RUTH POWLETT.
Lieutenant Gulston and his companion had not long to wait to learn the
verdict, for in a few minutes the people began to pour out of the house,
and a constable came out, and, after looking round, walked up to the
lieutenant.
"Mr. Gulston," he said, "your presence will be required to-morrow at
eleven o'clock at Mr. Volkes's. Captain Mervyn will be brought up there
at eleven o'clock to-morrow."
"Very well," Mr. Gulston replied. "What verdict have the coroners jury
found?"
"They have found Captain Mervyn guilty of wilful murder," the man
replied.
The next morning the inquiry was heard before Mr. Volkes and two other
magistrates, and the doctor's evidence, that of Mr. Gulston, the
gardener, the cook, and the constable who found the glove, was
considered sufficient. Mr. Carne was not summoned, and although Ruth
Powlett's name was called, she did not answer to it, Dr. Arrowsmith
explaining to the bench that she was too ill to be present. Captain
Mervyn was asked if he had any questions to ask the witnesses, or any
statement to make; but he simply said that he should reserve his
defence, and the case was then adjourned for a week to see if any
further evidence would be forthcoming, the magistrates intimating that
unless some altogether new light was thrown upon the subject they should
commit the prisoner for trial.
Very gravely and silently the men who composed the coroner's jury walked
down to Carnesford; scarce a word was spoken on the way, and a
stranger, meeting them, might have supposed, not unnaturally, that they
were returning from a funeral. The news had arrived before them, having
been carried down at full speed by one of the few villagers who had been
present. It had at first been received with absolute incredulity. The
idea that Captain Mervyn should kill Margaret Carne seemed so wild a
proposition that the first person to arrive with it was wholly
disbelieved, and even the confirmation of those who followed him was
also doubted. People, however, moved towards the foot of the hill to
meet the jury, and a small crowd had collected by the time they had come
down. The jury, upon being questioned, admitted that they had found
Ronald Mervyn guilty, and when the fact was grasped, a sort of awed
silence fell upon their hearers.
"Why, whatever were you all thinking of?" one of the men said. "Why, you
must have been downright mad. You find that Captain Mervyn was the
murderer of his own cousin, and Mr. Carne your own landlord, too! I
never heard tell of such a thing."
The jury, indeed, were regarded almost as culprits; even to themselves
now, their verdict seemed monstrous, though at the time the evidence had
appeared so strong that they had felt themselves unable to resist the
coroner's expressed opinion that, upon the evidence before them, they
had no course open but to return a verdict of wilful murder against
Ronald Mervyn.
"You will hear about it presently, lads," Hiram Powlett said. "If you
had been in our place, and had heard what we have heard, you would have
said the same. I should have no more believed it myself this morning, if
any one had told me that Captain Mervyn had murdered his cousin, than I
should if they had told me that the mill stream was running the wrong
way; but now I sees otherwise. There ain't one of us here as wouldn't
have given another verdict if we could have done so, but having heard
what we heard there weren't no other verdict to be given. I would have
given a hundred pounds myself to have found any other way, but I
couldn't go against my conscience; and besides, the coroner told us that
if Captain Mervyn is innocent, he will have full opportunity of proving
it at the trial. And now I must be off home, for I hear Mr. Carne sent
down Ruth, as soon as she had given her evidence, in one of his
carriages."
Ruth had so far recovered that she was sitting on a chair by the fire
when her father entered. She had heard nothing of what had taken place
at the inquest beyond her own evidence, and she looked anxiously at her
father as he slowly took off his coat and hat and hung them up, and came
over to the fire beside her.
"How are you feeling now, Ruth? You were looking sadly when you were in
the court."
"I believe you will kill the child between you," Mrs. Powlett said,
testily, as she entered with the dinner. "Any one can see with half an
eye that she ain't fit to be going before a court and giving evidence
after the shock as she 'as had. She ought to have been left quiet. If
you had half the feeling of a man in you, Hiram Powlett, you wouldn't
have let them do it. If I had been there I should have got up and said:
'Your worship can see for yourself as my daughter is more fit to be in
bed than to be worrited and questioned here. She ain't got nothing to
tell you more than you knows yourself. She just came in and found her
mistress dead, and that's all she knows about it.'"
"And what verdict did you find, father?" Ruth asked, as soon as her
mother had finished.
[Illustration: "'_What verdict did you find, father?' Ruth asked._"]
"Verdict! What verdict should they find," Mrs. Powlett said, angrily,
"but that they just knew nothing at all about it?"
"That wasn't the verdict, Hesba," Hiram Powlett said, as he seated
himself at the table; "I wish to God it had been. There was things came
out at the trial as altogether altered the case. We found as one had
been quarrelling with Miss Carne, and threatening what he would do to
her. We found as something belonging to him had been found close at
hand, where it could only have been put somewhere about the time of the
murder. We found as the person couldn't tell us where he had been at the
time; and though it were sorely against us to do it, and seemed the most
unnatural thing in the world, we had to find a verdict of wilful murder
against Captain Mervyn."
Ruth had risen from her seat as her father was speaking; her face had
grown whiter and whiter as he went on, and one hand had gone to her
heart, while the other clutched at the back of the chair. As he finished
she gave a sudden start, and burst into a scream of hysterical laughter,
so startling Hiram Powlett and his wife, neither of whom was looking at
her, that the former upset his chair as he started to his feet, while
the latter dropped the plate she was in the act of setting before him.
For some minutes the wild laughter rang through the house. Hesba had at
once taken the girl in her arms, and seated her in the chair again, and
after trying for a minute or two vainly to soothe her, turned to Hiram.
"Don't stand staring there, Hiram; run for the doctor. Look what you
have done, with your stories about your courts and your verdicts. You
have just scared her out of her mind."
Fortunately as Hiram ran up into the village street he saw Dr.
Arrowsmith--who had waited at The Hold, talking over the matter to some
of his neighbours--driving down the hill, and at once fetched him in to
Ruth.
"The girl is in violent hysterics, Hiram," the doctor said, as soon as
he had entered. "Carry her upstairs, and lay her down on the bed; it's
no use trying to get her to drink that now"--for Mrs. Powlett was trying
in vain to get Ruth to take some brandy--"she cannot swallow. Now I will
help you upstairs with her. The great thing is to get her to lie down."
It seemed hours to Hiram Powlett, as he listened to the wild screaming
and laughter overhead, but in reality it was not many minutes before the
doctor came down again.
"I am going to drive home and get some chloroform," he said, "I shan't
be two minutes gone;" and before Hiram could ask a question he hurried
out, jumped into his dogcart, and drove off.
There was no change until his return, except that once or twice there
was a moment's cessation in the screaming. Hiram could not remain in the
house, but went out and walked up and down until the doctor returned.
"No change, I hear," the latter remarked, as he jumped down from the
dogcart, for Ruth's cries could be heard down at the gate of the garden.
Then he hurried on into the house and upstairs, poured some chloroform
into a handkerchief, and waved it in Ruth's face. Gradually the screams
abated, and in two or three minutes the girl was lying quiet and still.
"Now, lift her head, Mrs. Powlett, while I pour a few drops of this
narcotic between her lips."
"Can she swallow, sir?"
"Not consciously, but it will find its way down her throat. I don't like
doing it, but we must send her to sleep. Weak as she is, and shaken by
all she has gone through, she will kill herself if she goes on with
these hysterics."
As soon as Ruth showed signs of returning consciousness, the doctor
again placed the handkerchief near her face, keeping his fingers
carefully on her pulse as he did so.
This was repeated again and again, and then the opiate began to take
effect.
"I think she will do now," he said, at last; "it's a hazardous
experiment, but it was necessary. Now you can go down to your husband
for a few minutes, and tell him how she is. I shall remain here for a
time."
"She is off now," Mrs. Powlett said, as she came downstairs.
"Asleep?" Hiram asked.
"Well, it's sleep, or chloroform, or laudanum, or a little of each of
them," Mrs. Powlett said. "Anyhow, she is lying quiet, and looks as if
she were asleep. Dear, dear, what things girls are. And to think that
all these years we have never had a day's sickness with her, and now it
all comes one on the top of the other; but, of course, when one's got a
husband who comes and blurts things out before a girl that's that
delicate that the wind would blow her over, what can you expect?"
"I didn't mean----" Hiram began, but Hesba cut him short.
"That's the way with men; they never do mean; they never use the little
sense they have got. I don't expect that there's a man, woman, or child
in Carnesford that wouldn't have known better. Here you had her down
here for well nigh a month as bad as she could be; then she gets that
terrible shock and goes off fainting all day; then she has to go into
court, and as if that wasn't enough for her, you comes and blurts out
before her that you found as Captain Mervyn murdered his cousin. I
wouldn't call myself a man if I was you, Hiram Powlett. I had a better
idea of you before."
"What could I have said?" urged Hiram, feebly.
"Said?" Hesba repeated, scornfully. "In the first place you need not
have said anything; then if you couldn't hold your tongue, you might
have said that, of course, you had found a verdict of wilful murder
against some one or other, which would be quite true; but even if it
hadn't been you need not have minded that when it comes to saving your
own daughter's life. There, sit down and have some food, and go out to
your mill."
Hiram Powlett had no appetite whatever, but he meekly sat down, ate a
few mouthfuls of food, and then, when Hesba left the room for a moment,
took his cap from the peg and went out. Mrs. Powlett ate her meal
standing; she had no more appetite for it than her husband, but she knew
she should not have an opportunity of coming downstairs again when once
the doctor had left, so she conscientiously forced herself to eat as
much as usual, and then, after clearing away the things, and warning the
little servant that she must not make the slightest sound, she went into
the parlour and sat down until the doctor came downstairs.
"She is quiet now. I will come back again when I have had my dinner. Sit
close by her, and if you see any signs of change, sprinkle a little
water on her face and send for me; and you may pour a few drops of
brandy down her throat. If her breathing continues regular, and as slow
as it is at present, do nothing until I return."
For a fortnight Ruth Powlett lay between life and death, then she turned
the corner, and very slowly and gradually began to recover. Six weeks
had passed by, and she was about again, a mere shadow of her former
self. No further evidence of any kind had been obtained with reference
to the murder at The Hold. Mrs. Mervyn had a detective down from
London, and he had spent days in calling at all the villages within
twenty miles in the endeavour to find some one who had heard a horseman
pass between the hours of twelve and three. This, however, he failed to
do; he had tracked the course of Ronald Mervyn up to ten o'clock, but
after that hour he could gather no information. Even a reward of fifty
pounds failed to bring any tidings of a horseman after that hour. Ronald
Mervyn had followed a circuitous route, apparently going quite at
random, but when heard of at ten o'clock he was but thirteen miles
distant, which would have left an ample margin of time for him to have
ridden to The Hold and carried out his designs.
The description of Margaret Carne's watch and jewellery had been
circulated by the police throughout England, but so far none of it
appeared to have been offered for sale at any jeweller's or pawnbroker's
in the country. In South Devonshire, people were divided into two
parties on the subject of Ronald Mervyn's guilt or innocence. No one
remained neutral on the subject. Some were absolutely convinced that, in
spite of appearances, he was innocent. Others were equally positive that
he was guilty. The former insisted that the original hypothesis as to
the murder was the correct one, and that it had been committed by some
tramp. As to the impossibility of this man having killed Margaret Carne
in her sleep, they declared that there was nothing in it. Every one knew
that tramps were rough subjects, and this man might be an especially
atrocious one. Anyhow, it was a thousand times more probable that this
was how it came about than that Ronald Mervyn should have murdered his
cousin.
The other party were ready to admit that it was improbable that a man
should murder his cousin, but they fell back upon the evidence that
showed he and no one else had done it, and also upon the well-known
curse upon Carne's Hold, and the fact that Mervyn on his mother's side
had the Carne blood in his veins. Every one knew, they argued, that mad
people murder their husbands, wives, or children; why, then, not a
cousin?
There was a similar difference of opinion on the subject among the
little conclave in the snuggery at the "Carne's Arms."
Jacob Carey and the old clerk were both of opinion that Ronald Mervyn
was guilty, the former basing his opinion solely upon the evidence, and
the latter upon the curse of the Carnes. The landlord maintained a
diplomatic reserve. It was not for him to offend either section of his
customers by taking a decided side. He therefore contented himself by
saying, "There's a great deal in what you say," to every argument
brought forward in the coffee-room, the tap-room, or snuggery.
The "Carne's Arms" was doing a larger trade than it had ever done
before. There were two detectives staying in the house, and every day
coaches brought loads of visitors from Plymouth; while on Saturday and
Monday hundreds of people tramped over from the railway station, coming
from Plymouth and Exeter to have a view of the house where the tragedy
had taken place. The pressure of business was indeed so great that the
landlord had been obliged to take on two extra hands in the kitchen, and
to hire three girls from the village to attend to the customers in the
coffee-room and tap-room.
Hiram Powlett was Captain Mervyn's champion in the snuggery. It was true
he had few arguments to adduce in favour of his belief, and he allowed
the smith and Reuben Claphurst to do the greater part of the talking,
while he smoked his pipe silently, always winding up the discussion by
saying: "Well, neighbours, I can't do much in the way of arguing, and I
allow that what you say is right enough, but for all that I believe
Captain Mervyn to be innocent. My daughter Ruth won't hear a word said
as to his being guilty, and I think with her."
Hiram Powlett and his wife had indeed both done their best to carry out
the doctor's orders that nothing should be said in Ruth's hearing of the
murder. But the girl, as soon as she was sufficiently recovered to talk,
was always asking questions as to whether any further clue had been
discovered as to the murderer, and she was indeed so anxious and urgent
on the matter that the doctor had felt it better to withdraw his
interdict, and to allow her father to tell her any little scraps of
gossip he had picked up.
"The idea has evidently got possession of her mind, Hiram," the doctor
said. "She was very attached to her mistress, and is no doubt most
anxious that her murderer shall be brought to justice. I have changed my
opinion, and think now that you had better not shirk the subject. She
has been a good deal more feverish again the last day or two. Of course
she must stay here now until after the trial, which will come off in a
fortnight. When that is over, I should strongly recommend you to send
her away from here for a time; it doesn't matter where she goes to, so
that she is away from here. If you have any friends or relations you can
send her to, let her go to them; if not, I will see about some home for
convalescent patients where she would be taken in. There are several of
them about; one at the Isle of Wight, I believe. That would suit her
very well, as the climate is mild. Anyhow, she must not stop here. I
shall be heartily glad myself when the trial is over. Go where I will I
hear nothing else talked about. No one attends to his own business, and
the amount of drunkenness in the place has trebled. If I had my way, I
would have a regulation inflicting a heavy fine upon every one who
after the conclusion of the trial ventured to make any allusion, however
slight, to it. It's disgusting to see the number of people who come here
every day and go up the hill to have a look at the house."
As the day for the trial approached, Ruth Powlett became more and more
anxious and nervous about it. It kept her awake at nights, and she
brooded on it during the day. For hours she would sit with her eyes
fixed upon the fire without opening her lips, and the doctor became
seriously anxious lest she should be again laid up before it became
necessary to give her evidence.
There was indeed a terrible fight going on in Ruth's mind. She knew that
Captain Mervyn was innocent; she knew that George Forester was guilty,
and yet the memory of her past life was still so strong in her that she
could not bring herself to denounce him, unless it became absolutely
necessary to do so to save Ronald Mervyn's life. Ronald had insulted and
threatened her mistress, and had not George Forester been beforehand
with him, he might have done her some grievous harm, or he might perhaps
have murdered Lieutenant Gulston, for whom Ruth felt a strong attraction
because she had discerned that Margaret loved him.
It was right, then, that Ronald Mervyn should suffer, but it was not
right that he should be hung. If he could clear himself without her
being obliged to denounce George Forester, let him do so; but if not, if
he were found guilty, then she had no other course open to her. She must
come forward and produce the knife and describe how she had found it,
and confess why she had so long concealed it. All this would be very
terrible. She pictured to herself the amazement of the court, the
disapproval with which her conduct would be received, the way in which
she would be blamed by all who knew her, the need there would be for
going away from home afterwards and living somewhere where no one would
know her story; but not for this did she ever waver in her
determination. Ronald Mervyn must be saved from hanging, for she would
be as bad as a murderess if she kept silent and suffered him to be
executed for a crime she knew that he had not committed.
Still she would not do it until the last thing; not till everything else
failed would she denounce George Forester as a murderer. She loved him
no longer; she knew that had he not been interrupted he would perhaps
have killed her. It was partly the thought of their boy-and-girl life,
and of the hours they had spent together by the side of the Dare, that
softened her heart; this and the thought of the misery of the kind old
man, his father.
"I don't understand Ruth," the doctor said one day to Mrs. Powlett. "She
ought to get better faster than she does. Of course she has had a
terrible shock, and I quite understand its affecting her as it did, just
as she was recovering from her former illness; but she does not mend as
she ought to do. She has lost strength instead of gaining it during the
past week. She is flushed and feverish, and has a hunted look about her
eyes. If I had known nothing of the circumstances of the case I should
have said that she has something on her mind."
"There is nothing she can have on her mind," Hesba Powlett replied. "You
know we had trouble with her about that good-for-nothing George
Forester?" The doctor nodded. It was pretty well known throughout the
village how matters stood.
"She gave him up weeks and weeks ago, just at the time he went away,
when he was wanted for the share he had in that poaching business up in
the Carne Woods. She told her father that she saw we had been right, and
would have nothing more to say to him. That was a week or more before
she had that fall on the hill, and I have never heard her mention his
name since. I feel sure that she is not fretting about him. Ruth has
always been a sensible girl, and once she has made up her mind she
wasn't likely to turn back again."
"No, I should not say that she was fretting on his account, Mrs.
Powlett. Fretting in young women shows itself in lowness of spirits and
general depression and want of tone. In her case it appears to me to be
rather some sort of anxiety, though about what I cannot guess. If it had
been any other girl in the village, I should have had my suspicion that
she had taken a fancy in some way to Ronald Mervyn, and was anxious
about the trial; but of course that is out of the question in Ruth's
case. No doubt she is anxious about the trial, and has a nervous dread
of being obliged to stand up and describe the scene again in a crowded
court, and perhaps be questioned and cross-questioned. It's a trying
thing for any one; still more so, of course, for a girl whose nerves
have been shattered, and who is in a weak and debilitated state of
health. Well, I shall be heartily glad when it's all over, and we settle
down into our ordinary ways."
"What do you think will be the verdict, sir? Do you think they will find
Captain Mervyn guilty?"
"I do not like to give an opinion, Mrs. Powlett. It depends so much on
the jury, and on the way the counsel and judge put it, but I hardly
think that the evidence is sufficient to hang a man. There are, of
course, grave grounds for suspicion, but I should doubt whether any jury
would find Mervyn guilty upon them. It would be amply sufficient if it
were merely a case of robbery, but men don't like to find a verdict when
there is a possibility of their finding out too late to save a man's
life that they have been mistaken. At any rate, Mrs. Powlett, do your
best to keep Ruth's thoughts from dwelling on the subject. I wish it was
summer weather, and that she could sit out in the garden. Of course she
is not strong enough to be able to walk, except for a hundred yards or
so, but I would get her to take a little turn, if it's only once round
the garden now and then."
"I don't think she would walk if she could, sir. When I was speaking the
other day about her getting well enough to go out for walks, she turned
white and shivered, and said she didn't want to go outside the door
again, not for ever so long. That fall she got seems to have changed her
altogether."
"Well, well, we must get her away, as I said, Mrs. Powlett. She wants
more bracing air than you have got here, and to have the wind either
coming straight off the sea or else to be in some hilly, breezy place."
"I am sure I don't know how it's to be managed. She can't go by herself,
and I don't see how I am to leave Hiram."
"You will have to leave Hiram for a day or two, and take her wherever we
fix upon as the best place and settle her there. Hiram will get on very
well without you for a day or two. She is no more fit to travel alone
than a baby. However, I must be off. Keep up her spirits as well as you
can, and don't let her brood over this business."
At last the day when Ronald Mervyn was to be tried for murder arrived.
The Assizes were at Exeter, and never in the memory of man had there
been such numerous applications to the sheriff and other officials for
seats in the court. The interest in the case had extended far beyond the
limits of Devonshire. The rank in life of the victim and the accused,
the cold-blooded nature of the murder, and the nature of the evidence
rendered the affair a _cause celebre_, and the _pros_ and _cons_ of the
case were discussed far and wide.
The story of the curse of Carne's Hold had been given at full length by
the reporters of the local papers and copied by all the journals of the
kingdom, and the fact that madness was hereditary in the family went for
much in the arguments of those who held that Captain Mervyn was guilty.
Had it not been for this, the tide of public feeling would have been
distinctly in favour of the accused.
By itself, the rest of the evidence was inconclusive. Men who have been
jilted not unfrequently use strong language, and even threats, without
anything coming of it. The fact of the glove having been found where it
was was certainly suspicious, but, after all, that in itself did not
count for much; the glove might have been blown to where it was found,
or a dog might have picked it up and carried it there. A dozen
explanations, all possible even if not probable, could be given for its
presence, and before a man could be found guilty of murder upon
circumstantial evidence, there must be no room whatever left for doubt.
Therefore, the quarrel, the finding of the glove, and even the fact that
Captain Mervyn was unable to prove an _alibi_, would scarcely have
caused public opinion to decide against him had it not been for the fact
of that taint of insanity in his blood. Call a dog mad and you hang him.
Call a man mad and the public will easily credit him with the commission
of the most desperate crimes; therefore, the feeling of the majority of
those who assembled at the Court House at Exeter, was unfavourable to
Ronald Mervyn.
The attitude of the prisoner did much to dispel this impression; he was
grave, as one might well be with such a charge hanging over him, but
there was nothing moody or sombre, still less wild, in his expression;
he looked calmly round the court, acknowledged the encouraging nods
given him by some of his fellow officers, who had come over to bear
witness on the point of character, and who to a man believed him to be
innocent. Certainly there was nothing to suggest in the slightest degree
the suspicion of madness in his appearance; and many of those who had
before been impressed by the story of the family taint, now veered round
and whispered to their friends that the story of insanity was all
nonsense, and that Ronald Mervyn looked wholly incapable of such a crime
as that of which he was accused.
Dr. Arrowsmith had brought Ruth over under his personal charge. As she
came out, when he called in his trap to take her to the station, he was
surprised at the change which had taken place since he saw her the
evening before. The anxious and nervous expression of her face was gone,
and she looked calm and composed. There was indeed a certain determined
expression in her face that led the doctor to believe that she had by a
great effort conquered her fear of the ordeal to which she was to be
exposed, and had nerved herself to go through it unflinchingly. As they
journeyed in the train she asked him:
"Shall we be in the court all the time, doctor?"
"No, Ruth, I do not think you will be in court. I fancy the witnesses
remain in a room together until they are wanted. I myself shall be in
court, as the solicitor for the defence is a personal friend of mine,
and will give me a place at his table."
"Do you think, sir, that after I have given my evidence they would let
me stand there until it is done?"
"I should hardly think so, Ruth, and I am sure it would be a very bad
thing for you."
"I have a particular reason for wanting to be there, Dr. Arrowsmith, and
to hear it to the end. A most particular reason. I can't tell you what
it is, but I must be there."
The doctor looked at her in surprise.
"You think you will not feel the suspense as much if you are in the
court as you would outside Ruth? Is that what you mean?"
"That's it, partly, sir. Anyhow, I feel that I must be there."
"Very well, Ruth, if you see it in that way, I will do what I can for
you. I will ask Captain Hendricks to speak to the policemen in the
court, and tell them to let you remain there after you have given your
evidence. There will be a great crowd, you know, and it will be very
close, and altogether I think it is foolish and wrong of you."
"I am sorry you think so, sir; but I do want to be there, whatever
happens to me afterwards."
"Of course you can do as you like, Ruth; but the probability is that you
will faint before you have been there five minutes."
"I will try not to, sir, and I don't think I shall. It is only when I
get a sudden shock that I faint, and I don't think I can get one there."