“No, sir.”
Mason sat down. “That is all,” he said.
“The witness is excused,” Sampson announced, and a note of triumph was apparent in his voice.
Sampson next called one of the ambulance attendants to identify the bag and its contents. Mason offered no cross-examination.
Sampson heaved a sigh of relief. Well, he’d got past that hurdle Very nicely. Mason had been forced to surrender the point. He consulted his list of witnesses.
“Call Carl Ernest Hogan,” he said, and, with Hogan on the stand, quickly ran through his occupation ballistics expert for the police force. Once more, Mason stipulated to the qualifications of the Witness, subject to the right of cross-examination. And Hogan, testifying with the close-clipped efficiency of an expert who is as much at home on the witness stand as in his own living room, identified the test bullet which had been discharged from the gun found in the bag, identified the bullet which had been handed him by Sergeant Holcomb as the fatal bullet, and then introduced a greatly enlarged micro-photograph showing the marks of the rifling on the two bullets. The photograph was offered in evidence, and admitted without objection. The jury needed only to look at it to tell that the two bullets had unquestionably been fired from the same gun. An attempt had been made to trace the ownership of the gun from the numbers. The attempt had been unsuccessful because the records of a merchant, going back over a period of years, had been lost or destroyed. The numbers on the gun, however, had not been tampered with. “Cross-examine,” Sampson said triumphantly.
Sampson sat back in his chair, breathing easily while the cross-examination droned on. No, the witness couldn’t, of his own knowledge, testify as to the fact that this gun had been found in the bag. It was a gun which had been given him by Sergeant Holcomb of the homicide squad. The witness had, however, checked the numbers, and, as Mr. Mason could observe, the numbers tallied with those which had been written down by Harry Diggers at the time of the accident.
No, the witness couldn’t, of his own knowledge, testify that this bullet was the fatal bullet. That bullet, as he understood it, had been taken by the autopsy surgeon from the body of Austin Cullens, given to Sergeant Holcomb, and by Sergeant Holcomb handed to the witness.
Larry Sampson, thinking that perhaps some of the jurors might be misled, took occasion to interpolate a comment to the court. “We’re not asking to introduce this fatal bullet in evidence at the present time, Your Honor. It’s only been marked for identification. The last link in the chain will be forged by the testimony of Sergeant Holcomb, and then we’ll have to have the bullet introduced.” Judge Barnes nodded.
Mason said casually, “By the way, Mr. Hogan, you were testing two guns at the same time, were you not?”