Part 12 (2/2)
Mrs. Boppert, the scrub-woman, followed him; and if she was watched by no one else in that room, she was watched by me. Her manner before the Coroner was no more satisfactory, according to my notion, than it had been in Mr. Van Burnam's parlor. She gave a very perceptible start when they spoke her name, and looked quite scared when the Bible was held out towards her. But she took the oath notwithstanding, and with her testimony the inquiry began in earnest.
”What is your name?” asked the Coroner.
As this was something she could not help knowing, she uttered the necessary words glibly, though in a way that showed she resented his impertinence in asking her what he already knew.
”Where do you live? And what do you do for a living?” rapidly followed.
She replied that she was a scrub-woman and cleaned people's houses, and having said this, she a.s.sumed a very dogged air, which I thought strange enough to raise a question in the minds of those who watched her. But no one else seemed to regard it as anything but the embarra.s.sment of ignorance.
”How long have you known the Van Burnam family?” the Coroner went on.
”Two years, sir, come next Christmas.”
”Have you often done work for them?”
”I clean the house twice a year, fall and spring.”
”Why were you at this house two days ago?”
”To scrub the kitchen floors, sir, and put the pantries in order.”
”Had you received notice to do so?”
”Yes, sir, through Mr. Franklin Van Burnam.”
”And was that the first day of your work there?”
”No, sir; I had been there all the day before.”
”You don't speak loud enough,” objected the Coroner; ”remember that every one in this room wants to hear you.”
She looked up, and with a frightened air surveyed the crowd about her.
Publicity evidently made her most uncomfortable, and her voice sank rather than rose.
”Where did you get the key of the house, and by what door did you enter?”
”I went in at the bas.e.m.e.nt, sir, and I got the key at Mr. Van Burnam's agent in Dey Street. I had to go for it; sometimes they send it to me; but not this time.”
”And now relate your meeting with the policeman on Wednesday morning, in front of Mr. Van Burnam's house.”
She tried to tell her story, but she made awkward work of it, and they had to ply her with questions to get at the smallest fact. But finally she managed to repeat what we already knew, how she went with the policeman into the house, and how they stumbled upon the dead woman in the parlor.
Further than this they did not question her, and I, Amelia b.u.t.terworth, had to sit in silence and see her go back to her seat, redder than before, but with a strangely satisfied air that told me she had escaped more easily than she had expected. And yet Mr. Gryce had been warned that she knew more than appeared, and by one in whom he seemed to have placed some confidence!
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