The Washington herald. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1906-1939, 1907-02-22

New York, Feb. 21.-If Evelyn Nesbit
Thaw has in store for her any half hour
more unhappy than one through which
she passed this morning under the relent-
less cross-examinatiOn OF District Attor-
ney Jerome the Three Fates, who pursue
their calling pietorially upon the wall Of
the courtroom in the Criminal Courts
building. where Harry X. Thaw is being
tried for his life, may well be accused Of
malice. The entire day was one of pitt
less exposure of the life she led.
In reply to the sharp, teTse questions of
the district attorney. Mrs. Thaw made no
attempt TO escape JeromeS queries. She
answered promptly and clearly as TO all
the material facts of those relations. the
number of times she saw White, and the
places and circumstances, so far as she
could remember them. There was no de-
NAL OF attempt al denial of the truth,
either regarding White or Thaw. Appar-
emily in this regard her mind was an
open book of pages OF which the district
attorney has only to turn 10 read. The
writing was often blurred. and few were
the lines on most OF the pages, but such
as they were they were all held up to the
pitiless light.
Hearers Embarrassed.
The book which Jerome thus read aloud
in the courtroom made the most distress
ing sort OF reading imaginable 1t made
the spectators who heard it shift uneasly
in their seats; it made the jurors drop
their eyes from the face of the witness;
it made many of those present look up at
the ceiling and try TO think Of something
else; anything, i'm fact. excepting the story
that Jerome. in his remorseless voice, was
reading aloud from the book OF Evelyn
Thaw's life.
There We're passages IN that reading
when for ten consecutive minutes every
man in the room sat stiffiy erect in his
chair. every nerve tense, every muscle
taut, every sense rasped TO the verge of
endurance. When there came "a pause in
the reading when the district attorney
had to look for some notes OF get the wit
ness to identify a document. AN audible
sigh of relief breezed over the courtroom
as the tensity relaxed, and people Settled
back i'm their seats and breathed deeply
once more.
If the district attorney was aware of
the indeIible impression his relentless
inquiry was producing, he gave no sign
of it, He went about his work with no
indication that he regarded il as anything
extraordinary For all the evidence ne
gave of any contrary belief. he might
have been a surgeon busily at work upon
On absorbing case in a dissecting room.
IT cannot be said that the district at
torney br0wbeat the witness. There was
FI4-ff Ta called hrBu-faasfuo
jerome Relentless.
He did not menace the witness by voice
or gesture But he kept everlastingly at
it. tracing her life step by step. His
questions followed each other as rapidly
as the witness made reply. They fell
from his lips in cutSng tones. Ike the
drops of water that fell with horrible in
evitabiity upon the head of the victim
i'm the torture chamber Of the inquisition.
There was no escaping them, no evading
them. They were short, simple, lucid, all
too awfully clear.
The worst happened after the cross-ex-
animation had been i'm progress for about
an hour Jerome had been told again that
it was Harry Thaw who had brought her
10 believe that after all there are in this
world good women. despite the philoso-
pil ol cohuuc' u'dt HIdiiloIu "Hile H""
ilstilieu INTO hef mlho.
Has Answer Ready.
There had been one moment when il
1ool,sl ss ~ -l,, ,Ifet-i,.+ stt,,-,o,- had
,I-i,-.,, tI,, ,-it,,,.. i,,+. n -, So,
"hich She could not escape win any y'iihs
but the shreds OF the effect produced by
this story OF the contrasting influences
of White and ThaW. After he had got
tba witness ~ saw that a+ that ti,,,a
There vras pobod,- ..,,D5er c,od.s bIua
,,..--,..
'o""'" loiI sue lel' 80 o'''cil -
dS Sl'e lei' toward stanford hite' ne
"'Nsu Ht''i
iheH why IeeiIhs as you did' did
I,,,,r.r-,,-,., " ''''e a. 0'i'
''' ' 'iau d" answer ieduS
-, '.',-.l''7. -
9',O ''' i'o'ilei gave
'''1 80. M, Ulu cue ii'''ue me
,-l - =, -, -
-. =. vi
tn, ,.,,,,.t.,,,,., .,,.,i.,.... .,..-.,..
liaved Rpt its ra,iof ~, a,-t,.a,.,'l,.
80 ..b,,... -. 80
tnrned the jisrrict 5ftorne,s sfte,,'ior -
that period of her life immediately fol-
t;t-7 49, - - -