The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1893-12-20
STILL ON THE STAND
Court Occupied All Day YeSter-
day with Annie Wagner,
And Her Cross-ExaminatiOn Is Only Be-
gun-Denies Having Bought
the Poison.

Have you ever been to a murder trial?
Probably not. most Of you who read this.
You have the idea that because murder is
not a fine art, but a brutal crime, it savors
Of a lack of refinement TO show more than
a languid interest in the fate OF the one
accused of the deed. Perhaps you say,
with a shudder and a shrug. that you never
read the details of such cases in the news
papers: while as for going TO the court
room to watch the process by which the
guilty is brought TO punishment or the in
nocent set free, the manner in which a life
is lost or saved, why, you cannot dream of
that. 1t would be vulgar and degrading,
the exhibition of a low curiosity which you
fiatter youself you have not. But you love
the dramatic, so you go to the play and
smile and weep over the mimic joys and
woes of a stage heroine, while the tragedy
of real life goes on across the way. Not all
people are fastidious as you. Some of them
have learned that the drama of life is worth
their notice and alters entertainment. 1t
may be that for lack OF dollars they cannot
crafty their taste for the woful at the
theater. and so come to view the actual
drama. which is free. Or it may be that
they find mock heroics tame after a
ARO AANO wv 0NRNAo
other of their fellow-beings fall now and
then. But whatever brings ~them-this class
of people-they come by hundreds to the
trial Of Annie Wagner. They fill all the
benches I'm the court room, they crowd the.
aisies, they stand packed in the rear, both
men and women, rising on tip toe and
stretching their necks eagerly hour after
hour. They pour into the narrow gallery
until it will hold no more. and when the
doors are closed long lines of disappointed
ones block the corridors. They are not OF
a disreputable sort, all these visitors. far
from it. Many Of them are elderly German
matrons interested in the prisoner because
of her nationality; many more are appar-
emily of her own class and calling In life.
all of them are intensely absorbed in the
proceedings and lose not a word or a motion
of any of the actors on this real stage.
The prisoner is in the witness chair on
this occasion, to which they have looked
forward as a climax, and the suppressed
excitement among the spectators is some
thing that no audience in a theater ever
knows. The prisoner sits there before them
with eyes cast down.. 1t requires courage
and nerve to face a battery of staring eyes.
all of them strange and some hostile, and
this girl, who has had no experience to
teach her courage in this alien land, drops
her lids modestly, only lifting them to look
at the interpreter as she answers his ques-
tons. She does not look like a murderer.
Her mouth is firm but sensitive in its
curves, the lines of her face and the ex-
preston of her dark eyes suggest gentle
ness. 1t is a face showing strength of char
acter, but not a sign of the diabolism that
could compass the death of three people.
1t would be a pleasing, even a pretty, face,
20 tha cbo1nur Of yoanu tao PC md tho no llar
of long confinement were removed. In the
semi-circle about her are scores of women
whose countenances show more of the wis
dom of the serpent, more evil possibilities
than hers. She clasps her hands together
firmly as If to brace herself for the ordeal
of examination, but she answers each ques-
ton quickly, without a multiplication Of
words that might give the prosecution a
chance to trip her. IAN admirable witness"
whispers a lawyer who has dropped In as
a spectator; lone of the best l ever saw
on the stand" Her manner and her Ian
guage give the impression of artless inno-
cence. She makes a visible effort to con-
troll her emotions, but now and then an
allusion is made that brings the tears and
sobs. When she tells how the officers, in
their search for poison, ransacked her
trunk and a basket containing clothing-a
basket she naQ DrOugnt from tne OH noinc
in the fatherland-she weeps bitterly, and
again when she tells the story Of her ar
rest. A watchful observer can detect re-
sponsive tears in the eyes Of sympathetic
jurors, but the girl herself does not know
when she scores a point in her own favor,
and never turns her eyes to the jury. The
women In the audience know. A portly
dame, with a scarlet bonnet trimmed with
pink feathers, mods her head sagaciously
when she discerns the drift of the examina-
ton. and whispers loudly to a Milesian maid
whose nose tip tits audaciously towards
her flaring green hat A rustling goes
over the crowd as the witness relates the
history of the box of rat poison In the
back of the room a man lifts a child to
his shoulder that IL may see the prisoner,
and some one in the gallery laughs aloud.
The judge threatens the arrest or dis
turbers. after which silence follows until
the audience again forgets the awful dig
But the prisoner does not smlla. In the
gether she sits with folded hands and
downcast eyes, thinking of-Wbat? Per-
haps the old home which she left with a
sad heart, but with high hopes of the future
in the Land for which she sailed; perhaps
of the fate that had come TO her In this
land that once held so much promise. Per-
haps her thoughts are of-crims; but does
any one, even the prosecutors, believe this
seemingly gentle. simple-minded woman,
this faithful, laborious servant to an unap-
preciative master, the fend they try TO
prove her? 1t will not do TO say until the
jury speaks. 1t must be left for them to
decide whether she has been a victim of
untoward circumstances and persecution,
or whether she is a woman VINO conceals
an amazing depravity under an innocent
exterior.
1t is the tragedy of a life which is pass
ing In that dingy court room, that hiQeous
room with its poisonous air and it's crowd
of unwashed spectators. II she is guilty,
no punishment can be 700 severe; If inno-
cent, what recompense can her world offer?
YESTERDAYS TESTIMONY.