Mrs Davis's suitcase

Mrs Davis's suitcase is one of the few personal objects examined in the inquiry, and its details complicate the picture of a woman who left almost no documentary trace. Its painted-over initials and a crucifix hidden at the bottom supply clues that Mrs Coppins had not understood at the time, helping Lejeune piece together aspects of Mrs Davis's past and faith.

Appearance and identifying marks

Mrs Coppins described the case as good quality but not new. Its initials had been altered: Jessie Davis's initials, I.D., were painted over a previous set that might have been H or A. Mrs Coppins had taken this for an ordinary secondhand purchase, since a good piece of luggage could be bought cheaply and its lettering changed. The marks therefore had a mundane explanation, but they also preserved a fragment of the woman's earlier identity without establishing what it had been.

A sparse collection of possessions

The suitcase held nearly all of Mrs Davis's belongings: she had little beyond the single case. Lejeune knew that her possessions were curiously few. She had kept no letters or photographs, and apparently had no insurance card, bank book, or check book. Her clothes, by contrast, were of good everyday quality and nearly new. The contrast between serviceable clothing and the absence of ordinary personal records made the case part of a larger pattern of obscured biography, rather than a complete explanation of it.

The hidden crucifix and its significance

When Mrs Davis became gravely ill, she urgently asked for a priest, specifying that she needed a Roman Catholic priest rather than the local vicar. Mrs Coppins had not known that she was Roman Catholic and remembered no visible crucifix. But a crucifix was tucked at the bottom of the suitcase. Lejeune knew of it and chose not to mention it while listening to Mrs Coppins's account. The concealed object thus supplied a quiet confirmation of a religious identity that Mrs Davis had not openly displayed; her request led Mrs Coppins to send young Mike for Father Gorman of St Dominic's, while she separately called the doctor and hospital without telling the sick woman.