An American Tragedy by Theodore Dreiser

request that he fix the date of the Special Grand Jury by

which Clyde might be indicted, this was set for August fifth.

And then that body sitting, it was no least trouble for Mason

to have Clyde indicted.

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And thereafter the best that Belknap and Jephson could do

was to appear before Oberwaltzer, a Democrat, who owed

his appointment to a previous governor, to argue for a

change of venue, on the ground that by no possible stretch

of the imagination could any twelve men residing in

Cataraqui County be found who, owing to the public and

private statements of Mason, were not already vitally

opposed to Clyde and so convinced of his guilt that before

ever such a jury could be addressed by a defense, he

would be convicted.

“But where are you going then?” inquired Justice

Oberwaltzer, who was impartial enough. “The same

material has been published everywhere.”

“But, your Honor, this crime which the district attorney here

has been so busy in magnifying——” (a long and heated

objection on the part of Mason).

“But we contend just the same,” continued Belknap, “that

the public has been unduly stirred and deluded. You can’t

get twelve men now who will try this man fairly.”

“What nonsense!” exclaimed Mason, angrily. “Mere

twaddle! Why, the newspapers themselves have gathered

and published more evidence than I have. It’s the publicly

discovered facts in this case that have aroused prejudice, if

any has been aroused. But no more than would be aroused

anywhere, I maintain. Besides, if this case is to be

transferred to a distant county when the majority of the

witnesses are right here, this county is going to be saddled

with an enormous expense, which it cannot afford and

which the facts do not warrant.”

Justice Oberwaltzer, who was of a sober and moral turn, a

slow and meticulous man inclined to favor conservative

procedure in all things, was inclined to agree. And after five

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days, in which he did not more than muse idly upon the

matter, he decided to deny the motion. If he were wrong,

there was the Appellate Division to which the defense could

resort. As for stays, having fixed the date of the trial for

October fifteenth (ample time, as he judged, for the defense

to prepare its case), he adjourned for the remainder of the

summer to his cottage on Blue Mountain Lake, where both

the prosecution and the defense, should any knotty or

locally insoluble legal complication arise, would be able to

find him and have his personal attention.

But with the entry of the Messrs. Belknap and Jephson into

the case, Mason found it advisable to redouble his efforts to

make positive, in so far as it were possible, the conviction

of Clyde. He feared the young Jephson as much as he did

Belknap. And for that reason, taking with him Burton

Burleigh and Earl Newcomb, he now revisited Lycurgus,

where among other things he was able to discover (1)

where Clyde had purchased the camera; (2) that three days

before his departure for Big Bittern he had said to Mrs.

Peyton that he was thinking of taking his camera with him

and that he must get some films for it; (3) that there was a

haberdasher by the name of Orrin Short who had known

Clyde well and that but four months before Clyde had

applied to him for advice in connection with a factory hand’s

pregnant wife—also (and this in great confidence to Burton

Burleigh, who had unearthed him) that he had

recommended to Clyde a certain Dr. Glenn, near

Gloversville; (4) Dr. Glenn himself being sought and

pictures of Clyde and Roberta being submitted, he was able

to identify Roberta, although not Clyde, and to describe the

state of mind in which she had approached him, as well as

the story she had told—a story which in no way incriminated

Clyde or herself, and which, therefore, Mason decided

might best be ignored, for the present, anyhow.

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And (5), via these same enthusiastic efforts, there rose to

the surface the particular hat salesman in Utica who had

sold Clyde the hat. For Burton Burleigh being interviewed

while in Utica, and his picture published along with one of

Clyde, this salesman chanced to see it and recalling him at

once made haste to communicate with Mason, with the

result that his testimony, properly typewritten and sworn to,

was carried away by Mason.

And, in addition, the country girl who had been on the

steamer “Cygnus” and who had noticed Clyde, wrote

Mason that she remembered him wearing a straw hat, also

his leaving the boat at Sharon, a bit of evidence which most

fully confirmed that of the captain of the boat and caused

Mason to feel that Providence or Fate was working with

him. And last, but most important of all to him, there came a

communication from a woman residing in Bedford,

Pennsylvania, who announced that during the week of July

third to tenth, she and her husband had been camping on

the east shore of Big Bittern, near the southern end of the

lake. And while rowing on the lake on the afternoon of July

eighth, at about six o’clock, she had heard a cry which

sounded like that of a woman or girl in distress—a plaintive,

mournful cry. It was very faint and had seemed to come

from beyond the island which was to the south and west of

the bay in which they were fishing.

Mason now proposed to remain absolutely silent regarding

this information, and that about the camera and films and

the data regarding Clyde’s offense in Kansas City, until

nearer the day of trial, or during the trial itself, when it would

be impossible for the defense to attempt either to refute or

ameliorate it in any way.

As for Belknap and Jephson, apart from drilling Clyde in the

matter of his general denial based on his change of heart

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909

once he had arrived at Grass Lake, and the explanation of

the two hats and the bag, they could not see that there was

much to do. True, there was the suit thrown in Fourth Lake

near the Cranstons’, but after much trolling on the part of a

seemingly casual fisherman, that was brought up, cleaned

and pressed, and now hung in a locked closet in the

Belknap and Jephson office. Also, there was the camera at

Big Bittern, dived for but never found by them—a

circumstance which led Jephson to conclude that Mason

must have it, and so caused him to decide that he would

refer to it at the earliest possible opportunity at the trial. But

as for Clyde striking her with it, even accidentally, well, it

was decided at that time at least, to contend that he had not

—although after exhuming Roberta’s body at Biltz it had

been found that the marks on her face, even at this date,

did correspond in some degree to the size and shape of the

camera.

For, in the first place, they were exceedingly dubious of

Clyde as a witness. Would he or would he not, in telling of

how it all happened, be sufficiently direct or forceful and

sincere to convince any jury that he had so struck her

without intending to strike her? For on that, marks or no

marks, would depend whether the jury was going to believe

him. And if it did not believe that he struck her accidentally,

then a verdict of guilty, of course.

And so they prepared to await the coming of the trial, only

working betimes and in so far as they dared, to obtain

testimony or evidence as to Clyde’s previous good

character, but being blocked to a degree by the fact that in

Lycurgus, while pretending to be a model youth outwardly,

he had privately been conducting himself otherwise, and

that in Kansas City his first commercial efforts had resulted

in such a scandal.

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However, one of the most difficult matters in connection

with Clyde and his incarceration here, as Belknap and

Jephson as well as the prosecution saw it, was the fact that

thus far not one single member of his own or his uncle’s

family had come forward to champion him. And to no one

save Belknap and Jephson had he admitted where his

parents were. Yet would it not be necessary, as both

Belknap and Jephson argued from time to time, if any case

at all were to be made out for him, to have his mother or

father, or at least a sister or a brother, come forward to say

a good word for him? Otherwise, Clyde might appear to be

a pariah, one who had been from the first a drifter and a

waster and was now purposely being avoided by all who

knew him.

For this reason, at their conference with Darrah Brook-hart