The Crime of the Century Part 16

"Were there any lights in the house?" he was asked.

"Yes, there was a light, a small one, in the front room of the first floor. I could see it through the blinds."

"Could you distinguish the loud words you heard?"

"No, I could not. I tried to, but as they were spoken in the house they did not reach me."

"Did you hear any sounds that would indicate that a scuffle was in progress?"

"No; I listened for them because I thought there was a fight."

"Did you hear any loud words before the man from the buggy entered?"

"No, I didn't; but I was a long way from the house then."

"Did you see the man's face?"

"He ran up the stairs in too much of a hurry for me to get a glimpse of him. He appeared to be in a terrible hurry."

"Did he speak to the man in the buggy before the latter drove away?"

"I think not."

"Do you remember whether he knocked for admission?"

"I don't believe he did. He had scarcely reached the landing when I heard the bolt of the door fly back and then it opened, and he went in."

"And you heard the loud words directly afterward?"

"Yes; just as soon as the door closed."

"How was the man dressed?"

"My impression is that he had on a long overcoat, which was of a brown color, but I wouldn't be sure of it."

"Did he have a box or parcel in his hand?"

"I am not sure. He went up-stairs so fast that I couldn't see much of him."

"Was he tall?"

"Yes; and I think quite straight and well built."

"What sort of a horse was attached to the buggy?"

"I think it was a light sorrel with a white face. I am sure about the white face."

"Was it a top buggy?"

"Yes."

"Did you notice the man in it?"

"Not very much, because he went away so fast."

"Did you see how he was dressed?"

"I could only see that he had on a slouch hat. I thought it was a little funny that they should be going up to the front door, because I had always noticed that the people who lived around there went in the back way."

Mertes had said nothing of this experience until he fell in with a party of friends who were discussing the discovery in the cottage. Then he added the startling incident of his night trip to the corner grocers, when he was probably the only man besides the murderers who heard the physician's death struggles. The authorities arrived at the conclusion that the loud voices that had startled him were made by the murderers as they fell on their victim, and that the doctor had been attacked the instant that he entered the door, being given no chance to defend himself. Taken in connection with the blows on the body, there was good ground for the theory that he was first struck over the left eye with a billy or sand-bag, and then hacked about the head with a hatchet or ice-pick. The towel that was found about the head might have been used at the start, to stifle any out-cry, and then to strangle the victim when it became apparent that horrible butchery would have to be resorted to to complete the job as it was begun. At the same time it was acknowledged that this theory was hardly compatible with the broken furniture, the blood be-spattered walls, and the other apparent evidence in the room that the physician had made a terrible struggle for life.

THE EXPRESSMAN IS FOUND.

There now remained but a single link to establish the connection between the furniture left in the cottage and that sold by Hatfield. The expressman who hauled the goods from the Clark street flat was still to be found. But there were several hundred men in the city engaged in that line of business, and although the police and detectives worked like beavers, it looked for a while as though their labor would be thrown away. Success came at last, however, although it was nearly two week's before the much wanted man was run to earth. He proved to be a Swede named Hukon Mortensen, a simple, unsuspicious young fellow, not possessed of more than the average intelligence of men of his occupation. From him it was learned that one day in the latter part of March, while at his stand, at the corner of Chicago avenue and Market street, he was approached by a man who asked him his terms for hauling a load of furniture from 117 Clark street to the corner of Lincoln and Belmont avenues. He offered to do the job for $2, but the man was not willing to pay more than $1.50, and this he accepted. This man, whose description tallied exactly with that given by the Carlsons of "Frank Williams," was a.s.sisted by another man in carrying the furniture down-stairs. When the wagon had been loaded Mortensen was told to go out to Lincoln and Belmont avenues and wait, his customer saying that he would take a cable car. The expressman was first on the ground; but the man did not put in an appearance for over an hour, when, with a companion, he drove up in a buggy, explaining the delay by saying that the cable had broken down. After the pair had carried the furniture into the cottage, young Carlson, meanwhile looking on, they took the expressman to a tobacco store two blocks away, where, after securing change for a five dollar bill, he was paid the amount agreed upon. After this he drove back to the city. It was after eight o'clock, and consequently pitch dark when his wagon was unloaded. Three or four times during the next few days the same man pa.s.sed the stand, and then he was not seen again in the neighborhood.

The plot, according to the surroundings, could now be outlined.

Preparations for the "removal" of the unfortunate physician had been commenced as early as February, when the flat was hired and the furniture purchased. Apparently it was the original intention to lure him into the third story of the Clark street building, where isolated, and, as "Simonds" remarked, "with no tenants on the same floor," he could be summoned from his office on the other side of the street and speedily done to death. For some reason or other, however, possibly because a single outcry might have alarmed the people on the floor below, this idea was abandoned, and the lonely cottage was hired. For over six weeks the a.s.sa.s.sins must have plotted and planned the carrying-out of their murderous intentions. Then came the summons of the night of May 4th, the crime, the efforts to dispose of the body in the lake, its concealment in the catch-basin, the throwing away of the b.l.o.o.d.y trunk, the endeavor to efface the blood-stains in the cottage with paint, and finally the strenuous effort to continue its occupancy, in order that its condition might not be seen by other eyes. So far the authorities were satisfied with the results accomplished.

ICEMAN O'SULLIVAN SUSPECTED.

The opinion was now almost general that Iceman O'Sullivan knew more concerning the tragedy than he was willing to admit. No one was yet bold enough to accuse him of actual complicity in the crime, while at the same time it was apparent that his statements to the police, as well as to the friends of Dr. Cronin, were widely at variance with the discoveries that had been made. The peculiar nature of the contract he was said to have made with the physician, to attend any man in his employ who might meet with an accident, his denial of any acquaintance with the men who had rented the cottage, in the face of the fact that he had been seen in conversation with "Frank Williams," and had guaranteed the payment of the rent by the latter, and numerous other circ.u.mstances, some more or less trivial, were sufficient to raise the question as to whether, even had he taken no actual part in the terrible crime, he, in legal phraseology was not "possessed of a guilty knowledge." Hence it was the police decided to place the iceman under surveillance.

Thereafter his house, as well as his every movement, when out of doors, was watched both night and day, and any attempt to leave the city would have resulted in his immediate arrest.

CHAPTER VIII.

THE WHITE HORSE AND BUGGY--DETECTIVE COUGHLIN HIRES IT FOR A "FRIEND"-- THE TROUBLE IN THE STABLE--DINAN GOES TO SCHAACK--THE CAPTAIN'S PECULIAR MOVEMENTS--SCANLAN IDENTIFIES THE HORSE--THE DETECTIVE AND O'SULLIVAN ARE JAILED--THE GRAND JURY INDICTS THEM WITH WOODRUFF--FULL ON THE TRACK OF THE CONSPIRATORS.

"Who owned the rig in which Dr. Cronin was driven to the a.s.sa.s.sin's den?"

"Who hired the white horse and buggy--if it was hired--that Frank Scanlan saw standing outside of the Windsor Theatre building on that memorable May night?"

These were the questions to which the friends of the murdered physician now directed themselves. The body had been found; the cottage in which the crime had been committed--with all its mute but gory testimony--had been located. But even now the wheels of the mill of justice had scarce begun to revolve. Dr. Cronin had left his home alive; he had reached the cottage alive. Whose rig was it that took him to it?

The question that was uppermost in the minds of thousands of people was soon to be answered--answered, too, in a manner that furnished a still more startling episode to the already startling tragedy. For the man that hired the horse and vehicle that carried the Irish Nationalist to his doom was a trusted officer in the employ of the city of Chicago; a man who, from the day of the disappearance, had, enjoying the full confidence of his superiors, been apparently working with might and main to bring about a solution of the mystery. It was Daniel Coughlin, detective.

COUGHLIN HIRES THE RIG.

Coughlin was attached to the East Chicago Avenue Police Station, which at that time was under the direction of Captain Michael J. Schaack, who had gained an international reputation for his brilliant work in connection with the celebrated Anarchist cases. The station house was located within a few doors of the southwest corner of Clark Street and Chicago Avenue. Little more than half a block north, on the former street, was a livery stable kept by Patrick Dinan. Naturally enough, as a result of his close proximity to the station, Dinan knew about all the officers and they knew him. Moreover, if any of them wanted a rig at any time to take their family or friends for a drive, they almost invariably went to No. 260 North Clark street to get it. So far as Dinan was concerned, therefore, there was nothing remarkable in the fact when, early on the morning of the day that the physician disappeared, Coughlin called at the stable.

[Ill.u.s.tration: DANIEL COUGHLIN, DETECTIVE.]