THE TRIAL BEGINS
Although he had been up most of the night at work on his speech, Maître
Raymond Floriot was among the early arrivals at court the next morning.
His unlined, youthful face wore an expression of grave responsibility
as incongruous as his black advocate's gown when he took his seat at
his desk.
The more he had hammered at his appeal to the jury the more he realized
that in the strength of his speech lay his one hope of victory. All
the evidence would be against him. He did not expect to profit much by
cross-examination. The affair was too simple. He must move the jury to
pity. There was not even a chance to instil a doubt into the minds of
the men who would judge his case. That is usually the chief aim of a
defending lawyer in a bad murder trial. He does not have to convince
twelve men of conscience that his client is innocent If he can work one
drop of the poison of uncertainty into their minds he is usually safe.
For the man of average imagination would rather violate his duty to the
state a dozen times and let a dozen murderers go free than send one
to the gallows and risk the punishment of remorse. "Certainty beyond
reasonable doubt," which is the formula of the law, is a farce with
most jurors. If there exists, to them, any doubt at all, nothing can
convince them that that doubt is unreasonable.
With this powerful weapon taken from him, the young advocate had but
one left--an appeal to the emotions. Had he had to face a jury of cold,
law-worshipping Anglo-Saxons or stolid, virtue-loving Teutons his best
move would have been a plea of guilty and an invocation to Mercy.
On these a lawyer might wear out an oratorical rod of Moses without
producing a drop of moisture in the way of a tear. But here were
volatile, easily moved Latins, and Louis Floriot knew his people when
he told his son to "shake them up." So the young man decided to ignore
the evidence and build his whole speech on the statement that the woman
made to the sergeant of gendarmes on her way to the prison after the
shooting--that she had killed Laroque to prevent him from "doing an
abominable act."
He was very nervous when he took his seat at the table reserved
for counsel for the defense, just in front of the dock. He felt
himself growing more uneasy when the judges in their robes of red and
black marched in from their room at the rear and the clerk solemnly
proclaimed that court was in session.
The great hall was crowded to the doors with men and women from every
plane of the social scale. Dozens of lawyers came to watch their new
brother break his first spear. A number of seats were reserved for
municipal officers. Veiled society women sat among them. Banker,
butcher and baker rubbed elbows and craned necks in the general throng,
and women of all descriptions squeezed and jostled their way through
them.
Raymond ran his eye hurriedly over the first rows and caught a smile
of pride on Helene's lovely face, gazing at him over the railing that
cut off the spectators from the attorneys and court officials. M. Noel
and Dr. Chennel gave him reassuring nods as they met his glance and
Rose waved her hand. He turned hastily away and began busying himself
with his papers as the prisoner was led in between two gendarmes. She
was crying and held her handkerchief to her eyes as she took her seat
in the dock. Raymond watched her nervously and tried to say a few
encouraging words but he could only stammer. M. Valmorin, from his desk
on the opposite side of the "bank," smiled at his future son-in-law's
symptoms of panic and gave him a friendly nod.
Raymond had watched court proceedings in criminal cases so often that
he was as familiar with the routine as a practised lawyer but now
that he was for the first time an actor it all seemed strange and
overwhelming. He was conscious only that Helene and his father never
took their eyes off him but he never looked their way again. The voice
of the clerk reading the charge sounded far away and seemed to be no
part of the present scene.
"--In consequence of which the woman, Laraque, is accused of having,
on April 3rd, 19--, at half-past five in the afternoon, committed an
act of voluntary homicide in Room 24 of the Hotel of the Three Crowns
in Bordeaux, on the person of her lover, Frederick Laroque, a crime
punishable by Articles 295 and 304 of the Penal Code."
The voice stopped amid absolute silence, and then Raymond heard the
grave, gentle tones of the kindly old President of the Court.
"Woman Laroque, you have heard the charge against you. You are accused
of having committed an act of voluntary homicide on the person of your
lover, Frederick Laroque. What have you to say in your defense? Do you
admit that you are guilty of this crime?"
He paused and Raymond, turning in his chair, locked up at his client.
Every eye in the room was on her. She was dressed entirely in black and
wore a black cloth shawl over her head that almost entirely concealed
her face, excepting from those directly in front of her. Her profile
was toward the judges. The black background made her pallor almost
ghastly. Her features were set and hard--a hopeless mask of chalk. She
gave no sign that she had heard the President's words.
"You refuse to reply?" he went on. "You persist in keeping silent as
you kept silent under examination? Let me beg of you, in your own
interests, to speak. Your silence can only be harmful to your case. You
refuse to speak?"--He paused again.
"The matter is in the hands of the jury. You shall hear the evidence
against you. Clerk of the court, call the first witness!"
A stir and a murmur ran through the court as the President settled back
in his chair and the clerk called, "Victor Chouquet! Victor Chouquet!"
Perissard and Merivel had managed to secure seats well forward and
watched the proceedings with the interest of experts.
"What did I tell you, my dear Merivel!" whispered the senior partner.
"It has all been arranged!"
"Of course it has!"
While they were awaiting the appearance of the boots of the Three
Crowns, Raymond gazed curiously at his client. It was the first time he
had ever seen her, and he was wondering what tragic story was masked
behind her stony, inscrutable face. She did not seem to be aware that
he was alive, and turning her head, glanced over the row of judges.
Suddenly Raymond saw her eyes widen with horror and amazement Her bosom
heaved and her lips worked as if she were trying to speaks He rose
hastily and leaned over the dock.
"What is the matter, madame? Are you ill?" he asked in quick undertone.
She turned to him with the jerky, uncertain movements of an automaton,
but kept her eyes fastened on the bench.
"What--who--who is that gentleman--talking to the judges?" she
whispered. The words could barely be heard.
"President Floriot, from Toulouse," answered Raymond. He supposed that
she had asked this apparently idle question to conceal the real thought
that had caused her agitation, and so went on earnestly:
"Believe me, madame, your silence may lose your case for you. I beg you
to speak!"
She drew the cloth more closely about her face and stared out over his
head with wild eyes. With a shrug of his shoulders Raymond dropped back
into his chair and turned to listen to the examination of Chouquet. He
was beginning to feel more master of himself and more certain that his
case was hopeless.
"State your name, age, and profession!" commanded the President as
Victor took his stand behind the witness railing.
"Victor Emmanuel Chouquet, twenty-nine years of age, boots of the Hotel
of the Three Crowns," replied Victor in his high-pitched drawl.
"Where do you live?"
"At the hotel, M. the President."
"You are no relation of the prisoner, are you, or in any way connected
with her service?"
"No, M. the President."
"Raise your right hand!--Do you swear to speak without hatred or fear,
to tell the whole truth? Say, 'I swear it.'"
"I swear it!" repeated the witness.
"Put down your hand. Give your evidence!"
Victor shuffled uneasily up against the railing and turned to the jury.
"On April 3d," he began, "a man and woman came to the hotel----"
"What time was it?" interrupted the President.
"It was a short time after lunch."
"Go on!"
"They had a trunk and a bag. I took them up to Room 24 on the top
floor, and the man said, as he went into the room, 'Not a palace, is
it?' And the woman said, 'Oh, what does it matter--this room or another
one!' to which the man replied, 'Well, I don't suppose we will be here
long.' Then they asked me for absinthe and cigarettes which I got for
them, and the man asked me to leave the bottle."
"Did they drink much?" interrupted the President.
"I didn't notice."
"What was the attitude of the woman?"
"She didn't have any," replied Victor, and a titter ran over the
benches. The court usher frowned and rapped on his desk.
"Did she look happy, sad, calm or nervous?" explained the President,
irritably. Victor considered for several moments.
"She looked very tired," he replied.
"Go on!"
"Some time afterward my wife went up to their room for the police form
and took down their names--M. and Mme. Laroque, from Buenos Ayres on
their way to Paris."
"Your wife was at the hotel?"
"Yes, she was chambermaid there."
"Why has she not been called as a witness?" the judge demanded with a
frown. Victor rubbed his hand across his eyes and snuffled.
"Because she's not there any longer. On the evening after the murder
she left me and I haven't seen her since. A few days after she had gone
she wrote me a note, saying, 'Don't worry about me. I am very happy.
Take care of the child.'"
There was a quick shuffling of feet and exclamations of pity and
sympathy swept across the court. The usher frowned and pounded his desk
again. The President's face softened as he watched Victor wiping away
his tears, and he gave him time to recover before requesting him to go
on.
"At about half-past five, as I was taking water to a room on the same
floor," said Victor at last, "I heard a shot fired and a shriek in Room
24. I rushed in and found M. Laroque lying on the floor in front of his
wife, who held a smoking revolver in her hand. I took the revolver away
from her and held her tight."
"Did she say anything?"
"She said, 'There's no hurry. I shan't try to get away.' Then the
police came and took her off."
"That's all you know?"
"Yes, M. the President."
"The prisoner is the woman you call Madame Laroque, is she?"
Victor gazed at the white face above Raymond's head.
"Yes, M. the President," he said. The President looked in the same
direction.
"Prisoner, you have heard the evidence of this witness? Have you
anything to say?" he asked, solemnly.
Jacqueline had not heard the evidence. From the moment she recognized
her husband a thousand mad thoughts had stormed through her mind
in a bewildering phantasmagoria. Her fierce hatred had given birth
to a hundred fantastic schemes of vengeance that the situation made
possible. Should she wait until her character and her shame had been
painted their blackest and then tell the crowded court that he was her
husband? Should she go to the place of execution and denounce him from
the scaffold? No! She could not do that because of her boy. She had
killed Laroque to hide her shame from her son. How could she proclaim
it now and make that terrible crime useless? But couldn't she tell just
enough to show _him_--God! how she hated him! who she was and to what
he had driven her? She could picture his face as he recognized her
and listened to the horrible story of her degradation. She was glad
that there was no vice so low that it had not soiled her; for thus the
greater would be his anguish when she proclaimed it....
"You insist on remaining silent?" the President was saying.
"Wait a little! Wait a little while!" she murmured, but so low that
even Raymond could not catch the words.
"Gentlemen of the Jury, have you any questions to ask the jury?" He
paused and turned to M. Valmorin.
"Thank you, no, M. the President," bowed the Prosecutor.
"Has the counsel for the defense anything to ask the witness?"
The instinct of the cross-examiner triumphed over the nervousness of
youth.
"The witness has mentioned that my client had been drinking absinthe,"
said Raymond, rising. His voice was sure and steady. "I should like to
know whether he thinks she was intoxicated."
The President nodded and turned to Victor.
"You hear the question? Was the prisoner drunk or sober when you ran
into the room and found her with the revolver in her hand?"
Victor shifted uneasily and appeared to hesitate.
"Well, she was very much excited," he said. "There's no doubt about
that, M. the President Her eyes were like a crazy woman's and her face
was red and she didn't seem to know what she was doing."
A stir and murmur from the benches told Raymond that the audience
credited him with a point scored.
"Would you say she was drunk?" he insisted.
"Well, some would say she was and some would say she wasn't," replied
the witness, falling back on his never-failing formula.
A titter ran through the court at this conservative answer, and the
president frowned.
"What would _you_ say?" demanded Raymond. Victor's confusion was
complete.
"I--I wouldn't say!" he stammered. Raymond turned back to his desk with
a shrug of his shoulders.
"Counsel for the defense, have you any more questions to ask the
witness?" demanded the court.
"No, M. the President," was the reply.
"Stand down!" commanded the President "Clerk of the court, call the
next witness!"
The next witness was Sergeant Fontaine, the gendarme who had arrested
Jacqueline. He talked in jerky, military tones, and gave his evidence
as if he were dictating an official report He told of arresting her in
the hotel and taking her to the prison.
"Did she say anything while you were taking her off?" asked the court.
"I did most of the talking," he replied. "I asked her why she had
killed Laroque and she said she had done it to prevent him doing a
disgraceful thing which would have brought unhappiness and despair to
some one she loved. I tried to make her say more, but she wouldn't. She
said that she wouldn't say another word to anybody, and she didn't."
No one had any questions to ask the witness, though it was plain from
the manner in which some of the jurors gazed at the prisoner that the
policeman's testimony had made an impression. They were the usual run
of jurors--plain middle-class tradesmen with a rather better than
average intelligence; and, as Raymond looked them over, he felt that
there was grim work ahead if he would upset their judgment and make
them follow the impulse of emotion. He did not think he could do it.
Victor and the sergeant were the only two witnesses, and the President
turned to Jacqueline when the gendarme had taken a seat beside Victor
on the bench reserved for witnesses.
"Before calling on the Public Prosecutor," he said solemnly, "I ask
you for the last time, prisoner, in your own interest, to tell the
jury why you committed this crime. You told the policeman who arrested
you, and who has just given his evidence, that you killed Laroque to
prevent him from committing an infamous and abominable act which would
have caused trouble to some one you loved. To what act did you allude?
To whom would it have brought trouble? Knowledge of the reasons which
caused you to commit the murder may have an important influence on the
jury in reaching a verdict. You refuse, to speak? You have made up your
mind to say nothing----"
He paused; and then:
"M. the Prosecutor!" he announced.
M. Valmorin rose slowly and bowed to the President, and then to the
jury. It was an old story with him--the murder of a degenerate man by a
fallen woman. He had only to go over an old formula.
"There you are!" whispered M. Perissard to his colleague. "It is
practically over!"
"Gentlemen of the jury, I shall not keep you long," began M. Valmorin,
in a gentle, pleasant voice. "The crime on which you have to give your
verdict is simple and baneful. The woman has killed her lover--but who
is this woman? What is her real name? Where does she come from? Who
is she? We do not know! Since her arrest the prisoner has refused to
answer all questions that have been put to her. She has not spoken a
syllable in reply to the Examining Magistrate, and you have seen for
yourselves that here in court she has insisted on remaining obstinately
silent, although her silence cannot but harm her case--if she has the
slightest shred of defense!
"There is sometimes an explanation of a murder--if not an excuse for
it--to be found in the motives that inspired it. Murders are committed
for reasons of money, for reasons of love, for reasons of jealousy,
or to quench a thirst for vengeance. And the passion which arms the
criminal's hand, which disturbs her power of reasoning and which
makes her act without thinking--this, to some extent, diminishes her
responsibility and the horror which the act of murder makes every man
feel."
The jurors were leaning forward, their eyes fastened on his face and
their reasons hypnotized by the musical, confident voice.
"When one or other of these reasons is brought forward, justice may be
tempered with mercy. But how can you be asked to find excuses for an
act, the motive of which the prisoner refuses to disclose? By this very
refusal we may be forgiven for believing--nay, we are almost forced to
believe that they are the worst possible motives. I distrust, for my
part, the impenetrable mystery in which the prisoner has robed herself,
and I can feel no pity for a guilty woman whose lips have not uttered a
word of repentance!"
A loud, clear voice rang suddenly and sharply through the court.
"_I will speak presently_!"
A burst of laughter would not have been more disconcerting! M. Valmorin
stopped, and every eye in the court was on the prisoner. Half of the
men in the great room had started to their feet. The attitude and the
look of suffering and the dark, hunted eyes were not visibly changed,
but it was undoubtedly the woman who had spoken. The prosecutor bit his
lip. Ten seconds before he had read in every eye in the jury-box, and
in nearly every face in the courtroom, a placid acquiescence. Now there
was pity in the glance of more than one of the twelve who would judge
his case, and he would have to win them away from it. This would be
harder than gaining their confidence at the outset had been.
The usher hammered the top of his desk until the excitement died away
and there was order in court once more. Then M. Valmorin began the
work of repairing the damage.
"As I was saying, gentlemen of the jury, we know nothing about the
woman Laroque," he continued, calmly, as if he considered of little
importance the sensation that accompanied the dramatic interruption.
"We have found no proof that she was ever a resident of France.
"In Buenos Ayres it is not known where she came from. During her stay
in South America she did not, so far as we can learn, offend any of the
laws of the country. In the month of March she took passage on board
the Amazon for Bordeaux. Nothing particular was remarked about her
during the trip, excepting that she told the fortunes of the passengers
with a deck of cards--that she said she was certain she would die
before long, and that she was in a great hurry to get back to France.
This is all we know about her past.
"On the afternoon of April 3d she arrived at the Hotel of the Three
Crowns, and at half-past five she killed her lover--a man whose past
will not bear scrutiny, and who had been sentenced for theft on two
occasions. You have heard the evidence of the servant with reference
to the overexcitement of the prisoner. I will draw no conclusion
from this evidence, nor is it necessary to go into the question of
the prisoner's moral responsibility, which overexcitement--caused by
drink--may have affected. I will leave this phase of the case to my
friend, the counsel for the defense--Maître Raymond Floriot----"
A frightful, unearthly shriek drowned the soothing voice of the
prosecutor and brought every man and woman in the courtroom, pale-faced
and startled, to their feet. Several women screamed, and the others
stared, frightened at the prisoner. She was standing, rigid and
swaying, head raised and eyes closed, her stiffened arms held close to
her sides, her hands opening and closing convulsively. Two gendarmes
seized her and tried to force her back into her chair.
"My God! My God!" she shrieked again and again. Raymond was beside her
in a moment, his hand on her arm, begging her to be calm.
"For God's sake! Stop torturing that woman!" roared a man's voice from
the audience.
It was the signal for a pandemonium! The usher pounded on his desk
until the boards cracked, but the crowd lurched forward against the
railing in a terrific uproar.
"Let her alone!"
"She's dying!"
"Great God! It's Jacqueline! It's Floriot's wife!" shouted Noel in Dr.
Chennel's ear. And the next moment that elderly physician was over the
railing like a boy. He burst through the gendarmes and rushed over to
the dock. But Jacqueline was again in her seat and waved him back. He
and Raymond bent over her.
"Are you ill? Shall I ask for an adjournment?" they asked breathlessly.
"No! No! No!" she panted, "I'm all right--all right!"
Her eyes were still closed and her lips worked as if she were trying
to speak. Dr. Chennel's fingers closed over her left wrist. He leaned
over and whispered reassuring words in her ear and gently patted her
shoulder. The subtle magnetism cf the physician seemed to have its
effect at last and she slowly opened her eyes and sat up.
The din in the courtroom died as suddenly as it had begun, and the
spectators shamefacedly sought their seats under the blazing eyes of
the President.
He was livid with anger.
"This is the most disgraceful scene that ever stained a French court!"
he cried in a voice that trembled with suppressed rage. "If there is
another sound from the benches during these proceedings I will order
the gendarmes to clear the hall!"
Noel glanced quickly at his friend in his seat behind the judges to see
if he, too, had recognized "the woman, Laroque."
Floriot's face was buried in his hands. He pressed a handkerchief so
tightly to his eyes that Noel fancied he could see the whiteness of the
nails. Any great blow--mental or physical--is immediately followed by a
practically complete cessation of all activity of the senses. The mind
--if it works at all--revolves around singular and ridiculous trifles,
utterly foreign to the disaster or its effect. It was this condition
that the recognition of Jacqueline left her husband. He was conscious
that quiet had been restored and that Valmorin was continuing his
speech, but the scene and its actors seemed remote from his life.
"As for the reason of the crime," the prosecutor was saying, "I repeat
that we do not know it. Now that the prisoner has promised to speak, we
may learn what it was."
Speak!--would she speak!--Raymond was standing half facing the
prosecutor, his profile toward the woman. His right hand rested on the
top of the railing in front of the dock. Jacqueline's eyes were on his
handsome head, and in them there was unutterable love and unutterable
dread. His delicate nostrils were quivering, and a touch of color came
and went in his cheeks. He was watching Valmorin with eager, anxious
eyes. Timidly, as a child, her hand crept out and closed softly over
his fingers. He glanced up at her quickly, with what was meant to be
a reassuring smile, but the early stage fright was returning. The
prosecutor was nearing the end of his speech and in a few moments he
must rise to reply. She drew her hand away, and he looked from it to
the woman for a moment as if something remarkable had happened.
... An invisible band that has never been measured by our mortal
standards binds mother and child together. It, alone of earthly ties,
takes no count of Time or Space, and joy and degradation and wealth and
want and woe alike are powerless to loosen. It has been called the only
unselfish love, but it is not that. For, "damned in body and soul," the
boy clings to his mother as to a promise of salvation; and a mother,
dying in shame and despair, yet sees in her child--Immortality!...
As if it had needed but that touch of the fingers to draw the cord
tightly around his heart, Raymond felt for a moment that his soul was
going out to the wretched woman that he had never seen until that day.
Emotions that he had never known before were stirred to life. A desire
to take her in his arms almost overpowered him. And what it meant to
the mother only a mother may know. "Speak!" She would commit a thousand
murders and go a thousand times to execution rather than utter a
syllable now!...
"You, gentlemen of the jury, will weigh in the balance her sincerity
and repentance with her guilt, and let your conscience be the judge of
what punishment is proportionate to the crime she has committed."
There was a rustle and low murmur of whispered conversation as M.
Valmorin resumed his seat.
"I don't think much of M. the Public Prosecutor," muttered M.
Perissard. M. Merivel nodded his acquiescence without taking his eyes
off the scene beyond the railing. The prisoner was huddled over the
front of the dock, sobbing violently The President gazed at her with
pity in his eyes.
"Woman Laroque, will you answer my questions now?" he asked, kindly.
She did not seem to hear.
"You said a few minutes ago that you would speak."
Jacqueline raised her wet, anguish-stricken face and held out both
hands, as if warding off a blow.
"No! Never! Never!" she cried, wildly, and sank down again.
"Take time for reflection, and let me, for the last time, advise you
not to remain obstinate!" persisted the judge.
There was no reply save a storm of weeping that shook the dock. Murmurs
of pity rose again and the usher rapped sharply on his desk for
attention.
"Counsel for the defense!" called the President,