The Crime of the Century; Or, The Assassination of Dr. Patrick Henry Cronin

by Henry M. Hunt

The little group stood dumbfounded as the ejaculation burst from the officer's lips, and, for the first time, they realized the terrible significance of their discovery. Quickly arousing themselves to action, however, they gently laid the body upon the stretcher and lifted it into the wagon. Little time was lost in making the return trip to the police station. Here the body was conveyed to the basement, which served the purpose of a morgue, and placed upon a low table. A cursory examination developed the fact that the cotton batting, as well as the towel around the neck, were heavily saturated with blood. Upon removing the towel, which had been tied in a knot, there was disclosed to view an

"AGNUS DEI,"

or scapular, a heart-shaped religious emblem very generally worn by adherents of the Roman Catholic faith as a safeguard against injury. Attached to a ribbon around the neck, it rested just below the collar bone. It was the only thing that the physician had worn in life that had been left to him in death, and, brutal and bloodthirsty as had been the assassins in the perpetration of their dastardly crime, they had evidently—even after stripping the corpse of their victim of every shred of clothing, in the hope that all means of identification would thus be destroyed—stood appalled at the idea of molesting the holy emblem of the church with their bloody hands. Even in that terrible moment, and in the presence of the naked and reeking corpse of the man they had lured to destruction, the "Agnus Dei," resting mute upon his breast, had possessed an influence that compelled them to pause. Thus far they had gone, but they could go no farther. It had spoken to their affrighted souls in trumpet tones: "Touch me not."

THE CORPSE WITH "AGNUS DEI" ON BREAST.

Considering the fact that the body had in all probability, been in the place where it was found for nearly three weeks, it was not by any means in the condition that would have been expected under the circumstances. It had swollen, however, to about one-third of the natural size. As it appeared under the gas light it was that of a stout, well-nourished man of about forty-five years of age. The skin was white, although the body and chest was considerably bloated. The feet, which had been the most exposed, were hardly cracked. The hair had peeled from the skin both of face and body. One side of the mustache, with the skin attached, was turned over onto the lip. Only a few straggling hairs were left on the other side, but, just under the lower lip, a small but well-defined goatee of dark bristling hairs was apparent. The forehead was bald, while the thick dark hair lay in matted clots on the back of the head. The chin—the towel not having been replaced—was sunk well into the neck. The mouth was tightly closed, and for a time resisted all efforts to force it open. About the ears and hands the skin hung in shreds, and the eyelids had swollen to such an extent that they had forced each other partly open. But it was the head that attracted the greatest attention, and brought exclamations of horror from the few spectators. It was a mass of wounds. In the forehead at the roots of the hair there were three horrible cuts, each over an inch in length, and attended with a slight discoloration that indicated decay. These had evidently been made with a sharp instrument. Over the right eye there was a wound that looked as though it might have been made with the cutting edge of a blunt axe. Others on the back of the head were evidently the work of a blunter instrument, but the worst one of all, on the top of the head, suggested the use of the back of a heavy axe. There was no need to look elsewhere for horrible explanations of the cause of death. The head told its own story. The unfortunate physician had been hacked to death with a brutality beyond conception.

FRIENDS IDENTIFY THE REMAINS.

With amazing rapidity the news had spread throughout the suburb, and by this time the station was besieged by an excited crowd, while hundreds of voices clamored loudly but vainly for admission. Down in the city, too, where the information had been telephoned as soon as the remains had reached the morgue, the excitement was equally intense. It was just at the hour when the mercantile establishments, business houses, and manufactories, were emptying their army of toilers at the conclusion of the work of the day, and the bulletins that were displayed at the newspaper offices and a score of other places in the most frequented thoroughfares, were surrounded by thousands of people, who read and commented upon the startling information that was thus conveyed. Many gave vent to shouts of horror, others loudly breathed imprecations upon the murderers. Extra editions of the evening papers, giving the facts so far as known up to the hour of publication, were successively issued, and added to the popular excitement. Before midnight the fact that the body of the missing physician had been discovered under such revolting circumstances was known under almost every roof in the great western metropolis, and was being discussed by Irishmen in scores of towns throughout the country, to which it had been flashed over the electric wires.

Among the earlier arrivals at the morgue were several citizens of Lake View, who had known the physician when in the flesh, and with one or two exceptions, their identification of the remains was instantaneous and complete. They were soon joined by John F. Scanlan, Mortimer Scanlan, Pat McGarry, James Boland, and John E. Scanlan, all intimate friends of Dr. Cronin and members of the committee which had the case in charge. They made a careful examination of the remains and pointed out the resemblances. The Doctor had large hands, as had the corpse; he was a hairy man, and there was lots of loose body hair on the corpse. The water had rotted this off, but it lay in masses and tufts on the body. The height of the man and his build agreed with that of the physician. Next to this they relied upon the "Agnus Dei." Cronin had worn one of these reliquaries, and had never taken it off even while bathing. Then some one remembered that the Doctor had an extravasion of blood under the finger nail of the right thumb; and this, too, was found upon the corpse. A mark upon the side was also declared to be identical with one upon the body. Cronin had a superfluity of hair about the wrists, and this point of resemblance was found on the corpse. There was also a peculiarity of the second finger of the right hand, which might be described as a base-ball finger, with which Dr. Cronin had been afflicted. This malformation was apparent on the same hand of the dead man. But the most convincing and conclusive identification of all was that of Dr. T. W. Lewis, a dental surgeon, who had done considerable work for the Doctor. Upon his arrival at the morgue, John F. Scanlan pried open the mouth of the corpse with a pencil, and Dr. Lewis immediately recognized his handiwork in the gold filling of some of the upper teeth. It was a remarkable fact, moreover, that in a lower jaw plate that he had made for the physician he had placed several teeth peculiar to themselves, and known to the profession as "crown sunk." He had done this something in the line of an experiment. This identical plate was taken from the mouth of the dead man, while, to make the proof still more positive, the cast of Dr. Cronin's mouth, taken for the purpose of making the plate, was found to fit the mouth of the corpse to a fraction.