BLAKE'S EVIDENCE.
When Blake stood up and tendered his testimony, a murmur of ugly
import ran through the room. In all there were not more than fifty
people present, but the fifty were typical of the general public, and
already feeling ran high against Blake.
He looked around contemptuously, defiantly. At one moment it seemed
as though he was about to laugh outright. The public can endure
anything better than derision. The murmur grew to a groan. Silence
was called in a tyrannical tone. The coroner pushed his spectacles up
on his forehead, and regarded Blake steadfastly for a few seconds.
A square-built man, of medium height, stood before the judge. His
hair was short, crisp, grizzled. He wore his hat jauntily in front of
his waistcoat, and had an eye-glass fixed in his left eye. In the
hand which held his hat he carried a stout oak stick. His hat was a
soft felt one; his clothes light, coarse tweed, of pepper-and-salt
colour. His brow was firm, low, and handsome; his complexion florid,
the colour of his eyes bright blue. He wore no hair on his face but
heavy, grizzled moustachios. His boots were patent leather. He was
ungloved.
The coroner, an old and venerable-looking man, viewed Blake with
anything but favour.
"Do I understand you to say, sir, that you are the person who saw
deceased last before his death?"
This was said in a grave, monitory-tone.
"So I believe," said Blake, lightly; "and as I am most anxious to
tell all I know, I should like to be examined before the
adjournment."
"I had determined to take no more evidence to-day than would warrant
me in adjourning until a _post-mortem_ examination could be made."
"Well, if you examine me, it may save the police trouble."
The coroner looked at the inspector who was watching the case, and
then at Pringle and Bertram Spencer, who were watching the case for
the widow and brother of the deceased. The inspector looked down and
smiled; Pringle looked up at the ceiling in unpleasant doubt; but
Spencer, who represented Mr. Edward Davenport, was urgent that Blake
should be heard. The public were also anxious Blake should be
examined. The public were athirst for blood or scandal. In this case
the public was unwashed and evil-visaged. Even the jury, who were not
there by choice, had a forbidding, ghoul-like, and clayey look. The
coroner was scrupulously clean. He was blanched and ghostly. Alfred
Paulton looked like one suffering from a hideous nightmare. The
inspector was grim, sardonic, rigid; the coroner's clerk sullen and
sleepy, and seemed to think the last thing which in fairness ought to
trouble a coroner's clerk was a coroner's inquest.
In that dull, saddened room, lit by the wan February light, the only
bright-looking figure or face was that of Thomas Blake, upon whom
rested a strong suspicion of murder.
After some talk and thought, the coroner resolved to take Thomas
Blake's evidence, and having cautioned the witness, which made the
witness smile in a way that provoked the public, he took down Blake's
version of the story. Again it will be most convenient to throw the
evidence into the form of uninterrupted narrative:
"I am now thirty-six years of age. I have known the late Mr.
Davenport for many years. I knew him abroad before I met him in
Ireland. It was in Florence that I met him first. I was introduced to
him by an American gentleman, a sculptor by profession. I saw a good
deal of Mr. Davenport when I was in Florence. I am now speaking of
eleven or twelve years ago. While I was on friendly terms with him in
that city his mind was affected. He suffered from a delusion that
there was a conspiracy to kill and rob him. He usually at that time
carried valuable jewels and considerable sums of money on his person.
I often advised him to give up that habit, but my words for some time
produced no effect on him. Then, all at once, they seemed to operate,
and he turned on me and said, with great fury, that if there were
danger to his property or person he had no one to fear but me.
"At that time I was a needy man, and I had borrowed money of him,
which I have never repaid. That is so. During the time Mr. Davenport
was ill--was suffering from this delusion or suspicion--I was
constantly with him. I do not think he disclosed to any one but me
the delusions or suspicions he was under. When he recovered he made
me swear most solemnly I would never tell a soul. Then he lent me,
or, if you prefer it, gave me, more money, and left Florence, and I
lost sight of him until I met him in Ireland.
"I do not consider my conduct in that matter dishonourable. I had
done him a service by minding him and keeping his malady private, and
he gave me money for my services. Yes, and for my silence, if you
like.
"I do not know whether my conduct would be considered gentlemanly. I
am not here to give an opinion, but to state facts. If an opinion of
gentlemanly conduct is required, why not have an attorney's clerk
from the purlieus of Lincoln's Inn Fields as an expert? I beg your
pardon, sir, I should not have used such words, but I heard that
question suggested by Mr. Davenport.
"I did not again see the late Mr. Davenport on the Continent. The
next time we met was in Ireland. Yes; at that time I was paying
attentions to Mrs. Davenport, who was then Miss Butler. When the
deceased came on the scene, Miss Butler and I were secretly engaged
to one another--engaged to one another without the knowledge of Miss
Butler's father. I was then practically without means or the
reasonable expectation of getting any; but, then, few young men in
such a position are very particular as to whether the expectation is
reasonable or not. If they expect, that is enough for them."
Then the witness gave evidence in the same line as that of the widow.
While this part of the inquiry was progressing, a light rain began to
fall. The evidence of Blake went on:
"It was I who broke off the engagement between Miss Butler and
myself. By the time that occurred, Mr. Butler had discovered the
existence of the private engagement. He was very indignant, and
forbade me his house. This was at Scrouthea, Mr. Butler's place in
the county of Cork.
"I took no notice of Mr. Butler's prohibition. I communicated with
Miss Butler as often as I thought fit and could find an opportunity.
But at this time I began to feel there would be no chance of our ever
marrying. The opposition of Mr. Butler continued undiminished. Mr.
Davenport did not cease to importune, and at that time I lost the
last money I had in the world on a horse.
"It was not purely matters of prudence that made me desist in my
suit. I saw now quite plainly there was no use in my continuing to
hope. Persistence would only waste the lives of both of us. All this
time Mr. Davenport and I were on speaking terms. I was in no fear of
his supplanting me in the affections of Miss Butler, and he was in
abject fear of me.
"His fear of me arose from the power I had of telling of the seizure
to which I had seen him subjected in Florence. Like all men who are a
little odd, his great aversion was from being thought odd, and the
notion of any one suspecting him of insanity filled him with absolute
horror.
"To be brief, I told him I had lost the last shilling I had in the
world, and that consequently I had made up my mind Miss Butler and I
could never more be anything else but friends, and that I would leave
the country if I had the means. He asked me to say nothing about what
I had seen in Florence, shook me by the hand, and lent or gave me a
thousand pounds. With that thousand pounds I went out of the country.
Before leaving, I wrote to Miss Butler saying all must be at an end
between us because of my poverty, arising from my loss on the Turf.
"How much did I lose on the horse? Let me see. All I had. How much
was that? Let me see again. About seven hundred and fifty pounds."
"But when Mr. Davenport had given you the thousand pounds, you were
better off than before the race. Why, then, did you renounce Miss
Butler?"
"Yes, no doubt, I was even better off; but do you think I could
honourably employ this man's money in taking away from him the woman
he loved?"
"And do you think it was honourable for you to give her up, and take
hush money from your rival?"
"I am here, as I said before, to state facts, not to give opinions.
When gentlemen want opinions, they hire lawyers to give them."
"You gave up the lady to whom you were engaged, and black-mailed your
friend for a thousand pounds?"
"I give up the facts to you. It is the duty of the attorney to
embellish them. I am not, Mr. Coroner, bound to answer questions
which are simply rhetorical."
The coroner merely shook his head, and the evidence went on:
"From the day I bade Mr. Davenport good-bye in Ireland, ten years
ago, until the day of his death, I often saw Mr. Davenport, and spoke
to him."
"And you heard from him? You received communications from him?"
"Yes."
"And money?"
"Yes, from time to time I received money from him by letter."
"Was that money black-mail?"
"I wrote him saying I was in want of money, and he sent me money
accompanied by friendly letters. You are at liberty to call it what
you like. If you search his papers, no doubt you will find my letters
to him. I did not keep copies of them, nor did I keep his replies.
"Yes; I had an object in calling on him the night he died. I had
heard he was in London, or coming to London, and I got the address in
Dulwich. I had business with him. It was to get more money from him.
You may say 'extract more money from him' if you like.
"I knocked at the door. He opened it himself. He complained of his
asthma, said there was no servant in the house, and that Mrs.
Davenport had gone to bed. He asked me to go into the dining-room,
which I found as has been described, and we sat and chatted for some
time in a most agreeable manner. We talked of indifferent things. Of
course we spoke of Mrs. Davenport. He said, in talking of her, that
although theirs had not been a love-match, they had got on
wonderfully well together, and that he was quite happy, and he
believed she was contented. He asked how long I purposed staying in
London, and I said only a few days. Then he invited me to call on
Mrs. Davenport and himself when they were in better trim----"
"What--what is that you say?" shouted Mr. Edward Davenport, starting
to his feet and gesticulating wildly. "It's perjury--wilful and
corrupt perjury!"
It was with the greatest difficulty Bertram Spencer could prevail
upon his client to resume his seat and keep silent. After a while
Blake was allowed to continue his evidence:
"I promised to come the next evening but one, and he said that would
suit them admirably. Then he smiled and said he was sure this was not
merely a visit of ceremony, and that he supposed I would allow him to
be of any use I chose. I told him he was quite right, that I had no
money, and that two hundred pounds would be of the greatest service
to me at that moment. He said he had not so much by him, but that he
would give me a hundred now and another hundred when I called the
next day but one. 'That will be,' said he, 'the 19th of February.' He
added that he'd make a memorandum of it, and he did so in the
pocket-book which has been produced here by the police. After that
nothing passed but 'Good-nights' on both sides, and then I went away,
closing the front door after me."
Here reference was made to the pocket-book, but no such entry as that
described could be found. There was no such entry in the book.
Then, having cautioned the witness again, the coroner said two leaves
of the book had been torn out, one of which had been found. On the
leaf found appeared words of the gravest import. They were:
"_Pretended death. Blake gone. He emptied chloroform over me--held me
down. Can't stir. Dying_."
Could witness give any explanation of this?
"No; I can give no explanation of that writing. It is perfectly
untrue. When I left the presence of the man now dead he seemed to be
in as good health as his asthma would allow. My only way of
accounting for what followed is that, after my leaving, he
administered some chloroform to himself. This disturbed his reason,
and he suffered from a return of the old delusion he had suffered in
Florence----"
"And of which you are the only living person who knows, or ever did
know, anything?"
"Yes."
"And further?"
"And further, that while suffering under this delusion, and being
greatly excited and rendered tremulous by it, he accidentally spilled
the remainder of the chloroform over himself."
"He did not show any suicidal tendency, or say anything of suicide
while you were present?"
"No; on the contrary, he seemed in very good spirits, and spoke quite
cheerfully of the future. By-the-way, I forgot to mention one saying
of his. When asking me to come and see Mrs. Davenport and himself on
the 19th, he said, 'You know I am not afraid of a rival now. We are
none of us as young as we were ten years ago, and if you have kept
single with the notion of marrying a rich widow--she will be rich,
Blake--you will have a weary time to wait; for asthma gives a long
lease to life."
Here the inquiry was adjourned for four days in order to give time
for the _post-mortem_ examination.
As the people began to leave their places, Richard Pringle whispered
to Jerry O'Brien:
"That man Blake has put his head into the halter and kicked away the
barrel from under his feet."
When Pringle and O'Brien got out of that room in the "Wolfdog," they
looked everywhere for Alfred Paulton. He was not to be found. He had
disappeared, leaving no word or trace behind him.
As Blake left the inn, two men, dressed like stable-helpers, came up
to him and said they arrested him on suspicion of being concerned in
the murder of the late Mr. Louis Davenport.
The rain was now falling in torrents.