146
THE GREEN BAG
the truth of the old saying, "Murder will out." Early in the afternoon of the murder Tucker dropped from his pocket a knifesheath upon the seat of a market wagon which he had boarded on Weston bridge and on which he rode a little distance. On the end of the sheath there were imprints of teeth of peculiar shape and it was later found that Tucker's front teeth exactly fitted into them. The boy who was driving the team picked it up after Tucker left, and acting on the principle that ' ' findings is keepings," put it in his pocket and did not think of it again until he saw by the newspapers that Tucker had been examined in connection with the Page murder. Through his father the sheath was turned over to the police, and Tucker was again, on April gth, summoned to police head quarters and questioned; this time with a stenographer present. He made numerous false statements with reference to facts, which tended to connect him with the mur der. Among the most significant were those with reference to the sheath and knife. When the sheath was produced at this interview, Tucker evidently thought that the officer had taken it from his (Tucker's) overcoat pocket. He asserted that it was his, but that he did not have it with him the day of the murder, and that it had been at home in his room all the time since the murder. He maintained very vigorously that he owned no hunting-knife, or any other kind of knife, and had not owned one for years. Before the interview was fin ished some officers who had been searching his room came in. They had found in a coat pocket in his room, the blade of a hunting-knife broken into several pieces; the cutting edge had been chipped and bent, and an attempt had been made by filing to obliterate the maker's name. When Tucker was confronted with this, he admitted that it was his knife, and that he had broken it up for fear that it would connect him with the murder. That knife when whole fitted
into the sheath; and that knife, according to the testimony of all but one of the medical experts, could have made all of the wounds in Miss Page's body; and according to the testimony of the physicians called by the government, the wounds, from their appear ance, measurement and character, must have been made by a knife of this type. In that same pocket of Tucker's from which the broken pieces of the knife were taken, a Canadian stickpin was also foundTucker was arrested after the interview on April gth; "probable cause" was found at the preliminary hearing before the dis trict court on April 22d. He was indicted for murder at the June sitting of the Grand Jury, and after one postponement came to trial on January 2d, 1905. The trial lasted twenty days exclusive of Sundays, and re sulted in a verdict of guilty of murder in the first degree. So far as a most pains taking research shows, every person, except the defendant, who was anywhere near the Page house on the day of the murder, was called either by the prosecution or by the defence, but there was no one who heard the victim's screams, or saw the mur derer enter or leave the house. The greater part of the time was taken by the testimony of expert witnesses, and yet the issues which concerned them were far from the vital ones in the case. In a cap ital trial in Massachusetts, the State not only pays the defendant's counsel and sum mon such witnesses as he desires, but the court may on motion authorize the em ployment of experts on his behalf, — who are also paid by the State. The defence in this case was authorized to employ six ex perts on handwriting, but by agreement of counsel four only testified on each side. The experts consulted by the government had reported that the J. L. Morton address was in Tucker's handwriting. The defend ant's experts then examined the standards, and declared that Tucker had not written it, but with equal positiveness said that it was clearly in the handwriting of Mabel Page.
