The Mysteries of London, Vol. IV — page 195: what you’re looking at

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188 THE MYSTERIES OF LONDON. -— to bs young, was at tho garden-gate; and I could |are all produced by the same sized boots. Th not see her countenance. The light which the de- ceased carriod fell fully upon tho face of the other female; and I therefore obtained a good view of her. The prisoner at the bar is the female alluded to.” Mrs, Dyer then narrated how she and her lodgers had discovered the murder on the ensuing morning ; but these details aro already known to tho reader. The inspector of police who had the casein hand, was next examined, and his deposition was to the following effect :— In consequence of the informa- tion I receivod from Mrs. Dyer, immediately after the murder was discovered, I instituted certain in. quiries, and ascertained, in the;course of the morn- ing, that an old and a young woman had taken a cab in the neighbourhood of the Angel at Islington, on the previous night, which was the one in ques- tion, They drove to Suffolk-stroct, Pall Mall, where the young lady paid the driver his fare from a heary and well-filled purse. Tho driver gave me a description of the elder female; and that descrip- tion tallied with the one already given by Mrs, Dyer. I theroupon repaired to Suffulk-street, and learnt that the two women had taken their de- parture in a post-chaise, between nine and ten o'clock that morning. This was the morning after the murder. Previous to their departure, they were joined by a young gentleman who wont away with them. He had called on several occasions at tho lodgings ; and his namo was - Here the magistrate interposed, and said that t might not be necessary to mention this name publicly, as there was nothing to implicate the gentleman referred to, The inspector accordingly proceeded thus :— “Tho chaiso was sont for in a great hurry, and its destination was unknown to tho landlady and ser- vants of the houso. No previous intimation of tho intended departuro of the lodgers had beon given. Thoy settled all their liabilities before they left. The prisoner at the bar paid the rent and other littlo mattors owing; but did not display any large sum of monoy. Ilaving ascertained all these particulars, I sent a description of tho elder femalo to the various railways having olectric tolegraphs; and the prisoner at the bar was apprehended at Dover, in consequcnce of the information thus con- veyed,” Upon being cross-cxaminod by tho learned gon- tleman for tho dofence, tho inspector fairly and impartially deposed as follows :—‘‘ The stake with which the murder was cvidently perpetrated, was found by the side of the corpse. It wastaken from a piece of unonclosed waste ground at the back of the house. 1 beliove this to bo tho fact, becauso I door-post of the back gate was cut away from the outside. preciso place where the bolt fitted into the door: postin the inside. The cutting away roendored it easy to force back the bolt with the fingers. The work of cutting was performed, I should say, with a knife—most probably a pocketor clasp-knife. It must have taken half an hour at the least to accom: plish ; and the hand that did it must have been tolerably strong. There are marks of footsteps, indicated in the same manner as those on the win- dow-ledge, up the stairs from tho back door to the back parlour. The lock of the back door so often alluded to, was picked from tho outside.” The inspector’s evidence terminated hore; and the counsel for Mrs. Fitzhardinge recalled Mrs. Dyer. “ Will you state, as accurately as you can, the hour when you returned home on the night of the murder ?” he asked. “ HWalf-past elevon, sir,” was the answer. “That will do,” said the learned gentleman, who forthwith proceeded to call tho driver of the cab which Mrs, Fitzhardingo and Perdita had taken on the night in question. “ At what hour,” he de- manded, “did the prisoner and the young lady who accompanied her hire your vehicle?” “Tt was twelve o’clock,” replied the man. “I am sure it was precisely midnight, because I had just loft a public-house when I was hailed by the ladies.”’ This witness was ordered to stand down; and the landlady of the house in Suffolk-street was called next. Sho deposed that she was sitting up for her lo¢gers on the night in question, and that they reached home at twenty minutes to one. Sho was certain as to the correctness of her statement, because sho looked at the clock in the passage as she passed by to let the Jadics in. Thero was nothing confused in their manner, She attended them to the door of their bed-chamber, and did not observe that their shoes were at all soiled with damp clay. Sho was convinced that they did not leave tho houso again that night. Tho ladies had always appeared to have plenty of money from tho very day they ontered her dwelling. The learned counsel then proceeded to address the magistrate on bohalf of Mrs. Fitzhardinge. Hoe began by remarking on tho meagre nature of the. evidence against her—the mere fact that she and the young lady who was with her, and who was her daughter, were the last persons seen in the company of the murdered man ;—~and hoe complained bitterly that his client should have been arrested— have discovered a hole from which a stake had | ignominiously brought back to London—and forced most likely been taken; and the stake now pro- duced fits that hole. I also discovorod marks of footsteps between the back door of tho house and the spot where tho stake bad been pulled up. Those marks aro of a man’s boots. Tho soil of some part of the waste grourd is moist and damp. There aro marks on tho wit.dow-ledge of the back parlour, as if somo one with dirty boots or shoos had clambered up and cood there. Tho shutters have numerous heart-h, ies in thom, so that a per- son standing up on th, ‘ledge, outside the window, could see into the bak parlour. IJ discovered no traces of any female f,bdtstepson tho waste ground; neither are thore twa esceipttens of marks. Thoy — through tho ordeal of a public examination on such a Shallow pretence. Every circumstance, adduced that morning—every foaturo of the evidonce, tended only to exculpate tho prisoner at tho bar. In the first place, it was clear, from the testimony recorded, that tho prisoner and her daughter had quitted the houso of tho decoased at half-past olevon—had taken a cab at the Angel at midnight—and had drivon straight home, reaching Suffolk-street ot twenty minutes toone. Now tho distance from the sceno of the murdor to the Angel would require rapid walking for two females to accomplish in half ar hour, and leave not an instant to accomplish the crime before they set out, much less to cut away the EConnicloooks Whoever did it must have known the (CO)