“It is a point gained, and I compliment the jury upon it. We can now proceed to settle, if possible, the identity of the person who accompanied Mrs. Van Burnam into your father’s house.”
“Wait,” cried Mr. Van Burnam, with a strange air, “I acknowledge I was that person.”
It was coolly, almost fiercely said, but it was an admission that wellnigh created a hubbub. Even the Coroner seemed moved, and cast a glance at Mr. Gryce which showed his surprise to be greater than his discretion.
“You acknowledge,” he began—but the witness did not let him finish.
“I acknowledge that I was the person who accompanied her into that empty house; but I do not acknowledge that I killed her. She was alive and well when I left her, difficult as it is for me to prove it. It was the realization of this difficulty which made me perjure myself this morning.”
“So,” murmured the Coroner, with another glance at Mr. Gryce, “you acknowledge that you perjured yourself. Will the room be quiet!”
But the lull came slowly. The contrast between the appearance of this elegant young man and the significant admissions he had just made (admissions which to three quarters of the persons there meant more, much more, than he acknowledged), was certainly such as to provoke interest of the deepest kind. I felt like giving rein to my own feelings, and was not surprised at the patience shown by the Coroner. But order was restored at last, and the inquiry proceeded.
“We are then to consider the testimony given by you this morning as null and void?”
“Yes, so far as it contradicts what I have just stated.”
“Ah, then you will no doubt be willing to give us your evidence again?”
“Certainly, if you will be so kind as to question me.”
“Very well; where did your wife and yourself first meet after your arrival in New York?”
“In the street near my office. She was coming to see me, but I prevailed upon her to go uptown.”
“What time was this?”
“After ten and before noon. I cannot give the exact hour.”
“And where did you go?”
“To a hotel on Broadway; you have already heard of our visit there.”
“You are, then, the Mr. James Pope, whose wife registered in the books of the Hotel D—— on the seventeenth of this month?”
“I have said so.”
“And may I ask for what purpose you used this disguise, and allowed your wife to sign a wrong name?”
“To satisfy a freak. She considered it the best way of covering up a scheme she had formed; which was to awaken the interest of my father under the name and appearance of a stranger, and not to inform him who she was till he had given some evidence of partiality for her.”
“Ah, but for such an end was it necessary for her to assume a strange name before she saw your father, and for you both to conduct yourselves in the mysterious way you did all that day and evening?”
“I do not know. She thought so, and I humored her. I was tired of working against her, and was willing she should have her own way for a time.”