THE VERDICT.
Pale and trembling, Tom passed out into the aisle and down around the
jury-box, and stepped upon the little railed platform.
In impressive tones, the clerk administered to him the oath, and he
kissed the Holy Bible and swore to “tell the truth, the whole truth,
and nothing but the truth.”
_The whole truth!_
The words echoed and re-echoed through his mind, as he looked down
upon the lawyers and jurors, and across the bar into the hundreds of
expectant faces turned toward him. For a moment he felt frightened and
dizzy.
But only for a moment; fear gave place to astonishment, for Jack
Rennie had started to his feet, with wild eyes and face blanched with
sudden dread, and, bending over till his great beard swept Pleadwell’s
shoulder, he whispered, hoarsely, into the lawyer’s ear, in a tone
audible throughout the room,--
“Ye did na tell me who the lad was! He mus’ na be sworn; it’s na
lawfu’. I’ll no’ have it; I say I’ll no’ have it!”
In another moment Pleadwell had his hand on the man’s shoulder, and
forced him into a seat. There was a whispered consultation of a few
minutes between attorney and client, and then, while Rennie sat
with his eyes turned steadfastly away from the witness, his huge
hand clutching the edge of the table, and the expression of nervous
dread still on his face, Pleadwell, calmly, as if there had been no
interruption, proceeded with the examination.
He asked Tom about his residence and his occupation, and about how
blind Bennie lost himself in the mines. With much skill, he carried
the story forward to the time when Tom said good-night to Sandy, and
started down the hill toward home.
“As you approached the breaker, did you see a man pass by you in the
shadow?”
“I did,” replied Tom.
“About how far from you?”
“I don’t know; ten feet, maybe.”
“Where did he go?”
“Around the corner, by the engine-room.”
“From what point did he come?”
“From the loading-place.”
“How long after he left the loading-place was it that you saw the first
blaze there?”
“Two or three minutes, maybe.”
“Did you see his face?”
“I did.”
“How did he look? Describe him.”
“He was short and thin, and had no whiskers.”
Pleadwell pointed to Rennie, and asked,--
“Was this the man?”
“No, sir,” answered Tom.
Pleadwell leaned back in his chair, and turned to the jury with a smile
of triumph on his face. The people in the court-room nodded to each
other, and whispered, “That clears Jack.”
Every one, but Jack Rennie himself, seemed to feel the force of Tom’s
testimony. The prisoner still sat clutching the table, looking blankly
at the wall, pale, almost trembling, with some suppressed emotion.
But through Tom’s mind kept echoing the solemn words of his oath: “The
whole truth; _the whole truth_.” And he had not told it; his testimony
was no better than a lie. An awful sense of guilt came pressing in upon
him from above, from below, from every side. Hateful voices seemed
sounding in his brain: “Perjurer in spirit! Receiver of bribes!”
The torture of his self-abhorrence, in that one moment of silence, was
terrible beyond belief.
Then a sudden impulse seized him; a bright, brave, desperate impulse.
He stepped down from the witness-stand, passed swiftly between chairs
and tables, tearing the money from his breast-pocket by the way,
and flinging the hated hundred dollars down before the astonished
Pleadwell, he returned as quickly as he came, stepped into his
place with swelling breast and flaming cheeks and flashing eyes, and
exclaimed, falling, in his excitement, into the broad accent of his
mother tongue,--
“Noo I’m free! Do what ye wull wi’ me! Prison me, kill me, but I’ll no’
hold back the truth longer for ony mon, nor a’ the money that ony mon
can gi’ me!”
Men started to their feet in astonishment. Some one back among the
people began to applaud. Jack Rennie turned his face toward the boy
with a look of admiration, and his eyes were blurred with sudden tears.
“He’s the son o’ his father!” he exclaimed; “the son o’ his father!
He’s a braw lad, an’ good luck till him, but it was flyin’ i’ the face
o’ fortune to swear him. I told ye! I told ye!”
“Who gave you that money?” asked the district attorney of Tom, when
quiet had been partially restored.
Pleadwell was on his feet in an instant.
“Stop!” he shouted. “Don’t answer that question! Did I give you that
money?”
“No, sir,” replied Tom, awed by the man’s vehemence.
“Did Jack Rennie give you that money?”
“No, sir.”
Pleadwell turned to the court.
“Then if your Honors please, we object to the witness answering this
question. This is a desperate theatrical trick, concocted by the
prosecution to prejudice this defendant. We ask that they be not
allowed to support it with illegal evidence.”
The judge turned to Tom.
“Do you know,” he asked, “that this money was given to you by the
defendant’s authority, or by his knowledge or consent?”
“I can’t swear that it was,” replied Tom.
“The objection is sustained,” said his Honor, abruptly.
Pleadwell had gained a point; he might yet win the day. But the
district attorney would not loose his grip.
“Why did you just give that money to the attorney for the defence?” he
asked.
Pleadwell interposed another objection, but the court ruled that
the question was properly in the line of cross-examination of the
defendant’s witness, and Tom answered,--
“’Cause I had no right to it, an’ he knows who it belongs to.”
“Whom does it belong to?”
“I don’t know, sir. I only know who gave it to me.”
“When was it given to you?”
“A week ago last Thursday, sir.”
“Where was it given to you?”
“In Mr. Pleadwell’s office.”
“Was Mr. Pleadwell present?”
“No, sir.”
“How much money was given to you?”
“One hundred dollars, sir.”
“For what purpose was it given to you?”
“To send my blind brother away to get his sight.”
“I mean what were you to do in consideration of receiving the money?”
Before Tom could answer, Pleadwell was addressing the court:
“I submit, your Honor,” he said, “that this inquisition has gone
far enough. I protest against my client being prejudiced by the
unauthorized and irrelevant conduct of any one.”
The judge turned to the district attorney. “Until you can more closely
connect the defendant or his authorized agent,” he said, “with the
giving of this money, we shall be obliged to restrict you in this
course of inquiry.”
Pleadwell had made another point. He still felt that the case was not
hopeless.
Then Summons, the private counsel for the prosecution, took the
witness. “Tom,” he said, “did you tell the truth in your direct
examination?”
“I did, sir,” replied Tom, “but not the whole truth.”
“Well, then, suppose you tell the rest of it.”
“I object,” interposed Pleadwell, “to allowing this witness to ramble
over the field of legal and illegal evidence at will. If counsel has
questions to ask, let him ask them.”
“We will see that the witness keeps within proper limits,” said the
judge; then, turning to Tom, “Go on, sir.”
“Well, you see,” said Tom, “it was all just as I told it; only when I
got to the bottom o’ the hill, an’ see that man go by me in the dark, I
was s’prised like, an’ I stopped an’ listened. An’ then I heard a noise
in under the loadin’-place, an’ then that man,” pointing his trembling
forefinger to Rennie, “came out, a-kind o’ talkin’ to himself. An’ he
said that was the last job o’ that kind he’d ever do; that they put it
on him ’cause he hadn’t anybody to feel bad over him if he should get
catched at it.
“An’ then I see a blaze start up right where he come from, an’ it got
bigger an’ bigger. An’ then he turned an’ see me, an’ he grabbed me by
the shoulders, an’ he said, ‘Don’t you speak nor whisper, or I’ll take
the life o’ ye,’ or somethin’ like that; I can’t quite remember, I was
so scared. An’ then he pushed me down the track, an’ he said, ‘Run as
fast as ever you can, an’ don’t you dare to look back.’
“An’ I run, an’ I didn’t look back till the fire was a-burnin’ up
awful; an’ then I went with the rest to look at it; an’ he was there,
an’ a-workin’ desperate to save things, an’--an’--an’ that’s all.”
Tom stopped, literally panting for breath. The jurors were leaning
forward in their seats to catch every word, and over among the crowded
benches, where the friends of the prisoner were gathered, there was
a confused hum of voices, from which, now and then, rose angry and
threatening words.
Rennie sat gazing intently upon Tom, as though fascinated by the boy’s
presence, but on his face there was no sign of disappointment or anger;
only the same look of admiration that had come there when Tom returned
the money.
He clutched Pleadwell’s sleeve, and said to him,--
“That settles it, mon; that settles it. The spirit o’ the dead father’s
i’ the lad, an’ it’s no use o’ fightin’ it. I’ll plead guilty noo, an’
end it, an’ tak ma sentence an’ stan’ it. How long’ll it be, think ye?”
“Twenty years in the Penitentiary,” answered Pleadwell, sharply and
shortly.
Rennie dropped back in his chair, as though the lawyer had struck him.
“Twenty years!” he repeated; “twenty years! That’s a main lang time; I
canna stan’ that; I canna live through it. I’ll no’ plead guilty. Do
what ye can for me.”
But there was little that Pleadwell could do now. His worst fears had
been realized. He knew it was running a desperate risk to place on the
witness-stand a boy with a conscience like Tom’s; but he knew, also,
that if he could get Tom’s story out in the shape he desired to, and
keep back the objectionable parts, his client would go free; and he had
great faith in the power of money to salve over a bruised conscience.
He had tried it and failed; and there was nothing to do now but make
the best of it.
He resumed his calm demeanor, and turned to Tom with the question,--
“Did you ever tell to me the story you have just now told on the
witness-stand, or any thing like it?”
“I never did,” answered Tom.
“Did you ever communicate to me, in any way, your alleged knowledge of
Jack Rennie’s connection with this fire?”
“No, sir.”
Pleadwell had established his own innocence, so far as Tom’s story was
concerned at least, and he dismissed the boy from the witness-stand
with a wave of his hand which was highly expressive of virtuous
indignation.
Tom resumed his seat by the side of Sandy, whose mouth and eyes were
still wide open with surprise and admiration, and who exclaimed, as he
gave the boy’s hand a hearty grip,--
“Weel done, Tommy, ma lad! weel done! I’m proud o’ ye! an’ Bennie’n the
mither’ll be prouder yet o’ ye!”
And then, for the first time since the beginning of his trouble, Tom
put his face in his hands and wept. But he felt that a great load had
been lifted from his conscience, and that now he could look any man in
the eye.
There were two or three unimportant witnesses sworn in rebuttal and
sur-rebuttal, and the evidence was closed.
Pleadwell rose to address the jury, feeling that it was a useless task
so far as his client was concerned, but feeling, also, that he must
exert himself to the utmost in order to rebut a strong presumption of
questionable conduct on his own part.
He denounced Tom’s action in returning the money to him as a dramatic
trick, gotten up by the prosecution for effect; and called particular
attention to his own ignorance of the gift of any such money.
He declared Tom’s story of his meeting with Rennie, on the night of the
fire, to be improbable and false, and argued that since neither the
prosecution, nor the defence, nor any one else, had ever heard one word
of it till it came out on the witness-stand, it must, therefore, exist
only in the lad’s heated imagination.
He dwelt strongly on the probable falsity of the testimony of the
so-called detective; went over carefully the evidence tending to
establish an _alibi_ for Rennie; spoke with enthusiasm of the man’s
efforts and bravery in the work of rescue; lashed the corporations for
their indifference to the wrongs of the workingmen; spoke piteously of
the fact that the law denied to Rennie the right of being sworn in his
own behalf; and closed with a peroration that brought tears into the
eyes of half the people in the room.
He had made a powerful speech, and he knew it; but he thought of its
effect only as tending to his own benefit; he had no hope for Rennie.
Mr. Summons addressed the jury on the part of the Commonwealth. He
maintained that the evidence of the detective, taken in connection with
all the other circumstances surrounding the case, was sufficient to
have convicted the defendant, without further proof.
“But the unexpected testimony,” he declared, “of one brave and
high-minded boy has placed the guilt of the prisoner beyond the
shadow of a doubt; a boy whose great heart has caused him to yield
to temptation for the sake of a blind brother; but whose tender
conscience, whose heroic spirit, has led him to throw off the bonds
which this defence has placed upon him, and, in the face of all the
terrors of an order whose words are oaths of vengeance, and whose acts
are deeds of blood, to fling their hated bribes at their feet, as they
sat in the very court of justice; and to ‘tell the truth, the whole
truth, and nothing but the truth,’ for the sake of his own honor and
the upholding of the law.”
Warming up to his theme, and its possibilities in the way of oratorical
effect, Summons brought wit to bear upon logic and logic upon law, and
eloquence upon both, until, at the close of his address, the conviction
of the defendant was all but certain, and Tom’s position as a hero was
well assured.
Then came the charge of the court; plain, decisive, reviewing the
evidence in brief, calling the attention of the jury to their duty
both to the Commonwealth and to the defendant, directing them that
the defendant’s guilt must be established, in their minds, beyond a
reasonable doubt, before they could convict; but that, if they should
reach that point, then their verdict should be simply “Guilty.”
The jury passed out of the court-room, headed by a constable, after
which counsel for the defendant filed exceptions to the charge, and
the court proceeded to other business.
Very few people left the court-room, as every one supposed it would
not be long before the bringing in of a verdict, and they were not
mistaken. It was barely half an hour from the time the jury retired
until they filed back again, and resumed their seats in the jury-box.
“Gentlemen of the jury,” said the clerk of the court, rising, “have you
agreed upon a verdict?”
“We have,” replied the foreman, handing a paper to a tipstaff, which he
handed to the clerk; and the clerk in turn handed it to the presiding
judge.
The judges, one after another, read the paper, nodded their approval,
and returned it to the clerk, who glanced over its contents, and then
addressed the jury as follows:--
“Gentlemen of the jury, hearken unto your verdict as the court have it
recorded. In the case wherein the Commonwealth is plaintiff and Jack
Rennie is defendant, you say you find the defendant _guilty_. So say
you all?”
The members of the jury nodded their heads, the clerk resumed his seat,
and the trial of Jack Rennie was concluded.
It was what every one had anticipated, and people began to leave the
court-room, with much noise and confusion.
Rennie was talking, in a low tone, with Pleadwell and Carolan, while
the sheriff, who had advanced to take charge of the prisoner, stood
waiting for them to conclude the conference.
“I don’t want the lad harmed,” said Rennie, talking earnestly to
Carolan, “him, nor his mither, nor his brither; not a hair o’ his head,
nor a mou’-ful o’ his bread, noo min’ ye--I ha’ reasons--the mon that
so much as lays a straw i’ the lad’s path shall suffer for’t, if I have
to live a hunder’ year to tak’ ma vengeance o’ him!”
The sonorous voice of the court-crier, adjourning the courts until the
following morning, echoed through the now half-emptied room, and the
sheriff said to Rennie,--
“Well, Jack, I’m waiting for you.”
“Then ye need na wait longer, for I’m ready to go wi’ ye, an’ I’m
hungry too.” And Rennie held out his hands to receive the handcuffs
which the sheriff had taken from his pocket. For some reason, they
would not clasp over the man’s huge wrists.
“Oh!” exclaimed the officer, “I have the wrong pair. Simpson,” turning
to his deputy, “go down to my office and bring me the large handcuffs
lying on my table.”
Simpson started, but the sheriff called him back.
“Never mind,” he said, “it won’t pay; Jack won’t try to get away from
us, will you, Jack?” drawing a revolver from his pocket as he spoke,
and grasping it firmly in his right hand, with his finger on the
trigger.
“D’ye tak’ me for a fool, mon?” said Rennie, laughing, as he glanced
at the weapon; then, turning to Carolan and Pleadwell, he continued,
“Good-nicht; good-nicht and sweet dreams till ye!” Jack had never
seemed in a gayer mood than as he marched off through the side-door,
with the sheriff and his deputy; perhaps it was the gayety of despair.
Carolan had not replied to the prisoner’s cheery “good-nicht.” He had
looked on at the action of the sheriff, with a curious expression in
his eyes, until the trio started away, and then he had hurried from
the court-room at a gait which made Pleadwell stare after him in
astonishment.
It was dark outside; very dark. A heavy fog had come up from the river
and enshrouded the entire city. The street-lamps shone but dimly
through the thick mist, and a fine rain began to fall, as Tom and Sandy
hurried along to their hotel, where they were to have supper, before
going, on the late train, to their homes.
Up from the direction of the court-house came to their ears a confusion
of noises; the shuffling of many feet, loud voices, hurried calls, two
pistol-shots in quick succession; a huge, panting figure pushing by
them, and disappearing in the fog and darkness; by and by, excited men
hurrying toward them.
“What’s the matter?” asked Sandy.
And some one, back in the mist, replied,--
“Jack Rennie has escaped!”