Chapter IV: The Story of a Crime

The following dispatch appeared in the columns of the New York Hemisphere, under the usual sensational headlines:

“Raymond, Vt., May 31.—This quiet town among the Green Mountains
had cause indeed to mourn upon this year’s occurrence of the
nation’s Memorial Day. Last evening, at the close of the most
general observance of the solemn holiday yet undertaken in
Raymond, the community was horror-stricken by the discovery of
the foulest crime ever committed within the limits of the state.

“Roger Hathaway, cashier of the Raymond National Bank and
treasurer of the Wild River Savings Bank, was found murdered at
the entrance of the joint vault of the two institutions, which
had been rifled of money and securities aggregating, it is
thought, not less than $75,000. The crime had apparently been
most carefully planned and evidenced not only thorough
familiarity with the town and the interior arrangements of the
banks, but also the possession of the fact that the national
bank had on hand at the time an unusual amount of ready money.
The position of the murdered cashier and the conditions of the
rooms indicated also that the official had met his death while
endeavoring to protect the funds entrusted to his care, his
lifeless body, in fact, barring the entrance to the rifled
vault, a mute witness to his faithfulness even unto death.

“The Raymond National and Wild River Savings Banks occupy
commodious quarters on the ground floor of Bank Block, a
three-story brick structure on Main Street, the principal
business thoroughfare of the town. The banking rooms are in the
northern portion of the block, occupying the entire depth of the
building, the only entrance being from Main Street. The north
wall of the block is parallel with a tributary of the Wild
River, which joins that stream, about 300 yards distant. The
interiors of the banking-rooms are plainly but conveniently
arranged. A steel wire cage extends east and west, separating
the officials of the institutions from the public, with the
customary counter and two windows for the savings and national
bank, respectively. At the rear of the room is the private
office of the cashier, separated from the main room in part by
the vault, an old-fashioned brick affair, built into the
partition in such a manner as to be partly in both rooms. The
iron doors to the vault open into the cashier’s private office,
although originally designed to be entirely within the main
office. Some years prior the office of the cashier was enlarged
to accommodate the meetings of the directors, and the partition
was moved east, bringing the major portion of the vault within
the enlarged room. Two doors communicate with the cashier’s
room, one opening from the public office, the other from the
interior of the main banking-room. Two large windows, looking
respectively west and north, afford light for the cashier’s
office. Both these windows are heavily barred, as indeed are the
two windows on the north side of the main office. A dark closet,
four by six feet, in the southwest corner of the cashier’s room,
serves in part as a storage-room for old ledgers, account-books
and supplies, and as a wardrobe for employes.

“It was in the cashier’s room that the tragedy that has so sadly
marred the evening of Memorial Day took place, that witnessed
the awful struggle between the assassin and the white-haired
custodian of the bank’s funds. The details of that struggle may
never be known, but the circumstances tell plainly that Cashier
Hathaway either surprised the assassin in the dark closet, where
he had perhaps concealed himself to await an opportunity to work
upon the combination of the safe, or had himself been surprised
while about to close the door of the vault.

“The crime was committed in the vicinity of 8 p.m., and its
early discovery—within less than half an hour thereafter,
indeed—singularly enough was due to a letter which the murdered
cashier had previously sent to the president of the bank,
requesting his immediate presence to confer on a business
matter. The president, the Hon. Cyrus Felton, upon returning to
his residence shortly after 8 o’clock, found a note from Cashier
Hathaway asking him to call at the bank at once. The note had
been left by a messenger, the servant stated, about fifteen
minutes before. Mr. Felton hastily repaired to the bank, about
ten minutes’ walk. He found the outer door ajar, but the door to
the cashier’s private office was locked. This was not unusual,
and, presuming that the cashier was busy within, Mr. Felton used
his own key and opened the door without knocking. Then the awful
discovery of the murder was made.

“Cashier Hathaway lay face downward in front of the open safe
door, his right arm partially drawn up beneath the body and his
heavy oaken desk chair overturned near by. His first thought
being that the cashier had fallen in a shock, Mr. Felton
hastened to raise the recumbent form. As he turned the body
over, the soft rays from the argand lamp on the cashier’s desk
revealed an ominous pool upon the polished floor, even now
augmented by the slight moving of the body. Roger Hathaway lay
weltering in his own blood, slowly oozing from a bullet hole
directly over the heart.

“It was several moments before Mr. Felton could pull himself
together to take cognizance of the circumstances. He then noted
the unmistakable evidences of a desperate struggle. As stated,
the cashier’s own chair lay overturned near the body; one of the
side drawers in the desk was partially drawn out, and the
orderly row of directors’ chairs were now disarranged as if a
heavy body had been flung violently against them. The door of
the dark closet was wide open and a lot of old ledgers that had
been piled upon its floor were toppled over into the room. The
doors of the safe were open, and a glance within revealed the
principal money drawer half-withdrawn, and empty save of two
canvas bags of specie and nickels; a goodly bunch of keys with
chain attached hanging in the lock. The story was told. Cashier
Hathaway had been murdered and the bank robbed.

“Mr. Felton immediately notified Sheriff Wilson, and the legal
machinery of the town was at once set in motion to encompass the
capture of the murderer and robber. It was thought that with the
short start obtained the feat would be a comparatively easy
matter.

“Nearly $50,000 in available cash, and half as much more in
securities, part negotiable and part worthless to the robber,
were secured by the murderer. The presence of this unusually
large amount of ready money was due to the fact that $50,000 of
Mansfield County bonds matured to-day and were payable at the
Raymond National Bank.

“The presence of Cashier Hathaway in the bank at that particular
time was by the merest chance, and the conclusion is therefore
irresistible that the murder was not premeditated. The savings
and national banks, though both among the most prosperous and
stable fiduciary institutions in the state, are comparatively
small, the capital of the national bank being $50,000 and
employing but a small clerical force. The latter comprise,
besides the cashier, the teller of the bank, Frederick Sibley;
the bookkeeper of the savings bank, Ralph Felton, son of the
president, and one clerk, a youth named Edward Maxwell. For the
last two weeks the teller, Mr. Sibley, has been confined to his
residence by illness, and considerable extra labor has
necessarily devolved upon the cashier. Memorial Day, a legal
holiday in Vermont, the bank had been closed, and on returning
from the services at the cemetery, in which he had taken
part—for Mr. Hathaway had been a gallant soldier in the famous
Vermont brigade—the cashier had dropped into the bank,
apparently to complete some work upon the books. It is possible
that the robber—the opinion is general that there was but one
engaged in the enterprise—had previously entered the bank, and
upon the entrance of the cashier concealed himself in the only
place available, the dark closet. He may have remained an
unobserved spectator of the cashier through the partly opened
door and as the latter finished his work and prepared to close
the safe, the robber may have concluded, by a coup de main, to
save himself the trouble of attempting to solve the combination,
and, noiselessly stepping from the closet, have sought to
surprise the cashier. On this hypothesis the presumption is that
Mr. Hathaway became aware of his danger, and turning sought to
ward off the blow, when the struggle ensued that was ended with
his death. Or the cashier may have discovered the presence of
some intruder in the closet, and seizing his revolver, which he
kept in a drawer of his desk, he may have approached the closet,
when the robber sprung upon him and, wresting the weapon from
the feeble hands of the old banker, turned it against the
latter’s breast.

“The fatal shot was fired at so close range that the clothing of
the victim was scorched by the explosion. No weapon was found in
the room; the revolver which, as noted above, the cashier was
known to have kept in his desk, is also missing. The wound was
made, the physicians state, by a 32-caliber bullet, which
penetrated the breast directly above the vital organ, and death
must have been instantaneous. The shot was fired at about 8
o’clock. Prof. Black, who occupies rooms directly over the
cashier’s office, heard a shot at that time, as did several
friends who were in the room with him, but they attributed it to
boys shooting water rats from the bridge beneath the professor’s
window.

“Thus far the tragedy possesses few extraordinary features. But
what has become of the murderer? Raymond is not so populous that
the presence of a stranger would be unnoted. Yet no one has
volunteered information of any suspicious characters in town.
Within fifty minutes of the commission of a daring crime the
perpetrator disappeared, leaving not a trace for the local
sleuths. The last seen of Mr. Hathaway alive, so far as known,
was about 7:45 o’clock, when he stepped to the door of the bank,
and, calling a boy who was standing on the bridge, throwing
stones into the stream, asked him to take a letter to President
Felton at his house. Half an hour later he was found shot
through the heart in his office.

“President Felton was seen by the Hemisphere representative
to-day, and told the story of the finding of the dead cashier
substantially as outlined above. He was terribly affected by the
tragedy and could hardly be induced to converse regarding it.

“Roger Hathaway was one of the best known and highly esteemed
residents of Raymond. He was 63 years of age and had been
identified with the national and savings banks ever since their
organization, the last twenty years as cashier and treasurer
respectively. He was prominent in Grand Army and church circles;
a deacon in the Congregational Church. Of a severely stern but
eminently just disposition, it was not known that Deacon
Hathaway possessed an enemy in the world. He lived in a plain
but substantial mansion, the family homestead of several
generations of Hathaways, with his two daughters, his wife
having died some ten years before. He was one of the founders of
both the savings and national banks, which under his management
had prospered to an unusual degree and stood high among the
banking institutions of the state. He had held several important
positions in the gift of his townspeople, and as town treasurer
his rugged honesty, economic conservatism and strict observance
of the letter of the law in the handling of the town’s funds,
had earned for him the sobriquet of ‘watchdog of the treasury,’
a title which he sealed even with his life blood.

“Up to a late hour this evening no clew to the murderer has been
discovered. The theory is held by the local police that the deed
was clearly that of an expert bank robber, and they are inclined
to think that he may be a member of the same gang that has
broken into numerous postoffices in New Hampshire and Vermont
within the last few months. The officials cite the fact that the
local papers had advertised that $50,000 in Mansfield County
bonds were to be redeemed at the Raymond National Bank upon this
particular date, and the natural presumption that the bank would
have on hand a large amount of currency, with the knowledge that
yesterday was a holiday, when the bank would be closed and
afford an unusual opportunity to work upon the safe, would form
a strong inducement to a daring burglar.”

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