The Evening Spider by Emily Arsenault

wasn’t pregnant, they found—but she had a mass in her uterus that likely would have mimicked the symptoms of pregnancy. Herbert Hayden was arrested again and put on trial in October of 1879.
    The article concluded with the names of all of the many lawyers who would be trying and defending the case. I looked for Matthew Barnett’s name, since Gerard had mentioned he was a lawyer. But his name wasn’t there.
    The brutality of the murder was horrific even to my modern sensibilities, so it was curious to me that Little Miss Muffin Minutes could be so matter-of-fact about the gory details of the trial. But then, perhaps by the time she’d gotten around to writing of her acquaintance’s—her brother’s?—involvement in the testimony, she’d grown used to some of the more shocking details being bandied about.
    I skimmed some of the subsequent pages of the journal, looking for more references to Harry, Professor Johnson, Herbert Hayden, and the trial. It appeared there were several.
    Then I looked over a few more New York Times articles. Itwas getting late, and I was too tired to digest all of the details, but one fact became clear as I read: Mary Stannard’s body had been exhumed three times at various points in the investigation. I wasn’t sure why, but that part chilled me nearly as much as the murder itself. Her various organs and body parts were kept in jars and examined by experts—many of them from Yale—and discussed in the courtroom.
    Said the New York Times on October 18:
    Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â  Prof. Samuel W. Johnson, a most important expert in this case, is a small man who dresses in an unassuming way, and wears spectacles. He looks like a German savant . For 23 years he has been an instructor in the Yale Scientific School, for 15 years in the Chair of Analytical Chemistry, and for the remainder of the time as Professor of Theoretical and Agricultural Chemistry.
    As I was reading this, I thought I heard a slight squeak. The receiving end of the baby monitor was upstairs, so I had to stop what I was doing and listen carefully.
    Silence.
    I read on, finding the early portions of the professor’s testimony:
    Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â  “Dr. White brought to me, Oct. 4, 1878, what he said were her stomach and liver, in a large glass bottle; he brought to me Oct. 8 what he said was her brain; Dr. Hotchkiss brought to me, March 7, 1879, what he said were portions of her diaphragm, gullet, intestines and lungs, and one kidney.”
    Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â  “What did you do with the stomach?”
    Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â  “No incisions had been made in it. I opened it, and found in it about two tablespoons full of liquid, and partly-digested food. There were some little lumps, which were probably white of egg, and some seeds of pulp of blackberries. Beside the food there was about a teaspoonful of a heavy, gritty white powder—a powder which when exposed to the sunlight and moved, reflected light like a crystalline substance. Under the microscope this substance was found to consist mainly of regular crystals; some of it was in opaque white lumps. This gritty powder I found to be ordinary white arsenic, mingled with flakes of yellow arsenic. Or arsenic sulphide; on the inner membrane of the stomach were stains of a canary-yellow color; these I scraped off, and found to be arsenious sulphide; this substance is produced when hydrogen sulphide gas generated by putrefaction comes in contact with white arsenic.”
    Then I heard Lucy’s little cry. Not a loud or desperate cry, but still I needed to check it out. I felt calm as I climbed the stairs, but as I reached the final step, I heard the cry change tone and become more impatient. I felt my stomach drop a little.
    The door was open a crack. I put my