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Just as he’d thought the Manhattan Company was about bringing clean water for the city.

“It was about twelve o’clock, as near as I can recollect, on the second day of January, the day when she was found, that Levi Weeks came to our house to buy some tobacco.” While Alexander was fuming, Ezra Weeks’s apprentice had already been questioned and stepped down, replaced by Lorena Forrest, whose husband ran the store next to the Rings. “I asked him if there was any news of Elma. He answered no. I told him I expected Ring’s family had, for they seemed much agitated.”

“Did you tell him of the muff?” inquired Burr. This was Burr’s courtroom now, Burr’s case, Burr’s triumph.

“Levi went away and in about half an hour he came in again while we sat at table, about one o’clock—I had heard before this about the muff’s being found; Mrs. Ring had informed me—and I told him that Mrs. Ring had mentioned to me that the muff and handkerchief had been found in a drain near Bayard’s Lane.”

“Was the Manhattan Well mentioned?” called the same juryman who had asked about that before.

“There was nothing said about the Manhattan Well.”

Alexander knew exactly what Burr was doing. He would prove that Levi had known where the muff had been found and use that to wrangle an acquittal and call it a win, never minding that a murderer sat in the courtroom, free to murder, and murder, and murder again.

They should be calling Joseph Watkins, they should be calling Ann Ashmore, they should be pointing the finger at the true guilty party, not quibbling over who had mentioned the Manhattan Well first.

Alexander could feel a strange energy surging through him. Burr and Brockholst had betrayed him; he owed them nothing more. But he did owe Levi Weeks—and Elma Sands.

Alexander pushed forward, claiming the attention of the witness. “Mrs. Forrest! Did you not hear Mr. Croucher say that he came near the well the evening when she was missing?”

Mrs. Forrest looked surprised at the change of subject. “Yes, he told me he did and said that he generally came that way.”

Before Burr or Brockholst could intervene, Alexander called, “The defense will now call Joseph Watkins to the stand.”

Alexander could see the look they exchanged. They might not like it, but there was nothing they could do about it, any more than he could do anything about Burr stealing his closing statement.

“Mr. Watkins,” demanded Alexander, “do you remember anything in the conduct of Mr. Ring that led you to suspicions of improper conduct between him and Elma?”

The question was a lightning bolt through the courtroom. There was a whispering and rustling in the galleries.

Mr. Watkins nodded slowly. “About the middle of September, Mrs. Ring being in the country, I imagined one night I heard a shaking of a bed and considerable noise there, in the second story, where Elma’s bed stood. I heard a man’s voice and a woman’s. I am very positive the voice was not Levi’s.”

“Can you hear through the partition?” called one of the jury.

“Pretty distinctly.” Watkins looked apologetically toward the benches where the Rings sat. “The noise of the bed continued some time and it must have been very loud to have awakened me.”

Elias Ring’s chin jutted out beneath the brim of his hat, his arms folded across his chest. Mrs. Ring sat bolt straight and unblinking, a figure carved from salt.

Watkins rubbed his chin. “I heard a man’s voice pretty loud and lively, and joking. I said to my wife, it is Ring’s voice, and I told my wife, that girl will be ruined next.”

Colden found his voice. “How could you distinguish between the voice of Mr. Ring and Mr. Weeks?”

Watkins wasn’t shaken. “Ring’s is a high-sounding voice, that of Weeks a low, soft voice.”

“Did you ever tell anybody that you thought the persons you overheard were Mr. Ring and Elma?”

“No,” Watkins admitted, looking again toward the Rings.

Colden tried again. “Did you ever speak of this noise which you and your wife heard in the night to anybody else?”

Slowly, Mr. Watkins said, “I don’t know but I once said to Croucher that I believed he had a hand in it.”

That was just the opening Alexander needed. “Did you ever converse with Croucher about where he was the evening Elma was missing?”

“I asked him once where he was that evening, but do not remember the answer he made.”

“Did you ever see Croucher busy in spreading suspicions about the prisoner?”

“The day she was laid out in the street, I saw him very busy in attempting to make people believe the prisoner was guilty.”