He used the
stone because he could throw it away and no weapon could be found.
The murderer saw the oaken staff. He knew that Mr. Ellicott had a
visitor that evening so he used the staff to complete his deadly work
and left it behind as a witness against an innocent man. He took the
money from the safe, drew himself up by the rope, closed the trap
door, locked up the rope and threw the stone into the pond. In France
he would be safe to spend the proceeds of his crime. A nice bit of
circumstantial evidence, is it not?"
"Then you believe in circumstantial evidence, Miss Dana?"
"In certain cases. But I think it would render the community just as
safe, and be more just to the accused if, in cases of circumstantial
evidence where there is the least doubt, the sentence should be
imprisonment for life with a provision in the law that there should
be no pardon unless the innocence of the life convict was
conclusively proven. When a murderer is taken red-handed, I would not
abate one jot or tittle of the old Mosaic law--an eye for an eye, a
tooth for a tooth, a life for a life. But you know that many
murderers of whose premeditated guilt there could be no doubt have
been much more leniently dealt with by our judges and juries than
those caught in the coils of circumstantial evidence."
"Where is the watchman now?" asked the district attorney.
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