Witness. Evidence. In an action against a street railway company for personal injuries, the defendant contended that the plaintiff was injured while attempting to get on a moving car when he was intoxicated. The plaintiff's wife, when cross-examined as to what she had said in reference to the accident to a woman who kept a grocery, denied telling the woman that her husband had gone down the harbor with two fellows from Everett or telling her that he had been drinking. The woman who kept the grocery was called by the defendant as a witness and was asked in regard to the plaintiff's wife "Did she tell you where her husband had been?" This was objected to by the plaintiff and admitted by the judge as competent to affect the credibility of the plaintiff's wife, if she said anything inconsistent with her statements on the stand, and ruled that the statement was "material if she testified as to her husband's condition." The plaintiff excepted to the ruling. The witness answered: "She came in again, and said I should trust her again, without her old bill being paid, because he went away yesterday without leaving any money, and he was drinking, and he was hurt, and she couldn't find any money in his pocket." Held, that, even treating the question as not a merely preliminary one, it was competent to ask the witness where the plaintiff's wife said that her husband had been, for the purpose of impeaching the wife's credibility as a witness, and that the answer, which was not responsive, was not in question, no objection having been made to it and no motion having been made to strike it out.
LORING, J.
[After the foregoing statement of the case.] Passing by the fact that the question was in fact a preliminary one and treating it as a question asking where she said her husband had been, it was competent for the purpose for which it was admitted. The answer was not responsive. No objection was made to the answer and no motion was made to strike it out. The only exception before us is the exception to the question. That exception must be overruled.
So ordered.