Fashion and Famine Part 46

"Were there not high words and angry defiance between you that morning?"

"He was angry--I was not; agitated, alarmed, I was--but not angry."

"Were you alone with him?"

"Yes!"

"How long?"

"Maybe ten minutes!"

"Once more," said the judge; "once more let me remind you that in another court these answers may be used to your prejudice. Now take time, you have no counsel, so take time for reflection before you reply.

What business had Leicester with you?--what was the subject of conversation between you?"

The old man bent his forehead to the railing, and thus stood motionless without answering. His own honest sense told him that every question that he refused to answer gave rise to doubt, and kindled some new prejudice against him. His obvious course was silence, or a frank statement of the truth. He raised his head, and addressed the judge gently as he might have consulted with a friend.

"If I have a right to refuse answers to a part of what you ask me, may I not, by the same right, remain silent?"

"There is no law which forces you to answer where a reply will prejudice your cause."

"Will anything I can say help my cause?"

"No!"

"Then I will be silent. But I never lifted my hand against that man--never, so help me G.o.d!"

The judge felt this to be a wise conclusion, and a faint gleam of satisfaction came to his lips. The meek dignity of that old men, the beautiful pale face now and then peering out from behind his poverty-stricken garments--the feeble old woman crowding close to his side, all had aroused his sympathy. It was impossible to look on that group and believe any one of those feeble creatures guilty of the blood that had reddened their poverty-stricken hearth, and yet the evidence had been fearfully strong before the coroner's inquest.

Some commotion arose in the crowd after this. Men began to whisper opinions to each other--now and then a rude joke or laugh rose from the vestibule. People began to circulate in and out at the various doors, and during all this several witnesses were examined. These persons had seen a gentleman, well, nay, elegantly dressed, enter the miserable bas.e.m.e.nt occupied by the prisoner and his family, very early on the morning of the nineteenth. One, a person who lived in the front bas.e.m.e.nt, testified to high words, and a sound as if some one had stamped several times on the floor. Then he heard quick footsteps along the entry; saw the stranger an instant in the front area, and then heard him go back again. This excited considerable curiosity in the witness, who opened the door of his own room and looked out. He caught a glimpse of the stranger going, quickly, through the next door, and saw two females.

The old woman and girl now standing behind the prisoner were crouching in the back end of the entry, apparently much frightened, for both were pale; and the old woman wrung her hands while the girl wept bitterly. A little after, perhaps two minutes, this man heard a sound from the next room, as if of some heavy body falling; this was followed by a _hush_ that made him shiver from head to foot. He went out and saw the two females clinging together, and creeping pale and terror-stricken up to the door, which the old woman tried to open, but could not, her hands shook so violently.

The witness himself turned the latch and looked in, leaning over the females, who, uttering a low cry, stood motionless, blocking up the entrance. He saw the stranger lying upon the floor, stretched back in the agony of a fierce death pang; his teeth were clenched; his eyes wide open; the chin protruded upward; and both hands were groping and clutching at the bare boards.

While the witness looked on, the limbs, half gathered up and strained against the floor, gave way, and settled down like ridges of withered gra.s.s. The room was badly lighted, but it seemed to the witness that there was some faint motion, after this a shudder, or it might be a fold of the dead man's clothes settling around him, but except this all signs of life went out from the body.

Then the witness had time to see the other objects in the room. The first thing that his eyes fell upon was the face of old Mr. Warren, the palest, the most deathly face he ever saw on a living man; he was stooping over the corpse, grasping what seemed a handful of snow, stained through and through with blood which he pressed down upon the dead man's side.

The witness grew wild with the terror of this scene. He pushed the two females forward and went in. The prisoner looked up, still pressing his hand upon the dead man; his lips moved, and he tried to speak, but could not. On stooping down, the witness saw that the stained ma.s.s clenched in the old man's fingers was one side of a white silk vest, clutched up with ma.s.ses of fine linen, which the dead man had worn. He also saw a knife lying on the floor wet to the haft. After a minute or so, the prisoner spoke, apparently feeling the body grow stiff under his hand; he turned his head with a piteous look, and whispered--"What can we do?"

The witness stated that his answer was "Nothing--the man is dead!"

Then the old man got up, and went to a bed huddled on the floor in one corner of the room, where his wife and grand-daughter had dropped, when the witness pushed them with unconscious violence from the threshold. He said something in a low voice to the woman, and she answered--

"Oh, Wilc.o.x, tell me that you did not do it!"

The prisoner looked at her--at first he seemed amazed as if some horrid thought had just struck him, then he looked grieved, wounded to the heart. The expression that came upon his face was enough to make one cry, but his voice, when he spoke, was even worse than the look; it seemed choked up with tears, that he could not shed.

"My wife!" he said nothing more, but that was enough to make the old woman cover her face with both hands and sob like a child. Julia, his grandchild, who had been sitting white and still as death till then, lifted her eyes to the old man's face, and you could see them deepen with sorrowful astonishment, as if she too had been suddenly wounded.

The look of horror died on her features, leaving them full of tenderness. She arose with the look of an angel, and clasping her hands over the old man's arm, as he stood gazing mournfully upon his wife, pressed her head against his side.

"Grandfather, she did not think it. It was the terror that spoke, not her, not my grandmother!"

The old man would have laid his hand upon her head, but it was crimson and wet. He saw this, and dropped it again.

The dim light, the pale faces, the man stark and dead upon the floor, made the scene too painful even for a strong man. The witness went out and aroused the neighborhood. He did not go back; more courageous men would have shrunk from the scene as he did.

I have given this man's evidence, not in his own words. He was a German, and spoke rude English; but the scene he described was only the more graphic for that. It impressed the judges and the crowd; it gratified that intense love of the horrible that is becoming a pa.s.sion in the ma.s.ses, and yet softened it with touches of rude pathos, that also gratified the populace. Here and there you saw a wet eye in the crowd.

Men who were strangers to each other, exchanged whispered wishes that the prisoner might be found innocent. The old woman and her grand-daughter became objects of unceasing curiosity. Men pressed forward to get a sight at them. The reporters paused to study their features, and to take an inventory of their poverty-stricken garments.

Other witnesses were called, all testifying to like facts, that served to fasten the appearances of guilt more closely upon that fallen old man. When all had been examined but the grand-daughter, the excitement became intense; the crowd pressed closer to the bar; those in the vestibule rushed in, filling every corner of the room.

The poor girl moved when her name was p.r.o.nounced, and with difficulty mounted the step which lifted her white face to a level with the judge.

The little hands grasped the railing till every drop of blood was driven from the strained fingers; but for this she must have fallen to the earth, for there was no strength in her limbs, no strength at her heart, save that which one fixed solemn thought gave. There was something deeper than the pallor of fear in those beautiful features--something more sublime than sorrow in the clear violet eyes which she lifted to the magistrate. He saw her lips move, and bent forward to catch the sound of words that she seemed to be uttering,--

"I cannot answer any questions; don't ask me, sir, please don't!"

He caught these words. He saw the look of meek courage that spoke even more forcibly than the tremulous lips. No one saw the look, or heard the voice, but himself, not even the prisoner; for age had somewhat dulled his ear. The face, the look, the gentle bearing of this poor girl, filled the judge with compa.s.sion. It is a horrible thing for any law to force evidence from one loving heart that may cast another into the grave. The magistrate had never felt the cruelty so much before. The questions that he should have propounded sunk back upon his heart. It seemed like torturing a lamb with all the flock looking on.

Still, the magistrates of our courts learn hard lessons even of juvenile depravity; not to be suspicious would, in them, be a living miracle.

This girl might be prompted by advice, and thus artfully acting as the tool of some lawyer. You would not look in her eyes and believe it, but soft eyes sometimes brood over falsehood that would make you tremble. No one is better aware of this than the acute magistrate; still there is something in pure simplicity that convinces the heart long before the judgment has power to act.

"Who told you not to answer my questions?" he said, in a low voice.

"No one!"

"Then why refuse?"

"Because my grandfather never killed the man, but what I should say, might make it seem as if he did."

"But do you know that is contempt of court--a punishable offence."

"I did not know it!"

"That I have power to make you answer?"

A faint beautiful smile flitted across her face. You might fancy a youthful martyr smiling thus when threatened with death by fire. It disturbed in no degree the humility of her demeanor, but that one gleam of the strength within her satisfied the magistrate.

Not even the reporters had been able to catch a word of the conversation. His dignity was in no way committed. He resolved to waive the cruel power, which would have wrung accusation from that helpless creature unnecessarily; for the evidence that had gone before was quite sufficient to justify a commitment.

"We shall not require the evidence of this young girl," he said, addressing a fellow-magistrate, who had been writing quietly during the proceedings.

"No," answered the magistrate, without checking his pen or raising his head, "what is the use? The story of that German was enough. I should have committed him after that. The poor girl is frightened to death. Let her go!"

"But in the other court, there she will be wanted!"

"True, she must be kept safe. Anybody forthcoming with the bonds?"

"I fear not. It seems hard to keep the poor thing in prison!"