The Devil's Gentleman

by Harold Schechter

  “I had no especial meaning,” came the breezy reply. “It was simply a form of speech.”

  “And ‘Don’t be cross with me anymore’?—what did you mean by that?”

  “I had written to him last June and he never sent me a reply,” Blanche said in the same offhanded tone. “I did not know whether he was piqued at something or not, but I concluded that there must be something the matter, so I just wrote, ‘Don’t be cross with me.’”

  “Then what does this mean?—‘If you would but let me prove my sincerity?’”

  “It was just a form of expression, rather awkwardly put,” Blanche said.

  “You signed yourself ‘Blanche,’” said Osborne, as though to imply that such informality indicated an unusual degree of intimacy between the two.

  “Yes,” Blanche said with a smile. “All three of us—my husband, Barney, and I—called each other by our first names.”

  After another twenty minutes of similarly unenlightening testimony, Blanche was dismissed and the proceedings adjourned for the day.

  For her performance, Blanche received high praise from Roland, his parents, and his attorneys. The press reviews were decidedly more mixed. Everyone agreed that she had comported herself with admirable aplomb. But there was a general consensus that she had done nothing to help clear up the mystery. If anything, her testimony reinforced the popular perception of her as a dangerously cunning female, capable of twisting any susceptible male—in this case, the public prosecutor, James Osborne—around her little finger.

  As one reporter, reflecting the casual misogyny of the era, put it, Mrs. Blanche Molineux had shown herself to be “clever beyond the ordinary run of her sex.”7

  49

  On Thursday, February 23—exactly two weeks after his first appearance at the inquest—Harry Cornish finally got his chance to take the witness stand again. This time, in stark contrast to the previous occasion, there was nothing tentative or evasive about his testimony. From the moment he began to speak, it was clear that he had come with only one purpose in mind: to deliver what the newspapers would call a “savage assault” on Roland Molineux.

  It was close to eleven before the proceedings got under way. Seated near the front of the room, Cornish could be seen tapping one foot impatiently. Assistant District Attorney Osborne, however, appeared to be in no great hurry to begin. For at least ten minutes, he sat at the lawyers’ table, leisurely reviewing a stack of memoranda. Finally, he turned to the athletic director, and addressing him as discourteously as ever, said, “Now, Cornish, you can take the stand.”

  Clutching several sheets of notes in one beefy fist, Cornish strode to the witness chair, then looked at the jury eagerly. Osborne, however, seemed intent on making him wait. Another six or seven minutes elapsed while Osborne held a whispered consultation with his colleague, Assistant DA Maurice Blumenthal. Only then did he turn to the witness and say, “Now, Cornish, can you suggest anything as to a motive in this case by any human being?”

  “Yes,” said Cornish. “I think I can.”

  For the next thirty minutes or so—pausing only intermittently to consult his notes—Cornish offered a long, somewhat rambling but unrelievedly bitter denunciation of Roland Molineux. So severe were the aspersions he cast on the latter’s moral character that, at several points, General Molineux seemed ready to spring from his chair and set upon his son’s accuser.1

  It was only natural, said Cornish, that he would suspect Molineux of having sent him the poison. No one else had ever harbored such intense and inexplicable animosity toward him. Molineux had “tried to take the bread and butter out of my mouth, and a man who would do that would do anything.”2

  Besides, Cornish was far from alone in suspecting Roland. “There were fifty men in the club who thought the same thing.” Indeed, it was general knowledge at the Knickerbocker that Roland was a man of questionable character. He was known, for example, to keep a library of “immoral books” in his room. Among these works was Alexander Dumas’s Celebrated Crimes (a collection of nonfiction accounts of notorious criminals, including several legendary poisoners), as well as a medical text meant only “for physicians who study the abnormal” and “not intended for laymen.” Though Cornish had not seen this volume himself, he had heard from others that it was “obscene.” The author’s name, he said, sounded something like “Craft Eby”3—an obvious reference to Richard von Krafft-Ebing, author of Psychopathia Sexualis, a pioneering study of sexual aberration that compiles hundreds of case histories of every known perversion, from fetishism to lust-murder, bestiality to necrophilia. Roland was also rumored to have a collection of pornographic pictures—“photographs of an indescribable character”—that he showed to select friends.4

  And there were other indications of Roland’s “bad mind.” According to Cornish, it was Molineux who had originated the stories about the supposed “coterie of degenerates” at the club. Molineux had also spread scurrilous rumors about John Adams, claiming, among other things, that Adams and Herbert Ballantine had been “unusually friendly” while classmates at Cornell.5

  And why, asked Cornish, had Molineux thought it necessary to hire a lawyer the instant the story broke in the newspapers? “I do not see why anyone who had nothing to fear should do anything of that kind.”

  There was also the matter of the tangled ties among Roland, Blanche, and Barnet. Cornish had it on good authority that—contrary to Blanche’s assertions—her relationship with Barnet had been much more than a mere friendship. It was widely known in the club, for example, that Barnet had made remarks about “kissing her,” and that, on at least one occasion, the two had been alone in his room, sharing a bottle of wine.

  Roland, moreover, was not nearly as friendly with Barnet as he had claimed. Cornish recounted an incident in the summer of 1898, when Barnet had left for the Atlantic Yacht Club, “ostensibly for a cruise. He came back shortly afterward. A friend said: ‘Thought you were going on a cruise.’ Barnet said: ‘I went to the boat but found that fellow Molineux there, and I would not go.’”

  Given the obvious enmity between Molineux and Barnet, it struck Cornish as “very queer” when he heard that Roland “had married Miss Chesebrough.”6

  Cornish was allowed to speak uninterruptedly for nearly a half hour. Reporters covering the inquest agreed that he presented a forceful argument—“like a lawyer summing up a case.”7 The moment he was finished, however, James Osborne—employing the same openly hostile manner as before—began to barrage him with questions whose only apparent purpose was to rattle the witness and subvert his testimony.

  His voice raised to a near-shout, Osborne treated the witness (as one reporter put it) “exactly as if Cornish were on trial for poisoning Mrs. Adams.” His questions were peppered with sneering remarks: “Oh, come, do you really mean to tell this jury—?” “Do you actually expect this jury to believe—?” “Is that the best explanation you can come up with?” Every small discrepancy and contradiction in Cornish’s testimony was flung back in his face. By the end of the day, it seemed to many observers that Osborne had not merely cross-examined Cornish but “pilloried him.”8

  Osborne’s demeanor couldn’t have been more different the following day, when Roland was called back to the witness stand to answer Cornish’s charges. Once again, the assistant district attorney treated Molineux with an almost fawning deference. “Mr. Molineux, I am very sorry to ask you to testify again, but I cannot help it,” he began, then proceeded to preface many of his questions with equally abject apologies: “I am sorry to trouble you, Mr. Molineux,” “Forgive me for bothering you, Mr. Molineux,” and so on. His tone, as one reporter noted, was consistently “helpful, conciliatory, friendly. The one distinct purpose of the examination seemed to be to protect Molineux.”9

  When Osborne asked about the “obscene” books Cornish had referred to, for example, Roland admitted that he owned a copy of Krafft-Ebing’s Psychopathia Sexualis. Far from treating this admission as a vindication of Cornish�
�s testimony, however, Osborne brushed the whole business off with a joke. “As a matter of fact,” he said with a laugh, “I believe everyone in the district attorney’s office has a copy. Except me, of course. I understand that Mr. Weeks owns one, too,” he added with a wink at Roland’s attorney. “I heard he bought it on the day it was published.”10

  By the time the inquest adjourned for the weekend, the audience was “buzzing and speculating upon the curious difference between Osborne’s treatment” of the two witnesses. That difference was captured in an acerbic little cartoon that ran in Saturday’s Evening Journal. It showed two images of Osborne. In one, he is throttling a miniature Cornish while grimacing angrily at the frightened and helpless little figure clutched in his mitts. In the other, he is dandling a doll-size Molineux on his lap while cooing sweetly to the smiling little man.11

  There was one part of Osborne’s examination of Molineux to which the press, while noting, attached little importance. It happened soon after Roland took the stand. After apologizing for troubling him with so trivial a matter, Osborne handed the witness a sheaf of papers and asked if he would mind identifying them for the record. Roland studied them for a moment before confirming that they were, in fact, specimens of his handwriting. Thanking him, Osborne took the papers from his hand and passed them to Coroner Hart.

  They were the penmanship samples Roland had produced the previous week in Osborne’s office under the supervision of handwriting expert William Kinsley.12

  50

  Something was brewing at the district attorney’s office.

  Over the weekend, Chief Detective McCluskey—who was supposedly at odds with the DA over his conduct of the case—paid a visit to Colonel Gardiner, accompanied by his two lead investigators, Detective Sergeants Carey and McCafferty. James Osborne was also present at the meeting.

  The five men remained shut up in Gardiner’s office for nearly two hours—their longest consultation since the start of the inquest. When McCluskey and his men emerged from the meeting, they had little to say to reporters. By then, however, rumors had spread that “a most startling denouement” was about “to occur in the Adams poison mystery.” A surprise witness was to be called when the inquest resumed on Monday—someone whose testimony would break the case wide open and “lead to the arrest of one of the suspected men.”1

  Despite McCluskey’s refusal to divulge the name of this mystery witness, the yellow papers quickly sniffed it out. It was Nicholas Heckmann, owner of the little advertising business at 257 West Forty-second Street, where the man who called himself H. C. Barnet had rented a private letter box the previous May.

  Heckmann, of course, had already been given the opportunity to identify the renter and, in spite of his insistence that he could pick the fake Barnet “out of a million,” had failed to do so. Now, however, he admitted that he had deliberately held back, believing that “his information was of value” and that he might be able to peddle it to a newspaper for as much as $1,200. Having finally accepted the regrettable fact that no one would pay him for his testimony, he had nobly resolved to offer it free of charge.

  When called to the stand, he declared, he would perform his “duty as a citizen and tell the truth.”2

  There was an air of anticipation in the little courtroom when the inquest got under way on Monday, February 27. Everybody who had read the weekend papers felt sure that something dramatic was about to happen. Even so, the day would deliver a far more stunning surprise than almost anyone expected.

  Certainly, Roland Molineux never saw it coming.

  The morning began unremarkably enough, with an appearance by Joseph Koch, proprietor of the little shop at 1620 Broadway, who declared that—owing largely to his poor eyesight—he could not identify the man who had rented a private letter box under the name of Cornish in December.

  Then, Nicholas Heckmann took the stand.

  A wiry little man with sharp eyes and a waxed mustache—its ends curled upward in the French style—Heckmann leaned forward eagerly in his chair. Seated a few yards away beside his father, Roland studied the witness intently, while a tense, suspenseful silence descended on the room.

  The audience did not have to wait long for the first moment of high drama in what would turn out to be a morning full of sensational scenes. After querying Heckmann about the nature and location of his business, Osborne asked if he had rented a letter box the previous May “to a person who gave his name as Mr. H. C. Barnet.”

  Heckmann confirmed that he had.

  “About how often did you see that person?”

  “About fifteen or twenty times,” said Heckmann.

  “Would you recognize him if you saw him again?”

  Heckmann nodded emphatically. “Yes, sir.”

  “Do you see him now in court?”

  Turning, Heckmann raised his left hand and pointed the forefinger straight at Roland. “Over there,” he said.

  Accounts of Roland’s reaction differ. According to some observers, the color drained from his face and he leapt from his seat, shaking one fist angrily at the witness. Others describe him as barking out a disdainful laugh before rising slowly to his feet. All agree, however, about what he said: “It is a lie. I have never seen that man but once in my life. I have never rented a letter box from him. What he says is a lie.”

  Ignoring him, Osborne asked Heckmann, “Is the man who just stood up the one who hired the letter box under the name of H. C. Barnet?”

  “Yes, sir,” said Heckmann.

  “Are you positive of that?”

  “Yes, sir,” Heckmann repeated.

  This time, it was Bartow Weeks, Roland’s attorney, who sprang from his seat. “I ask, Mr. Coroner,” he began, addressing the bench in a quivering voice. “In the interests of justice, I demand—”

  He was interrupted by District Attorney Gardiner, who was present in the courtroom for the first time since the start of the proceedings. “I demand that Mr. Weeks be directed to sit down.”

  “But I insist that this man, who has offered to sell his identification, be cross-examined!” shouted Weeks.

  “And I insist,” said Gardiner harshly, “that Mr. Weeks be committed for contempt.”

  “You must sit down, Mr. Weeks,” ordered Coroner Hart.

  Weeks vented his outrage for another few moments. Finally, after Hart threatened to expel him from the courtroom, he ceased his protests and lowered himself back into his chair.

  By then, Roland had also reseated himself. A change had come over his expression. The supercilious smile and complacent look were gone. Eyes narrowed, nostrils distended, lips tightly drawn, he seemed suddenly wary.

  It wasn’t Heckmann’s testimony that had put him on his guard. Like most people in the courtroom, he had been prepared for that by the weekend newspapers. What had taken him by surprise was the sudden shift in Gardiner’s attitude. Up until that moment, the men from the DA’s office had treated Roland and his lawyers with perfect, even inordinate, civility. In reacting to Weeks’s outburst, however, Gardiner’s tone had been harsh to the point of belligerence.

  As Hearst’s on-scene reporter, Charles Michelson, wrote:

  This was Molineux’s first intimation that there was a trap, that the honeyed words and courteous treatment he had received in so marked a degree were merely a bait to lure him on to his own destruction. Until then, he had borne himself before the Coroner with an air of superiority, confidence, and good humor. But once the trap was sprung, he saw the situation in an instant. There is nothing stupid about Molineux. From that moment on, he was the personification of watchfulness and care. In an instant, there had been a complete change in the attitude and conduct of the Coroner’s inquest. From being the shielded, protected, coddled, and stroked friend of the prosecuting officer, Molineux suddenly found himself exposed to the full broadside of that officer’s artillery. The manhunters came from behind their cover of soft words and apologies and attacked their quarry as openly as wolf-trappers go after a pelt when their
game is in the snare.

  Heckmann’s positive identification of Molineux was just the first of the day’s sensations. “Thenceforward,” wrote Michelson, “the inquest was a succession of the most dramatic scenes.”3

  The next one occurred during the testimony of William Kinsley, the handwriting expert who had spent the past week analyzing the penmanship specimens Roland had agreed to provide at the start of the inquest. Under questioning by Osborne, Kinsley declared “positively” that Roland’s writing matched that on the fake Barnet and Cornish letters.

  “And comparing those specimens with the poison package mailed to Cornish, what is your opinion?” asked Osborne.

  “That they were written by one and the same hand,” answered Kinsley.

  “And that is the hand of whom?”

  “It is the hand,” said Kinsley, “of Roland B. Molineux.”

  An excited buzz arose from the crowd. Coroner Hart pounded his gavel for silence.

  “I ask you, Mr. Kinsley, how strong is that opinion?” Osborne asked when quiet was restored.

  “I am positive of it,” said Kinsley. “I haven’t got a doubt.”

  Once more, Weeks sprang from his seat. “Mr. Coroner,” he cried in a voice choked with anger. “I presume there can be no question that this testimony by Mr. Kinsley is practically an accusation of crime against Mr. Molineux. I insist that my client has some constitutional rights!”

  “And I object to your stump speeches,” shouted Gardiner, rising to his feet.

  For a few moments, the two men engaged in a shouting match. It was only after he had been threatened, once again, with ejection that Weeks grudgingly resumed his seat.

  If Kinsley’s testimony was, as one observer wrote, “a knockout blow,” the witnesses who followed delivered the coup de grâce.4 In rapid succession, Osborne put six more handwriting experts on the stand—nationally recognized specialists from different parts of the country, including an official from the U. S. Treasury Department in Washington, D.C., and a gentleman named Ames who had come from San Francisco, where his testimony had helped convict Cordelia Botkin. All declared unequivocally—“without a shadow of a doubt,” as several of them put it—that the fake Barnet and Cornish letters, along with the address on the poison package, had been penned by Roland Molineux.