“Always,” she answered.
“Can you send and get one of them for me?”
She said she would willingly go, if the court said so. The court did say so, and she went. Her dwelling was not far off, and she soon returned, and handed me four receipts, which I took and examined. They were all signed in a strange, straggling hand, by the witness.
“Now, Nancy Luther,” said I, turning to the witness, “please tell the court, and the jury, and tell me, too, where you got the seventy-five dollars you sent in a letter to your sister in Somers?”
The witness started as though a volcano had burst at her feet. She turned pale as death, and every limb shook violently. I waited until the people could have an opportunity to see her emotion, and then I repeated the question.
“I—never—sent—any,” she fairly gasped.
“You did!” I thundered, for I was excited now.
“I—I—didn’t,” she faintly uttered, grasping the rail by her side for support.
“May it please your honor, and gentlemen of the jury,” I said, as soon as I had looked the witness out of countenance, “I came here to defend a youth who had been arrested for helping to rob the mail, and in the course of my preliminary examinations, I had access to the letters which had been torn open and rifled of money. When I entered upon this case, and I heard the name of this witness pronounced, I went out and got the letter which I now hold, for I remembered to have seen one bearing the signature of Nancy Luther. This letter was taken from the mail-bag, and it contained seventy-five dollars, and by looking at the post-mark, you will observe that it was mailed on the very next day after the hundred dollars were taken from Mrs. Naseby’s drawer. I will read it to you, if you please.”
The court nodded assent, and I read the following, which was without date, save that made by the post-master upon the outside. I give it here verbatim: