“Had she, as far as you know, any enemies—­any persons, I mean, who bore any grudge against her and were likely to do her an injury?”

“Yes.  Miriam Goldstein was her enemy.  She hated her.”

“You say Miriam Goldstein hated the deceased.  How do you know that?”

“She made no secret of it.  They had had a violent quarrel about a young man named Moses Cohen.  He was formerly Miriam’s sweetheart, and I think they were very fond of one another until Minna Adler came to lodge at the Goldsteins’ house about three months ago.  Then Moses took a fancy to Minna, and she encouraged him, although she had a sweetheart of her own, a young man named Paul Petrofsky, who also lodged in the Goldsteins’ house.  At last Moses broke off with Miriam, and engaged himself to Minna.  Then Miriam was furious, and complained to Minna about what she called her perfidious conduct; but Minna only laughed, and told her she could have Petrofsky instead.”

“And what did Minna say to that?” asked the coroner.

“She was still more angry, because Moses Cohen is a smart, good-looking young man, while Petrofsky is not much to look at.  Besides, Miriam did not like Petrofsky; he had been rude to her, and she had made her father send him away from the house.  So they were not friends, and it was just after that that the trouble came.”

“The trouble?”

“I mean about Moses Cohen.  Miriam is a very passionate girl, and she was furiously jealous of Minna, so when Petrofsky annoyed her by taunting her about Moses Cohen and Minna, she lost her temper, and said dreadful things about both of them.”

“As, for instance—?”

“She said that she would kill them both, and that she would like to cut Minna’s throat.”

“When was this?”

“It was the day before the murder.”

“Who heard her say these things besides you?”

“Another lodger named Edith Bryant and Petrofsky.  We were all standing in the hall at the time.”

“But I thought you said Petrofsky had been turned away from the house.”

“So he had, a week before; but he had left a box in his room, and on this day he had come to fetch it.  That was what started the trouble.  Miriam had taken his room for her bedroom, and turned her old one into a workroom.  She said he should not go to her room to fetch his box.”

“And did he?”

“I think so.  Miriam and Edith and I went out, leaving him in the hall.  When we came back the box was gone, and, as Mrs. Goldstein was in the kitchen and there was nobody else in the house, he must have taken it.”

“You spoke of Miriam’s workroom.  What work did she do?”

“She cut stencils for a firm of decorators.”

Here the coroner took a peculiarly shaped knife from the table before him, and handed it to the witness.

“Have you ever seen that knife before?” he asked.

“Yes.  It belongs to Miriam Goldstein.  It is a stencil-knife that she used in her work.”