a deep breath, a large and decidedly pompous man who sat at his right hand seized the opportunity to inquire in a round listen-to-me sort of voice:

  “You say you have been in the family for two years. Was it what you might call a united family?”

  “United?”

  “Affectionate, you know—on good terms with each other.” And the juryman lifted a very long and heavy watch chain that hung across his vest as if that as well as himself had a right to a suitable and well-considered reply.

  The butler, impressed perhaps by his manner, glanced uneasily around. “Yes, sir, as far as I know.”

  “The young ladies were attached to their uncle?”

  “Oh, yes, sir.”

  “And to each other?”

  “Well, yes, I suppose so; it’s not for me to say.”

  “You suppose so. Have you any reason to think otherwise?”

  And he doubled the watch chain about his fingers as if he would double its attention as well as his own.

  Thomas hesitated a moment. But just as his interlocutor was about to repeat his question, he drew himself up into a rather stiff and formal attitude and replied:

  “Well, sir, no.”

  The juryman, for all his self-assertion, seemed to respect the reticence of a servant who declined to give his opinion in regard to such a matter, and drawing complacently back, signified with a wave of his hand that he had no more to say.

  Immediately the excitable little man, before mentioned, slipped forward to the edge of his chair and asked this time without hesitation: “At what time did you unfasten the house this morning?”

  “About six, sir.”

  “Now could anyone leave the house after that time without your knowledge?”

  Thomas glanced a trifle uneasily at his fellow-servants, but answered up promptly and as if without reserve.

  “I don’t think it would be possible for anybody to leave this house after six in the morning without either myself or the cook’s knowing of it. Folks don’t jump from second-story windows in broad daylight, and as to leaving by the doors, the front door closes with such a slam all the house can hear it from top to bottom, and as for the back door, no one that goes out of that can get clear of the yard without going by the kitchen window, and no one can go by that kitchen window without the cook’s a-seeing of them, that I can just swear to.” And he cast a half quizzing, half malicious look at the round, red-faced individual in question, strongly suggestive of late and unforgotten bickerings over the kitchen coffee-urn and castor.

  This reply, which was of a nature calculated to deepen the forebodings which had already settled upon the minds of those present, produced a visible effect. The house found locked and no one seen to leave it! Evidently, then, we had not far to look for the assassin.

  Shifting on his chair with increased fervor, if I may so speak, the juryman glanced sharply around. But perceiving the renewed interest on the faces about him, he declined to weaken the effect of the last admission by any further questions. Settling, therefore, comfortably back, he left the field open for any other juror who might choose to press the inquiry. But no one seeming to be ready to do this, Thomas in his turn evinced impatience, and at last looking respectfully around inquired:

  “Would any other gentleman like to ask me anything?” No one replying, he threw a hurried glance of relief toward the servants at his side, then while each one marveled at the sudden change that had taken place in his countenance, withdrew with an eager alacrity and evident satisfaction for which I could not at the moment account.

  But the next witness proving to be none other than my acquaintance of the morning, Mr. Harwell, I soon forgot both Thomas and the doubts his last movement had awakened in the interest which the examination of so important a person as the secretary and right-hand man of Mr. Leavenworth was likely to create.

  Advancing with the calm and determined air of one who realized that life and death itself might hang upon the words he would be called upon to utter, Mr. Harwell took his stand before the jury with a degree of dignity that was not only highly prepossessing in itself, but to me who had not been over and above pleased with him in our first interview, admirable and surprising. Lacking, as I have said, any distinctive quality of face or form agreeable or otherwise—being what you might call in appearance a negative sort of person, his pale regular features, dark well-smoothed hair and simple whiskers all belonging to a recognized type and very commonplace—there was still visible on this occasion at least a certain self-possession in his carriage which went far toward making up for the want of impressiveness in his countenance and expression. Not that even this was in any way remarkable. Indeed there was nothing remarkable about the man, any more than there is about a thousand others you meet every day on Broadway, unless you except the look of concentration and solemnity which pervaded his whole person; a solemnity which at this time would not have been noticeable, perhaps, if it had not appeared to be the habitual expression of one who in his short life had seen more of sorrow than joy, less of pleasure than care and anxiety.

  The coroner, to whom his appearance one way or the other seemed to be a matter of no moment, addressed him immediately and without reserve.

  “Your name?”

  “James Trueman Harwell.”

  “Your business?”

  “I have occupied the position of private secretary and amanuensis to Mr. Leavenworth for the past eight months.”

  “You are the person who last saw Mr. Leavenworth alive, are you not?”

  The young man raised his head with a haughty gesture that well-nigh transfigured it.

  “Certainly not; as I am not the man who killed him.”

  This answer, which seemed to introduce something akin to levity or badinage into an examination the seriousness of which we were all beginning to realize, produced an immediate revulsion of feeling toward the man who, in face of fac
ts revealed and to be revealed, could so lightly make use of it. A hum of disapproval swept through the room, and in that one remark, James Harwell lost all that he had previously won by the self-possession of his bearing and the unflinching regard of his eye. He seemed himself to realize this, for he lifted his head still higher, though his general aspect remained unchanged.

  “I mean,” the coroner exclaimed, evidently nettled that the young man had been able to draw such a conclusion from his words, “that you were the last one to see him previous to his assassination by some unknown individual?”

  The secretary folded his arms, whether to hide a certain tremble that had seized him or by that simple action to gain time for a moment’s further thought, I could not then determine. “Sir,” he replied at length, “I cannot answer yes or no to that question. In all probability I was the last so to see him, but in a house as large as this I cannot be sure of even so simple a fact as that.” Then observing the unsatisfied look on the faces around, added slowly: “It is my business to see him late.”

  “Your business? Oh, as his secretary, I suppose?”