“Is that the gun which Virginia Trent had with her on the Saturday afternoon in question?”
Lieutenant Ogilby snapped open the cylinder, spun it swiftly and said, “It is.”
“Is that the gun which was fired by her at that time?”
“Yes, sir.”
Mason said to Sampson, “You may cross-examine.”
Sampson jumped to his feet, as though fairly tearing into the witness. “You say that is the same gun,” he thundered, “and yet you have given it only a casual inspection. You haven’t even looked at the number on the gun.”
“No, sir,” Lieutenant Ogilby said. “I didn’t make my identification from the number on the gun.”
“The company which manufactures this revolver makes thousands of absolutely identical revolvers, made by machinery, and alike in every respect, save only that, for the purposes of identification, each one of those revolvers is given a number by the manufacturer. Isn’t that right?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Then how can you presume to recognize this gun and differentiate it from the thousands of other identical guns which have been made, unless you look at the only positive mark of identification, to wit, the number stamped on the gun by the manufacturer?”