“ ‘D.M.’? ”
“Yes.”
“Her name’s Della Street. Why should she have D.M. on her baggage?”
“I don’t know, I’m sure. I’m just describing the baggage to you. She said something about the D.M. baggage being the wrong baggage. If you want to examine it, you can probably intercept it if—”
Sergeant Holcomb whirled and crossed the lobby at a run. A moment later the clerk heard the scream of a siren.
Emil Scanlon looked across the coroner’s jury and said, “You gentlemen have seen the remains.”
They nodded.
“The object of this inquest is to determine how that man met his death,” Scanlon said. “It may have been an accidental death, or it may have been something else. There’s even a possibility of suicide. I want you gentlemen to pay close attention to the evidence. This isn’t like a court of law. I conduct my inquests more or less informally. What I’m trying to do is to get at the facts. Some coroners don’t care to have attorneys asking questions. Sometimes I don’t. But, in a case of this sort, where I feel attorneys aren’t getting technical and taking up time, but are actually assisting us in getting somewhere, I’m always glad to allow questions. I think you gentlemen understand your duties. We’ll call the first witness.”
There was a commotion in the courtroom. A man, whose face was so completely bandaged that only a bit of his nose and one eye were visible, said in muffled tones, “I want to be excused.”
“Who are you?” Scanlon asked.