PRICE'S "SCOOP."

Otago Witness, Issue 2412, 24 May 1900, Page 54

PRICE'S "SCOOP."

. I. The tape-machine in the corner of the

sub-editor's room began to click.

Click — whirr — click !

One of the juniors walked lazily to the machine and took up in his hand the long serpent-like coil. " Sentenced to death," he announced. " Who — Kinsella?" The chief sub-editor looked lip quickly. . .'

The junior nodded.

Through the open window was heard the clatter of a hansom pulling up at the door, and presently Steele, the descriptive writer, "came" hurriedly in. He seized a wad of copy-paper, and began to write the concluding portion of his report. The first sections were already in the news-editor's hands, having been forwarded from the Old Bailey at intervals during the progress of the trial of Dermot -Kinsella for the wilful murder of Desiree Gobier, a young French actress, who had been found shot dead in her apartments.

Steelo bent lovingly over his task. He lather fancied his descriptive powers, and hie! ready pen flew over the paper at a great rate. With an eye' full oi satisfaction, he Avas contemplating the finish of a paragraph : " The white, shaking lips of the prisoner formed the words, ' 1 am innocent,' " when the door was flung open ond the editor-in-chief entered.

"This mustn't happen!" he sa^d excitedly, pushing up his glasses with a nervous gesture which was habitual to him. "This poor begga*. mustn't hang!" Everybody looked up. " It's all a question of identification, 1 lake it, Steele?" continued the editor.

" Well, yes," said the descriptive writer slowly. " Y'see "

'dentified him?" broke in the

" Who editor.

" The landlady of the girl's aparlments in Gowei street," replied Steele, ticking them off on his fingers with- great deliberation, " the cabman who picked him up in Bedford Square "

"What soi if looking man is he?" again broke in the editor.

'' Tall, dark, clean-shaven !"' replied the other.

"Wear glasses?" " Had worn them. I noticed the little red marks on the sides of his nose where they had nipped him," returned the man of observation.

"Good man!" said the editor. "Er — bui you couldn't sec them from the Press box?"

"I do."

" No ; I ?at at the solicitor's table," said Steele demurely. "Good man "again! But you mean to say that all those people swore to him after having only seen him once at 9 o'clock at night?" "I do." " Good heavens ! Why, how many thousands of men answer to that description? Why, I myself " • " Come to think," interrupted Steele, "he wasn't unlike you. Upon my soul, he was confoundedly like you!" Everybody looked at the editor. The bulky figure' of Lomas, the news-editor, loomed in the doorway. " Let's see," said the editor abruptly and nervously. " Didn't we have an interview with that cabman?"

" We did," said Lomas, with alacrity. " In i fact, we found him before the police did." "It was a ripping good story!" said the editor approvingly. " When did it appear?^ Lomas named the date, and sent~ a stray boy flying to get a copy from the file. 1 11 1 see, ' remarked the editor, " that the cabman describes ,him. in' the-,-. same words as you do, Steele. " ' Tall, dark, and clean- ' shaven, dressed in" the conventional frockcoat and tall hat — this was the description of the fare given to our representative by No. 105,782,' is what it says here. Who did this?" " I did," said the youngest reporter meekly. " Good ' &coop,' Price ! "' repeated the editor. Price, who was the dandy of the staff, pulled down his spotless cuffs and settled" liis tie with a conscious air. No one was more alive to Ins own merits as a journalist than Mr Price, and he regarded this discovery of No. 105,782 as a feat. "Didn't, we have a portrait of Kinsella V" queried the editor. " Course we did," returned Lomas, running his fingers through his untidy mop of curly fair hair. "We printed it the day after his arrest." ! "So we did— so we did ! " rejoined the ' editor gleefully. " Now, look here, we'll ! ■make 'em sit up. He's very like me, you ' say?" j "' Very," said Steele, looking up from the copy to which he had returned during the .■editor's conversation with Lomas. j V Then," continued the editor, raising J his voice, " we'll try the old Sydney Car- . ton dodge on 'em! Do you remember" — .j addressing Lomas — " the scene in ' A Tale •of Two Cities,' where Stryver gets Dar- j ■nay acquitted by showing his marvellous resemblance to. Carton?." ■ i " Rather ! " said Lomas. . ' Those of the 1 staff who- were- accustomed to the editor's brilliant ideas listened breathlessly. " r "Very well, then," rejoined the editor; "it is the very same situation. It all j turns on identification. Find your man who resembles Kinsella, and the thing is clone. I'm here ! " j <rßravo!r Bravo ! " " Splendid 1 " " Jolly ' good ! " The various men applauded each , after his own fashion. I

The editor dashed into his own room and returned with a cabinet - photograph of ■himself. " Lucky I had this by me ! ". he panted. " Get a block made as quick as possible, and ■ What -was the size of Kinsella' s jpicture? "

" Two and a-half by three and a-half," returned Lornas 1 .

" All right. Well, make this exactly the same size, then print 'em side by side. Page 4 will be the best place. Put under mine "

Lomas seized a wad of copy-paper and a 'stump of 'blue pencil. -

'"Ready? Then put, 'This is the editor j of this paper, who might "easily taken for Dermot Kinsella.' Then,, under his, ' This is Dermot Kinsella, yesterday sentenced to death at the Old Bailey for the v murder of Desiree Gobier.' Got that? Right ! - Oh,- we'll, knock the immortal soul out of this identification rot"! "" „ " Nobody had ,ever - seen the -chief" so excited. He was veiy pale, and his eyes were unnaturally bright. The men watched him admiringly.- -■• - \ " Now, then, about the article ! '" went on the editor, settling .his glasses on hts -nose. " Steele. you. had better do that. Make it red-hot!"'

Steele, finishing his report with the usual little flourish at .the bottom of the last slip, grunted assent/ "No ; stop ! " said the editor. " I'll do it myself — I'll do it myself ! "

The editor .went back into his own room and wrote furiously for a " while. He headed his article :

" " A MONSTROUS BLUNDER," and tliG opening sentence ran : " Dermot Kinsella must not die." Wifch pitiless logic the writer dissected the evidence, and the faults and discrepancies which it contained sprang into light with - startling effect. Then, came a furious attack on the identification theory- The well-known cases of Lesurques and Dubosc, of Je.an Cola?, were recalled.

""Gracious heavens," wrote the editor, " now many hundreds of men walk the London pavements daily, dark, tall, and cleanshaven, wearing tall hat and frock-coat, and a blue tie. with white spots? "

Never had the editor written with such fire and passion, and. Math all that, never hsd he . reasoned so well and so lucidly. He read the. article over with knitted brows when "he" had" reached "the end ; and scribbling across the top, "Lead first part," sent it up the lift into the composing "room.

" I think ' that will do," murmured the editor, leaning his head on his hand.

The effect of the article was even greater than had been, anticinated. A " Kinsella

j Committee,", with the condemned man's counsel and the foreman of the jury as vicepresidents, " was hastily formed. The ■ Dawn's editor was -asked to take the presidency, but declined on the ground of laclc of time. A meeting was convened at one 0/ the big hotels, but so great was the attendance that an overflow meeting took place in Hyde Park. The- excitement rose to boiling-point when a question was asked in the House, and hundreds of letters poured daily into the office of the Dawn. All the reporters of the paper turned into criine-investigators. Princely rewards had been offered to the man who could find fresh, evidence, and Price, proud of beating Scotr land Yard in the matter of the cabman;' was" eager- to surpass that achievement. He scoured London after clues, j The day of the execution was drawing j near. In 48 hours Derrnot Kinsella would die. The editor sat at his desk with a j grey-lined face, idly fingering a sheet of I thick oSicial-looking notepaper which lay i before him. He seemed to have put 10 years on to his age. in the fortnight which, had gone. Lomas burst ponderously into the room. " I say ," he began. " Hallo ! Wllat's up?" * • "Read that!" groaned" the editor. Lomas took the official r lookmg document. " H'ei ! ' ' Am directed to inform you ' — j mm, m'm — ' her Majesty's Secretary ,of Slate ' — mm, m'm — ' no reason to interfere ' ,—mm,, — mm, m'm — 'case of the convict Kinsella' ' — mm, mm— fixed for the 14 th" inst.' It's all up, "then?" " Looks like it." " Wait a bit, though ! Price swears he have found • the murderer?" "What?" The editor sprang up with blazing eyes. " Come in, "Price," he called. - » The reporter, spick-and-span as ever, walked briskly into the room as Lomas left it

The young man was a» pale as death. " Weil?" said the. editor. "You think you have found" the murdered?".- " "I know I have." "Yes. On what grounds?" Price licked his dry lips for a moment, and then said, with a desperate gasp : " You should be sure of your facts, you know. In your . story - on. ,the case you mentioned a blue tie with white spots. .Nobody else had ever mentioned such a thing. I took the liberty of visiting your rooms in the Temple, pretending I had come on a message from you. 1 found— : this-." * He took from his pocket a scarf of foulard such as he had described and laid It before the editor.

The two men faced each other 'like duellists. Price was shaking with- excitement. "Are you going to give me- up ?'S said the editor, with a harsh laugh, at last. "No.- Hang it, I-can'VdQ thaj!" said Pries. -„--.-...„ T "What do you want, then? .Kinsella mustn't ;swing;" " " . , "A confession." v * " Thank you." The editor began 'to write.- Price? stood by. -- . - "" ~ ? - " That's done," remarked the editor at last, calmly blotting the last slip. " Now, how much start will you give me?" " Two hours," said Price, " looking at him. in the eyes, and then looking away. ' " Bah ! yoii might as well say two minutes!"". Even at, this moment, when,, entirely at the' reporter's" mercy/ he seemed to dominate, the weaker. man. . , "Four Hours," said' Price, ~in a dry whisper. " It's compounding a felony, -' you know." ' - •. ' ■ "-Good ! Now witness this." Price bent over the "table to. witness-the confession. Like a/flash the editor's hand slipped into a drawer. A crashing report made the windows rattle. "I knew he'd do it!" muttered Price, gazing down through the blue smoke at the self-slain murderer.

— A man was ' sentenced to fourteen days* hard labour at Spalding for- sleeping in a stable. He would not work, 'and had been, several times convicted. The= police -stated that^there was £60 waiting for the man at a solicitor's, but" he was .too lazy to, fetch. it.