THE SUMMING UP.
Faradeane was led to the cell in which he was to wait during the
adjournment. Five minutes afterward the warder announced Mr. Edgar.
Mr. Edgar waited until the door closed, and then held out his hand.
Faradeane took it with the faintest gesture of surprise.
“I suppose you don’t remember me, my lord!” said Mr. Edgar. “I was a
guest at a river party you gave some years ago.”
Faradeane passed his hand across his brow.
“I beg your pardon,” he said, “I had forgotten. I am sorry that we
should meet again under such circumstances.”
“Yes, my lord,” said Mr. Edgar, “and yet I cannot help feeling glad
that the judge should have trusted your case to me. We have so short
a time in which to confer, that I am sure you will forgive me if I
proceed at once to discuss the matter. I need not say, my lord, that I
myself, speaking as a counsel, am quite convinced of your innocence.
It is not for me to ask you why you have seen fit to plead guilty
to a crime for which I, for one, am perfectly sure you were utterly
incapable. But I wish most earnestly, in fact, it is my duty, to
point out to you that unless some evidence can be produced to rebut
that which the prosecution have already produced, and that which I
believe they have still in hand, you stand in the most terrible peril.
I will ask you only one question bearing directly on the death of
this unfortunate woman. Will you tell me, my lord, as man to man--as
prisoner to his counsel--did she commit suicide?”
Faradeane turned his head away, and was silent for a moment; then he
said, “No.”
An expression of surprise crossed Mr. Edgar’s face, and he looked down
and bit his lip as if puzzled.
“She did not commit suicide?” he said. “Then how am I to account for
the presence of the revolver bearing your name? If she had committed
suicide, I could have accounted for the revolver being in her
possession, as part of the property which may have fallen into her
hands as your wife. How am I to account for this?”
“Mr. Edgar,” said Faradeane, gravely, “I can understand your desire to
do your duty, and to assist me; and, believe me, it costs me a great
deal not to be able to tell all that I should like to tell you; but I
have reasons for remaining silent. That these reasons are all-powerful
with me you may well believe, when I am content to plead guilty to
a crime the penalty for which is the scaffold. I can render you no
assistance. It was not by my wish that you were appointed my counsel. I
cannot close your lips. I cannot, in the face of the court, decline the
aid which it has appointed; but I can say nothing to help you in this
matter.”
Mr. Edgar took one or two paces up and down the narrow cell.
“Every word you have said, my lord,” he said, “goes further and further
to convince me that you are not guilty. Oh! I do beg of you--with all
the earnestness of which I am capable--consider the position in which
you stand. Such a name as that which you bear, surely you owe something
to that. If you have no thought for your own life, think of that name
which has been handed down to you honored and stainless----”
Faradeane put up his hand.
“Stainless no longer,” he said. “The story of my shame, and my wife’s,
is by this time all over England. In a word, Mr. Edgar, I am utterly
weary of the life which you would endeavor to save. I repeat, I can
tell you nothing; my lips are closed, let the end be what it may.”
The young counsel’s face paled, and he bit his lips.
“So be it, my lord,” he said; “but give me leave to tell you that
though you will render me no assistance, will give me no information,
I shall still do my duty. Forgive me if I tell you that there are no
reasons grave enough to warrant a man sacrificing his life, and I shall
still do my very utmost to prove that the plea of guilt which you set
up this morning is an utterly false one.”
Faradeane inclined his head.
“I am sure you will do that, Mr. Edgar,” he said, “and I am sorry I
cannot wish you success.”
Mr. Edgar bowed, and was leaving the cell, when Faradeane put out his
hand with a gesture to arrest him.
“One moment,” he said. “You can do something for me.”
Mr. Edgar stopped, and looked at him with a sudden hope.
“There is a lady in court,” said Faradeane, in a very low voice, “Mr.
Vanley’s daughter--Mrs. Bradstone. Will you do me a favor?”
“I will do anything you ask me, except believe you guilty of this
murder, my lord.”
“You will go to her and ask her--beg her to leave the court. I ask it
as the last favor I shall ever demand of her; I beg of her, in the
name of the friendship which existed between us, to leave the court and
go home.”
Mr. Edgar inclined his head.
“I will do as you wish, my lord,” he said; and he left the cell.
If that were possible, the excitement had increased during the luncheon
hour, and the crush in and about the court was greater than it had been
when the trial commenced.
Olivia, the squire, and Bessie had not left their seats.
Mr. Edgar, when he entered the court, made his way toward them.
“Mr. Vanley, I believe?” he said.
The squire nodded.
“I ask your permission to speak a few words to Mrs. Bradstone,” he said.
Olivia rose, inwardly trembling, but outwardly calm.
“I have just seen Lord Clydesfold, madam,” he said, “and he has asked
me to be the bearer of a message to you.”
Olivia’s lips moved.
“He has asked me to beg you to leave the court and avoid this, which
must be a most painful scene.”
“He asked you that?” said Olivia. “He wishes me to go?”
“Yes, madam; he does most earnestly.”
“Will you tell him,” said Olivia, “that I will do anything he asks me
but that? I cannot go.”
Mr. Edgar bowed respectfully and went toward his place, an expression
of keen, earnest thought on his face.
There was a buzz of the most profound interest and curiosity when, pale
and haggard, but still calm, and with a kind of weary indifference, the
prisoner was led into the dock.
As the judge took his seat upon the bench, Mr. Edgar rose.
“My lord,” he said, “I have had an interview with the prisoner, and
upon the result of that interview I have to ask your lordship to
adjourn the trial until next sessions.”
A murmur of astonishment ran through the court.
The judge looked grave.
“This is a very unusual application, Mr. Edgar, at such a period. I do
not know that I should be warranted in adjourning the trial, unless you
can assure me that you have evidence directly bearing upon the alleged
murder, evidence which has only just come into your possession.”
An older man might have made the assertion with brazen confidence, but
Mr. Edgar labored under the disadvantage of being a young and honest
man.
“As to evidence, my lord,” he began, with a slight hesitation.
But Mr. Sewell rose.
“My lord,” he said, “it is my duty to oppose the application of my
learned friend. If, as your lordship said, he had come into possession
of material evidence, I, as representing the Crown, should certainly
not oppose his application. But I would point out to your lordship
that, as we think, our chain of evidence for the prosecution is
complete and unbroken, and I submit that the adjournment would be both
unusual and uncalled for.”
“I am afraid I must agree with Mr. Sewell,” said the judge, gravely.
“The trial must proceed; we must go on.”
The spectators drew a long breath. It would have been a terrible
disappointment to have been robbed of so exciting a drama at the
conclusion of only the first act.
Mr. Sewell proceeded to call his witnesses.
The first was Browne, who had found the body, and Faradeane standing
beside it. The revolver was produced and handed to the jury.
Mr. Edgar asked: “Do you identify this?”
There was a moment’s pause.
“It bears the prisoner’s initials,” said Mr. Sewell.
Mr. Edgar examined the revolver closely. Then he said:
“Has any one a magnifying glass?”
A buzz went round, and a gentleman--a doctor--handed his pocket glass
to him.
He took it and examined the initials closely, long and closely, while
every eye was fixed upon him.
“I call your attention, gentlemen of the jury, to the fact,” he said,
slowly and impressively, “that these initials have been recently made.
Now, Browne, I ask you--and be careful how you answer--were those
initials upon this revolver when you picked it up?”
Every soul in the court waited for the answer.
“They were, sir,” said Browne.
Mr. Edgar drew a penknife from his pocket and handed it with the
revolver to the jury.
“I ask you, gentlemen, to compare the engraving upon that pocketknife
and the initials scratched upon the revolver. Further than that I
cannot go, unless his lordship permits me to go into the dock and swear
that the initials on that knife were engraved nine months ago.”
Mr. Sewell rose.
“My learned friend cannot be witness and counsel at the same time.”
“I am aware of that,” said Mr. Edgar, boldly. “I simply place the knife
beside the revolver for the jury’s inspection.”
While this little scene had been enacting, Olivia had leaned forward
with parted lips and dilating eyes, her heart throbbing with a faint
hope. Then she sank back, her hands tightly clasped in her lap.
Inch by inch, with terrible sequence, Mr. Sewell unfolded his case, and
minute by minute the case for the prosecution looked darker and more
unanswerable.
Faradeane stood apparently unmoved, his hand resting without a tremor
upon the front of the dock, his eyes fixed upon the ground.
At last Mr. Sewell said: “This is our case, my lord.”
Mr. Edgar rose, and squaring his shoulders as a man does who is facing
a more than ordinarily difficult task, said:
“My lord and gentlemen of the jury: I know that I have no need to ask
your indulgence. I know that I need not point out to you how terrible
is the responsibility which rests upon my shoulders. With you lies the
verdict, but with me lies the awful responsibility of so pleading for
the life of the prisoner at the bar that no chance, however slight,
shall escape my notice. I am aware that expressions of belief in the
innocence or guilt of a client made by a counsel can have but little
weight; but, gentlemen, I feel that I must tell you that if there
should be any shortcomings in my pleading on this man’s behalf, such
shortcomings will not arise from any doubt of his innocence.
“I stand here to fight for his life, and if I needed any spur beyond
that of a sense of duty, I should find it in the thorough belief which
I entertain of his innocence, and that notwithstanding that he has, for
reasons of which I am not afraid to state I am ignorant, seen fit in
the first instance to plead guilty.
“Gentlemen of the jury, you have heard from the eloquent lips of the
counsel for the prosecution the story of my client’s life. You have
heard how, in a moment of unreasoning passion, he, the bearer of a high
and noble name, married an ignorant and low-born gypsy girl.
“Now, mark, gentlemen of the jury, this man who is accused of this
crime. He did not--as, alas! too many men of his position have
done--take advantage of the lowliness of this girl, use her as a toy,
and as a toy tired of, throw her away; but, remembering his noble name
and all that belonged to it, he married her.
“Is that consistent with the story, gentlemen, of the prosecution?
But let me proceed. Having soon after this marriage discovered the
character of the woman he had made his wife; having found to his cost
that he had committed a folly which must mar his life, what does he do?
“Most men, as my learned friend truly said, would have rid themselves
of what had become an unbearable burden But Lord Clydesfold, the
prisoner, does not do this. Rather than drag the honored name of his
forefathers in the mud, he elects to leave this woman, to drop the name
which he had given her, and, providing for her every want--ay, and
luxury--he separates from her, bargaining only that she shall leave him
in peace.
“I ask you, gentlemen, is this consistent with the guilt which the
prosecution lays to his charge? Under this assumed name my client
seeks refuge in this secluded spot. He does not dash into a life of
dissipation, he does not seek forgetfulness in a reckless course of
living, but he comes here, and for months leads the life of a student
and of a gentleman.
“The only notice that is bestowed upon him by his neighbors is that
which is attracted by deeds of charity. It is impossible that such a
man as my client should live, however much he might desire it, a life
of seclusion. And though he shrank from making friends, friendships
are, so to speak, thrust upon him. He is the honored guest of the
highest and the best known of the inhabitants.
“I think I shall not go too far when I say that I shall call witnesses
who will speak of this man, not only with respect most deep and
profound, but with affection. And this man you are asked to sentence to
death for a crime of the most vulgar and sordid description.
“What is the story? That this unfortunate woman came to Lord
Clydesfold’s cottage on the night before her death, and demanded to see
him. I shall not attempt to disprove the evidence of the servant or
of Alford, who heard the deceased declare that her husband wished her
death.
“But, gentlemen, I call upon you to draw a distinction between such
words used by her, and such words used by him. All through this
interview his manner to her was one of patient forbearance, while hers
was one of furious taunting. Had Lord Clydesfold intended murdering her
he would have committed the crime that night, and not have waited until
she had time to go back to the village and spread the story of her
marriage.”
There was a buzz of excitement. Olivia’s hands clasped each other more
tightly.
“He goes to meet her in the Hawkwood Spinney at four o’clock the
following day. He knows that on that day the marriage of a well-known
and well-beloved young lady takes place at Hawkwood itself; that there
will be an excitement attending such a marriage; that the whole of the
village will be congregated in those very grounds; that persons will
be roaming all over the place.
“And yet the prosecution ask you to believe that this man, who
throughout has shown so much patient resignation, a man possessed of
no ordinary intelligence--that this man, my client, whose demeanor you
have an opportunity of witnessing at this moment----”
Here he raised his hand and pointed with a really splendid gesture to
Faradeane’s calm and dignified face.
“That this man was mad enough, fool enough, to go and meet this woman
with the intention of murdering her, surrounded by a crowd, and
murdering her not in a silent manner, but by shooting her. Do you think
any man in his senses would have conceived so wildly and ridiculously
foolish a plan?
“Gentlemen, I have not to establish the innocence of the prisoner at
the bar. It is sufficient for him if I convince you that his guilt is
not certain. If I can show you that there is a doubt--a doubt of the
faintest or slightest shadow--his lordship will tell you that I have
the right to demand a verdict of ‘not guilty,’ and I say that such a
doubt cannot but exist.
“It is not incumbent upon me to show how this woman met with her death.
She may in a moment of passion and disappointment have committed
suicide. She may have attempted to take the life of the husband who had
put her from him, and, in the struggle which took place, the weapon may
have been pointed toward her, and she may thus have received her death.
“These hypotheses are for your consideration. No one saw that woman
die. No man can come forward and say that Lord Clydesfold’s hand
committed the deed. Therefore, no one on my behalf can come forward
to say that she did not meet with her death in either of the ways I
suggested. Gentlemen, there is a doubt, and that doubt, I venture to
assert, will grow into certainty when you have heard the testimony of
this man’s character, which I shall now produce.”