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The New Tenant, a novel by E. Phillips Oppenheim |
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Chapter 35. Committed For Trial |
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_ CHAPTER XXXV. COMMITTED FOR TRIAL Early on the following morning Mr. Thurwell ordered his dog cart, and drove into Mallory. The arrest of Bernard Maddison had been kept quite secret, and nothing was known as yet of the news which was soon to throw the little town into a state of great excitement. But in the immediate vicinity of the courthouse there was already some stir. The lord lieutenant's carriage was drawn up outside, and there was an unusual muster of magistrates. As a rule the cases brought before their jurisdiction were trivial in the extreme, consisting chiefly of drunkenness, varied by an occasional petty assault. There was scarcely one of them who remembered having sat upon so serious a charge. Lord Lathon came over to Mr. Thurwell directly he entered the retiring room. "You have heard of this matter, I suppose?" he inquired, as they shook hands. "Yes," Mr. Thurwell answered gravely. "He was arrested at my house last night." "I can't believe the thing possible," Lord Lathon continued. "Still, from what I hear, we shall certainly have to send it for trial." "I am afraid you will," Mr. Thurwell answered. "I shall not sit myself; I am prejudiced." "In his favor or the reverse?" his lordship inquired. "In his favor, decidedly," Mr. Thurwell answered, passing out behind the others, and taking a seat in the body of the room. The general impatience was doomed to be aggravated. The first prisoner was an old man charged with assaulting his wife. The bench listened for a few minutes to her garrulous tale, and managed to gather from it that a caution from their worships was what she chiefly desired. Having arrived at this point, Lord Lathon ruthlessly stopped her, and dismissed the case, with a few stern words to the elderly reprobate, who departed muttering threats against his better half which, for her bodily comfort, it is to be hoped that he did not put into execution. Then there was a few minutes' expectation, at the conclusion of which Bernard Maddison was brought in between two policemen, very calm and self-possessed, but very pale. Directly he appeared Mr. Thurwell rose and shook hands with him, a friendly demonstration which brought a faint glow into his cheeks. He was offered a chair, and the services of the solicitor of the place, the latter of which he declined. Then the chief constable, a little flurried and nervous at the unwonted importance of his office, rose, and addressed the bench. The case against the prisoner was, he said, still altogether incomplete, and he had only one witness, whose evidence, however, he felt sure, would be such as to justify their sending the matter to be decided before a judicial tribunal. No doubt they all remembered the painful circumstances of Sir Geoffrey Kynaston's death, and the mystery with which it was surrounded. That death took place within a stone's throw of the cottage where the prisoner was then living, under an assumed name, and more than three miles away from any other dwelling place or refuge of any sort. He reminded them of the speedy search that had been made, and its extraordinary non-success. Under those circumstances a certain amount of suspicion naturally attached itself to the prisoner, and a search warrant was duly applied for, and duly carried out. At that time nothing suspicious was discovered, owing in some measure, he was bound to say, to the scrupulous delicacy with which the magistrate who had signed it--looking toward Mr. Thurwell--had insisted upon its being carried out. Subsequently, however, and acting upon later information, Detective Robson of Scotland Yard was appointed to look into the case, and the result of his investigation was the issuing of the warrant under which the prisoner stood charged with the murder of Sir Geoffrey Kynaston. Their worships would hear the evidence of Detective Robson, who was now present. Detective Robson stepped forward, and was sworn. On the 15th of June last, he said, he searched the prisoner's cottage on the Thurwell Court estate. He there found in the secret recess of a cabinet, which had apparently not been opened for some time, a dagger, produced, in a case evidently intended to hold two, and which was an exact facsimile of the one, also produced, with which the murder was committed. He found also a towel, produced, which was stained with blood, and several letters. With regard to the towel, he here added, that in one corner of the room was fixed a small basin, and on the floor just beneath, covered over by a carpet, and bearing several signs of attempted obliteration, was a large blood stain. The woman who had cleaned the cottage prior to Mr. Maddison's occupation, was in court, and would swear that the stain in question was not there at that time. He mentioned these details first, he went on to say, but the more important part of his evidence had reference to these letters, and his subsequent action with regard to them. He would call attention to one of them, he remarked, producing it, and allow the bench to draw their own conclusions. He would read it to them, and they could then examine it for themselves. The thin rustling sheet of foreign notepaper, which he held in his hand, was covered closely with delicate feminine handwriting, and emitted a faint sweet perfume. For the first time during the hearing of the case Bernard Maddison showed some slight emotion as the letters were handed about. But he restrained it immediately. The sentence which Detective Robson read out was as follows:-- "Bernard, those who have sinned against their fellow creatures, and against their God, may surely be left to His judgment. The vengeance which seeks to take life is a cruel bloodthirsty passion which no wrong can excuse, no suffering justify. Forgive me if I seem to dwell so much upon this. That terrible oath which, at his bidding, I heard you swear against Sir Geoffrey Kynaston rings ever in my ears!" There were other sentences of a somewhat similar nature. As Mr. Thurwell listened to them he felt his heart sink. What could avail against such evidence as this? There was no hesitation at all on the part of the magistrates. Bernard Maddison had pleaded "not guilty," but had declined to say another word. "Anything there is to be said on my behalf," he remarked quietly, in answer to a question from the bench, "I will say myself to the jury before whom I presume you will send me." While the committal was being made out, Mr. Thurwell leaned over and whispered to him. "Helen sends her love. I will arrange about the defence, and will try and see you myself before the trial." "You need send no lawyer to me," he answered. "I shall defend myself." Mr. Thurwell said no more. He was a little dazed by those letters, but he was not going to allow himself to be influenced by them, for his daughter's sake, as well as his own. He did not like to admit himself in the wrong, and he had made up his mind that this man was innocent. Innocent he must therefore be proved. As to his defending himself, that was all nonsense. He would see to that. Dewes should be instructed. The committal was read out, and Bernard Maddison was removed from the court. On the following day he was to be taken to York, there to be tried at the forthcoming assizes. Mr. Thurwell bade him keep up his courage in a tone which, though it was intended to be cheerful, was not particularly sanguine. There was but one opinion in the court, and despite all his efforts its influence had a certain effect upon him. But Bernard Maddison never carried himself more proudly than when he bowed to Lord Lathon, and left the court that morning. At home Helen was eagerly waiting for the news. She had no need to ask, for her father's face was eloquent. "Is it--very bad?" she whispered. He looked away from her with a queer feeling in his throat. To see his daughter, who had always been so quiet, and self-contained, and dignified--his princess, he had been used to call her--to see her trembling with nervous fear, was a new and terrible thing to him, and to be able to offer her no comfort was worse still. But what could he say? "The evidence was rather bad," he admitted, "and only a portion of it was produced. Still, we must hope for the best." "Please tell me all about it," she begged, very quietly, but with a look in her white face which made him turn away from her with a groan. But he obeyed, and told her everything. And then there was a long silence. "How did he look?" she asked, after a while. "Very pale; but he behaved in a most dignified manner throughout," he told her. "He must be well born. I wonder what or where his people are? I never heard of any of them. Did you?" She shook her head. "He told me once that he had no friends, and no relations, and no name save the one which he had made for himself," she said. "I don't know whether he meant that Maddison was not his real name, or whether he meant simply his reputation." "There must be people in London who know all about him," Mr. Thurwell remarked. "A man of his celebrity can scarcely conceal his family history." Helen had walked a little away, and was standing before the window, looking out with listless eyes. "Father, I wonder whether Sir Allan Beaumerville has anything to do with this?" she said. "Has he ever hinted to you that he suspected Mr. Maddison?" "Certainly not," he answered. "Why do you ask?" "Because one afternoon last week I saw him come out of Falcon's Nest. It was the afternoon he went botanizing." Mr. Thurwell shook his head. "The detective mentioned the date of his visit and search," he said. "It was a month ago." She wrung her hands, and turned away in despair. "It must have been through those dreadful people I went to," she sobbed. "Oh, I was mad--mad!" "I scarcely think that," Mr. Thurwell said thoughtfully. "They would not have kept altogether in the background and let Scotland Yard take the lead, if it had been so. What is it, Roberts?" The servant had entered bearing an orange-colored envelope on a salver, which he carried towards Helen. "A telegram for Miss Thurwell, sir," he said. She took it and tore it open. It was from the Strand, London, and the color streamed into her cheeks as she read it aloud. "We must see you at once in the interests of B. M. Can you call on us to-morrow morning? Levy & Son." "When are the assizes at York, father?" she asked quickly. "In ten days." "And you are going to London to-day, are you not, to see Dewes?" "Yes." "Then I will go with you," she said, crumpling up the telegram in her hand. _ |
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