Even layers of
goods such as a coat, shirt, and undershirt may each leave their
marks, but that does not concern us in this case. Now I have here
a piece of pongee silk, cut from a woman's automobile-coat. I
discharge the bullet through it--so. I compare the bullet now
with the others and with the one probed from the neck of Mr.
Parker. I find that the marks on that fatal bullet correspond
precisely with those on the bullet fired through the pongee
coat."
Startling as was this revelation, Kennedy paused only an instant
before the next.
"Now I have another demonstration. A certain note figures in this
case. Mr. Parker was reading it, or perhaps re-reading it, at the
time he was shot. I have not been able to obtain that note--at
least not in a form such as I could use in discovering what were
its contents. But in a certain wastebasket I found a mass of wet
and pulp-like paper. It had been cut up, macerated, perhaps
chewed; perhaps it had been also soaked with water. There was a
washbasin with running water in this room. The ink had run, and
of course was illegible. The thing was so unusual that I at once
assumed that this was the remains of the note in question. Under
ordinary circumstances it would be utterly valueless as a clue to
anything. But to-day science is not ready to let anything pass as
valueless.
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