“Ay don’t know. But it smelled something very very bad. And molasses too.”
“Molasses in it?”
“Yes, a little down in the bottom of the bottle. Such a queer doings!”
“Have you the bottle?”
“At my home, yes. The wife make me empty the bad stuff out.”
“Why?” and Berg turned to the Swedish woman.
“I think it a poison. I think the bad man kill the good man with a poison.”
“Well, I don’t think so. I think you two people trumped up this bottle business yourselves. It’s too ridiculous to be real evidence.”
The jurymen were perplexed. If these Swedes were implicated in the murder, surely they would not come and give themselves up to justice voluntarily. Yet, some reasoned that if they were afraid of the police, they might think it better to come voluntarily than to seem to hide their connection with it. It is difficult to tell the workings of the uncultured foreign intellect, and at any rate the story must be investigated, and the Swedes kept watch of.
Under the coroner’s scrutiny, Sandstrom became more restless than ever. He shuffled his big feet about and his countenance worked as if in agony. The woman watched him with solicitude. Apparently, her one thought was to have him say the right thing.