I went to Lizzie’s door and rapped on it.
Dr. Bowen came to it, holding open the door — opening the door, I should say — about six or eight inches, and asked what was wanted. I told him that we had come there as officers to search this room and search the building. He then turned around to Miss Borden and told me to wait a moment, and closed the door. He then opened the door again and said that Lizzie wanted to know if it was absolutely necessary for us to search that room. I told him as officers, murders having been committed, it was our duty to do so, and we wanted to get in there. He closed the door again, and said something to Miss Borden, and finally opened the door and admitted us.
We proceeded to search, looking through some drawers, and the closet and bedroom. While the search was still going on, I said to Lizzie, “You said that you were up in the barn for half an hour. Do you say that now?”
She said, “I don’t say half an hour. I say twenty minutes to half an hour.”
“Well, we’ll call it twenty minutes then,” I said.
“I say from twenty minutes to half an hour, sir,” she said.
I then asked her when was the last time that she saw her stepmother — when and where. She said that the last time she saw her was about nine o’clock and she was then in the room where she was found dead, and was making the bed.
That is to say, at nine o’clock she was making the bed in the room where she was found dead.
She then said that someone brought a letter or note to Mrs. Borden and she thought she had gone out and had not known of her return.
As we continued to search Lizzie Borden’s room, she said she hoped we should get through with this quick, that she was getting tired, or words to that effect — it was making her tired — and we told her we should get through as soon as we possibly could. It was an unpleasant duty — that is, considering that her father and stepmother were dead. We searched that room, and then we went to the room where Mrs. Borden was found dead.
I saw a door there which would lead into Lizzie Borden’s room and on Lizzie Borden’s side was a bookcase and, I think, desk combined. This was situated directly in front of the door, or in back of the door leading from where Mrs. Borden was found dead. The door was locked. I’m not sure on which side, but I think upon Lizzie Borden’s side.
I searched a clothespress that was in the room directly in front of Lizzie’s room, and then I searched Mr. Borden’s room, and went up to the attics and searched Bridget’s room, and the closet, together with the room adjoining the other rooms, and the west end of the attics. Then I came downstairs, went down in the cellar again, saw Dr. Dolan, saw Officer Mullaly, and asked where he got the axes and the hatchets, and he showed me.
I found — in a box in the middle cellar, on a shelf or a jog of an old-fashioned chimney — the head of a hatchet.
“Is this the hatchet you found?” Moody asked.
“This looks like the hatchet that I found there. Pretty sure that that’s the one. This piece of wood was in the head of the hatchet, broken off close.”
“Broken off close to the hatchet?”
“Very close to the hatchet.”
“Mr. Fleet, will you describe everything in respect to the appearance of that hatchet, if you can?”
“Don’t want anything but just what the hatchet was at that time,” Robinson said. “Don’t want any inferences.”
“I think he’ll be careful,” Moody said. “Any appearances that you noticed about the hatchet, you may describe.”
“Yes, sir, I don’t want to do anything else, Mr. Attorneys. The hatchet was covered with a heavy dust or ashes.”
“Describe the ashes as well as you can.”
“It was covered with white ashes, I should say, upon the blade of the hatchet. Not upon one side, but upon both.”
“Could you tell anything about whether there were ashes upon the head of the hatchet?”
“I don’t think you should make any suggestions,” Robinson said. “I object to that style of question.”
“Well,” Moody said, “describe further.”
“I should say that upon this hatchet was dust, or ashes as though the head...
“Wait a moment!” Robinson said. “I object to that!”
“Describe on what parts of the hatchet,” Moody said.
“On both the faces and all over, the hatchet was covered with dust or ashes.”
“Was that fine dust...?”
“Wait a moment,” Robinson said. “The witness didn’t say fine dust. We object to that.”
“Describe the dust there,” Moody said.
“The dust, in my opinion, was ashes.”
“According to your observation, what did it look like?”
“I object to it,” Robinson said.
“Describe it,” Mason said. “Whether he recognized it as ashes or any particular substance, he may say.”
“I recognized it as ashes.”
“Can you tell me how fine or coarse the ashes were?”
“They were fine.”
“Did you notice anything with reference to the other tools in the box at the time?”
“Yes, sir. There was dust upon them.”
“The same as upon this?”
“No, sir.”
“What difference was there, if any?”
“The dust on the other tools was lighter and finer than the dust upon that hatchet.”
“At that time, Mr. Fleet, did you observe anything with reference to the point of breaking of the hatchet?”
“The only thing I recognized at the time was that this was apparently a new break.”
“I object to that answer,” Robinson said. “That this was a new break.”
“At that time,” Moody said, “did you observe anything, with reference to the ashes, upon the point of the break upon the handle, upon the wood where it was broken?”
“There seemed to be ashes there like the other.”
“Now Mr. Mullaly,” Robinson asked, “when did you see the one that has no handle?”
“When Mr. Fleet called my attention to it.”
“Well, how was that? What was the condition of that?”
“That had ashes, what I call ashes, on each side of it. The handle was broken and it looked fresh, fresh broken.”
“I haven’t asked you about that just now. I am asking you about the hatchet part, the metal. How did that look as compared to today?”
“It looked different.”
“How?”
“That is, it was covered with ashes.”
“And those have been removed since that time?”
“There is none on there now that I can see.”
“And do you know where that has been since?”
“I do not.”
“And that piece of the handle — which is now out of the eye of the hatchet — you think does not look so new as it did at that time?”
“It don’t to me, not now.”
“Did you afterwards look in the box?”
“I did not. As I remember of, I didn’t look in it.”
“Do you know anything of what became of the box?”
“No, sir.”
“Nothing else was taken out of it while you were there?”
“Nothing but the hatchet and parts of the handle.”
“Well... parts? That piece?”
“That piece, yes.”
“Well, that was in the eye, wasn’t it?”
“Yes. Then there was another piece.”
“Another piece of what?”
“Handle.”
From where Lizzie sat, she saw Robinson’s back stiffen, as though he were a hunting dog catching the scent of an elusive quarry. In the same instant the jury became suddenly alert, the bearded and mustached faces seeming to come alive all at once. From the spectators’ benches at the back of the courtroom, she heard a murmur like a single exhalation of breath, and then all was silent again. At the prosecutors’ table, both Moody and Knowlton were frowning.