The Passion of Lizzie B.

The Passion of Lizzie B.

By Edward D. Hoch (excerpt)

Most eastern crimes made little impression upon people like Ben Snow who lived west of the Mississippi, but even he had heard of Lizzie Borden and the sensational murder trial the previous year at which she’d been acquitted of charges that she brutally murdered her father and stepmother. The eyes of the nation had been focused on the courthouse in New Bedford, Massachusetts, and even little children recited poems about the number of blows Lizzie struck with her axe. Still, the verdict of not guilty was cheered in the courtroom and almost universally hailed across the nation.

With the passage of time, that began to change. Lizzie went home to live with her sister at a different house in Fall River, and some people began to feel that she might indeed have been guilty, though the state had failed to prove it.

“I’ve heard of the case,” Ben admitted, “but I don’t believe I ever saw a picture of her.”

“I have one here that I obtained from the local library.” He produced an illustrated magazine and turned to an inside page where an account of the trial began. There were photographs of Lizzie Borden, her father, and stepmother. “You see the resemblance?”

“It’s a poor picture. One can’t be certain.” Yet Ben had to admit that this could well be the likeness of Lizzie Benson, the woman he’d met just a quarter of an hour earlier. “But isn’t Lizzie Borden still back East?”

“Who knows for certain? This article says she lives with her sister and is rarely seen. What could prevent her from placing that personal ad and coming out here under the transparent alias of Lizzie Benson?”

Grenadiers Lake. Photo by Elena

“Where was she living when you wrote her?

“The letters went to a post office box in Tauton, Massachusetts. That’s very close to Fall River.”

“Why do you need me?” Ben wanted to know. “If you don’t want to marry her, give her a ticket bacl East and be done with it.”

“If she is Lizzie Borden, she might not appreciate being jilted.”

“You’re afraid of her?”

“When I was showing her around my hardware store she picked up an axe. It gave me a jolt, seeing her with it.”

“All right,” Ben decided. “I’ll stay a week. By that time we should know if she’s dangerous or not.”

Clant drained the rest of the tea from his cup. “That will be just fine, Mr. Snow.”

It developed that Clant had given Lizzie a part-time job, working at his hardware store three afternoons a week. The following day Ben found her there, dusting shelves and bins with a feather duster. She recognized himm at once. “Hello again, Mr. Snow. You’ve decided to stay with us for a bit?”

He nodded. “I’ve taken a room at the hotel Omaha till next week. Then I’ll be heading back West.”

“Are you a friend of Cyrus’s?”

“An acquaintance. This is my first trip to Omaha and I decided to look him up.”

She put down the feather duster and picked up a big metal scoop, using it to combine two bins of small nails into one. “I’m trying to get Cyrus to weigh these nails and package them in five-pound bags. That’s the way some stores back East do it. Why spend the rest of your life selling things for a penny or two each?”

“You have a good business sense,” Ben told her. “Did you work in a store back East?”

“No, not really. It comes natural to me, I suppose.”

(Ellery Queen, Mystery Magazine, September 1993)