Further particulars with full biographies of all the parties in our
next edition.
Philip hastened at once to the Southern Hotel, where he found still a
great state of excitement, and a thousand different and exaggerated
stories passing from mouth to mouth. The witnesses of the event had told
it over so many time that they had worked it up into a most dramatic
scene, and embellished it with whatever could heighten its awfulness.
Outsiders had taken up invention also. The Colonel’s wife had gone
insane, they said. The children had rushed into the parlor and rolled
themselves in their father’s blood. The hotel clerk said that he noticed
there was murder in the woman’s eye when he saw her. A person who had
met the woman on the stairs felt a creeping sensation. Some thought
Brierly was an accomplice, and that he had set the woman on to kill his
rival. Some said the woman showed the calmness and indifference of
insanity.
Philip learned that Harry and Laura had both been taken to the city
prison, and he went there; but he was not admitted. Not being a
newspaper reporter, he could not see either of them that night; but the
officer questioned him suspiciously and asked him who he was. He might
perhaps see Brierly in the morning.
The latest editions of the evening papers had the result of the inquest.
It was a plain enough case for the jury, but they sat over it a long
time, listening to the wrangling of the physicians. Dr. Puffer insisted
that the man died from the effects of the wound in the chest. Dr. Dobb
as strongly insisted that the wound in the abdomen caused death. Dr.
Golightly suggested that in his opinion death ensued from a complication
of the two wounds and perhaps other causes. He examined the table
waiter, as to whether Col. Selby ate any breakfast, and what he ate, and
if he had any appetite.
The jury finally threw themselves back upon the indisputable fact that
Selby was dead, that either wound would have killed him (admitted by the
doctors), and rendered a verdict that he died from pistol-shot wounds
inflicted by a pistol in the hands of Laura Hawkins.
The morning papers blazed with big type, and overflowed with details of
the murder. The accounts in the evening papers were only the premonitory
drops to this mighty shower. The scene was dramatically worked up in
column after column. There were sketches, biographical and historical.
There were long “specials” from Washington, giving a full history of
Laura’s career there, with the names of men with whom she was said to be
intimate, a description of Senator Dilworthy’s residence and of his
family, and of Laura’s room in his house, and a sketch of the Senator’s
appearance and what he said. There was a great deal about her beauty,
her accomplishments and her brilliant position in society, and her
doubtful position in society. There was also an interview with Col.
Sellers and another with Washington Hawkins, the brother of the
murderess. One journal had a long dispatch from Hawkeye, reporting the
excitement in that quiet village and the reception of the awful
intelligence.
All the parties had been “interviewed.” There were reports of
conversations with the clerk at the hotel; with the call-boy; with the
waiter at table with all the witnesses, with the policeman, with the
landlord (who wanted it understood that nothing of that sort had ever
happened in his house before, although it had always been frequented by
the best Southern society,) and with Mrs. Col. Selby. There were
diagrams illustrating the scene of the shooting, and views of the hotel
and street, and portraits of the parties. There were three minute and
different statements from the doctors about the wounds, so technically
worded that nobody could understand them. Harry and Laura had also been
“interviewed” and there was a statement from Philip himself, which a
reporter had knocked him up out of bed at midnight to give, though how he
found him, Philip never could conjecture.
What some of the journals lacked in suitable length for the occasion,
they made up in encyclopaedic information about other similar murders and
Page: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 60 61 62 63 64 65 66 67 68 69 70 71 72 73 74 75 76 77 78 79 80 81 82 83 84 85 86 87 88 89 90 91 92 93 94 95 96 97 98 99 100 101 102 103 104 105 106 107 108 109 110 111 112 113 114 115 116 117 118 119 120 121 122 123 124 125 126 127 128 129 130 131 132 133 134 135 136 137 138 139 140 141 142 143 144 145 146 147 148 149 150 151 152 153 154 155 156 157 158 159 160 161 162 163 164 165 166 167 168 169 170 171 172 173 174 175 176 177 178 179 180 181 182 183 184 185 186 187 188 189 190 191 192 193 194 195 196 197 198 199 200 201 202 203 204 205 206 207 208 209 210 211 212 213 214 215 216 217 218 219 220 221 222 223