Witness: "Yes, I believe I have already explained myself sufficiently clearly on that point."
Counsel for the defence: "I cannot understand how you can now be so sure that the picture represents my client, while you believed quite otherwise when you had the living person before you. What is the reason for this?"
Witness: "I have before explained I was in a great hurry at the time. I wanted to get away before the person should turn round—it was all done in fun on my part. Besides, I thought I recognized Miss Frick's jacket,—she had been in the habit of wearing a jacket trimmed with braid. Later, I got to hear that Miss Frick that same day had given it to her maid as a present, and on looking at the photo I became convinced it was the maid."
Counsel for the defence: "Good! Are you also quite sure that the picture you now see here is the same as that you took on that occasion? The film has been several days out of your keeping, and in other hands."
The young Englishman seemed rather impatient at this examination. "If the film has not been tampered with at the photographer's," he exclaimed quickly, "it is the picture of what I saw in the museum. Whether it has been tampered with or not, I see here before me the same person, in the same position, and in the same room—others must now decide which is most probable."
He took up the picture again, examined it carefully, and handed it back to the public prosecutor.
"I have only wanted to show," said the counsel for the defence, quietly, "that you yourself at one time have doubted the identity of the person who stands in front of Miss Frick's cupboard in the photograph. I have now only two other questions to ask you.
"What was the time when you took the photograph?"
Witness: "About six."
Counsel for the defence: "Are you not able to give the time more exactly? Might it not just as well have been half-past six?"