On the Chopping Block

My mother alerted me to an ABC News article about the discovery of Lizzie Borden's attorney's handwritten journals. You know Lizzie Borden, right? She's the New England woman who was accused of murdering her parents with an ax in the late 19th century. Borden was acquitted, but the general consensus at the time was that she had made like O.J. Simpson and gotten away with murder. That's why we have the terse, perverse children's rhyme. Perhaps you're familiar with it:

Lizzie Borden took an ax and gave her mother 40 whacks.

When she saw what she had done, she gave her father 41.

As mentioned, Borden was found not guilty in her notorious trial. The writer of this article won't get off so lucky. She committed two misdemeanors, and now I have an ax to grind.

By a show of hands, how many readers were able to spot the first crime? Need a helping hand? It may not be evident, but the le is not on hand in the described evidence. Borden supposedly used a hatchet without a handle, not a hatchet without a hand. It was a "handleless hatchet," not a "handless hatchet."

Now that we've gotten a handle on the first crime, let's proceed with our blow-by-blow account.

It's as plain as day that as has been portrayed improperly. We need to ax that h and fix this hatchet job immediately. Do that, and I won't fly off the handle.