Nevermore Part 13

Esther Lawless stood erect as she fixed her eye with a troubled gaze upon Mr. M'Alpine's countenance.

'Must I answer this question, your worship?' said she; 'is it necessary in the case?'

'I think you had better,' said he, not unkindly. 'I am sure you will tell the truth.'

'I would not swear falsely to save my own life,' said the girl, in a low but distinct voice. 'I can only speak the truth while I stand here. I _did_ see him riding with Ned one day before we left the Eumeralla.'

At this admission, which apparently astonished the greater number of the spectators as much as it did Mr. England and the magistrate, both prisoners turned their faces towards the witness with undisguised surprise. On the countenance of Lance Trevanion there suddenly arose a look of complete bewilderment. Abandoning his pose of scornful indifference, he beckoned hastily to Mr. England, who came over to the dock. After a whispered colloquy, he again addressed the witness.

'I do not wish in any way to lead you, or to induce you to alter any part of your evidence which you feel certain of, but I entreat you, as you value the liberty, perhaps the life of an innocent man, to reconsider your last answer. I will repeat my question. Are you prepared, upon your oath, to state that you ever saw the accused, Mr.

Trevanion, in company with your cousin before you left New South Wales to come to Ballarat?'

The witness looked upward for a moment and clasped her hands. She shuddered, and essayed in vain to reply, but finally with recovered firmness of mien said, 'I wish it were not so, but I cannot be mistaken.

I saw him once certainly, and I believe once again, but I did see him once, if I can believe my eyes, near Eumeralla.'

A keen observer who had watched Kate Lawless's countenance might have marvelled at the mysterious smile which stole over her features at that moment, might have noted also a look of conscious triumph mingled with sudden wonder. For an instant, as she glanced towards the dock, her eyes sought out those of her brother; they met hers with one swiftest glance of sudden meaning.

On Lance Trevanion's countenance a despair sombre and terrible commenced to settle. His att.i.tude expressed utter hopelessness, the deepest disappointment. When Esther Lawless, after a sudden burst of tears, was permitted to leave the court, he did not raise his head. Mr. England made one of the brilliantly exhaustive speeches which had opened the prison gates to so many enterprising or unlucky personages. The court was charmed, captivated, convinced, by the overpowering rush and flow of his persuasive eloquence.

But Lance neither stirred nor looked up. The presentiment was about to be fulfilled. He was prepared for the worst.

The case was closed. Then. Mr. M'Alpine gave his decision--

'He had heard that day some of the most extraordinary and contradictory evidence that in his varied experience he had ever listened to. In view of the prisoner's high character and independent position, attested by so many witnesses, he had been on the point of discharging him, but, after hearing the witness's last answer, which amounted to an admission that the prisoner had been an a.s.sociate of the Lawless family, even before they had migrated to Ballarat, he could not entertain a doubt as to a committal. It was incontestably a case for a jury. It was for them to decide as to the credibility of opposing witnesses.'

Then came the concluding formula, after which the prisoner was asked if he desired to say anything.

'Only this,' said the erstwhile proud scion of an ancient race, stainless in honour, flawless in blood, of whom he alone--oh, hard and bitter fate!--had ever linked hands with disgrace! 'Only this: that I am as innocent of all thoughts of wrong or dishonesty to any man as my mate's little child. I never knew or thought that the horse was other than honestly come by. I have been deceived--by man and woman both. But the knowledge has come too late. The witness Catharine Lawless has lied foully. The other witnesses, particularly Esther Lawless--who is good and truthful--have been deceived by the resemblance borne to me by another person. I never was at Balooka before, and never in my life saw the Eumeralla district--never heard the name even! I protest my innocence of this and all other charges. I can say no more.'

Mr. M'Alpine paused in thought for a while--an unusual course with him--then, amid the almost unnatural silence of the court, he said: 'I feel compelled to send the case for trial. Launcelot Trevanion, you stand committed to take your trial at the next ensuing Quarter Sessions, to be holden at Ballarat, on a day to be named. Bail refused. Sergeant Dayrell, call up the witnesses to be bound over to appear.

'This court stands adjourned.'

CHAPTER XII

Bail having been refused, presumably at the instance of the police--who, in cases where there is probability of the prisoner levanting or of arrangements being made to defeat the ends of justice, are ent.i.tled to object--there remained no course but that Lance Trevanion should be re-committed to gaol. Ned Lawless was also detained for safe keeping, the same reasons operating even with greater force in his case. This was the third time that Lance had been brought forth to stand before a gaping crowd--the third time that he had been transferred to the grim precincts of a prison and heard the ma.s.sive iron gates clang behind him.

'I begin to feel,' he said bitterly to Stirling, 'almost like an habitual criminal. If there is a G.o.d that judgeth the earth, as they used to tell us in old days, why am I permitted to be thus degraded, falsely accused, and unjustly imprisoned?'

It was in this period of trial and sore need that Lance discovered the nature of friendship. Genial acquaintances and friendly-seeming personages he had encountered by the hundred. These were now for the most part too busy or indifferent to visit him in his affliction.

Charles Stirling, however, in spite of his onerous and responsible duties, lost no opportunity of aid or service. Sometimes he rode half the night in order to get back to his work in proper time after visiting the captive and comforting him as best he could. He pet.i.tioned the Governor-in-Council, drafting and procuring signatures to a memorial setting forth Lance's hard case and praying that he might be released on bail. He addressed members of the Bench, and essayed to persuade them to act independently, offering to find bail to any amount and lodge the money. Hastings and Jack Polwarth canva.s.sed their fellow-miners. The newspaper press was invoked. But all in vain. The time was in-opportune.

So many horses had been stolen that a strong popular prejudice had arisen; justice demanded a victim. A reactionary sentiment commenced to prevail. It was openly stated that because Trevanion, of Number Six, was a 'swell' and had dropped into a lucky claim, that was no reason why he should be let off more than a poor man.

Wild and unsettled were the times too--those years early in 'the fifties.' Martial law was thought necessary for the holding in check of an army of untamed spirits. A close discriminating adherence to legal form could hardly be attained. The upshot of it all was that, to the disgust and despair of Hastings and Jack Polwarth, who had hoped against hope, all their efforts were vain, and Lance was compelled to resign himself as best he might to his enforced and protracted _duresse_.

Before leaving for Melbourne Mr. England had indeed almost guaranteed that he only needed to be placed on his trial to be acquitted, a.s.serting that no jury in the colony could possibly find him guilty upon the evidence brought before the Bench; that a committal was very different from a conviction; that some magistrates made a point of committing for trial all prisoners brought before them so as to escape responsibility; that Mr. M'Alpine had a habit of acting in that way; that he (John George England) would take the shortest odds that the jury acquitted Lance without leaving the box.

How the weeks dragged on! Autumn was fast changing into winter when the Quarter Sessions were held. Lance had expected to have been in Melbourne about the time. Only to think of it! And had he not paltered with his duty and his solemn promise might he not have been in England now, seeing the yearly miracle of the spring transformation in that favoured clime and hearing the surges beat against the frowning headlands of Tintagel? Madness was in his thoughts. Why did he not dash his brains out against his prison walls and so end the hideous burlesque upon truth and justice, honour and common honesty even? Why had he not courage to do so? No--it would become his father's son to die in ways and fashions many and varied; but within gaol walls! No! a thousand times, no! That would be a doom impossible for a Trevanion of Wychwood.

From time to time he had gleams of hope--this miserable captive so unused to fetter and thrall. It _could_ not be. It should not be. The eternal justice of heaven would be falsified were this wrong to befall him. The words of prayer that he had lisped in childhood--the Bible lessons to so many of which he had hearkened in the old Norman Church at Wychwood--what would all these be but hollow cheats and ghastly mockeries were he to be found guilty? It was a simple impossibility. He had now but to wait--to eat out his heart for one other week, and then--oh! joy unspeakable! he would be free--free! A free man--not a prisoner! Did he ever imagine that he would attach such a meaning to the word freedom? It mattered not. Let him but once set foot outside this dismal gaol wall. Again he saw himself on the back of a good horse, or at the claim with good old Jack Polwarth and his wife and Tottie--poor dear Tottie! But here he could no longer follow out the chain of probabilities. His eyes filled with tears, and the once-proud Lance Trevanion, lowered in spirit and strength by confinement and meagre diet, threw himself upon his miserable pallet and sobbed like a child.

The 'next ensuing Court of Quarter Sessions,' to which Lance Trevanion had been committed for trial, was formally opened at Ballarat on a certain Wednesday at ten of the clock. The sheriff was in attendance, with bailiff and minor officials, and also various barristers, including Mr. England. An unusual number of police appeared on the scene, including the superintendent of the district--a very high personage indeed. All were in full uniform, while conspicuous among them stood Sergeant Dayrell, calm and impa.s.sive as usual, though a close observer might have noticed an occasional sign of impatience.

When the doors of the court-house were opened a rush took place which filled the building so completely that many were excluded and compelled to remain outside, trusting to occasional reports of the exciting matters within. The judge in his robes, attended by the sheriff, took his seat upon the bench punctually at the appointed time. And once more Lance Trevanion and his fellow-prisoner Ned Lawless were brought forth to serve as a spectacle to a wondering or sympathetic crowd, as the case might be.

The Crown prosecutor, in opening the case, alluded to 'the prevalence of a system of horse-stealing, now become so notorious; if unchecked it might lead to the gravest results. The jury would have an opportunity of hearing the evidence in detail, from which they would of course form their judgment. But they must not lose sight of the fact that the prisoners had been caught "red-handed," if he might use the expression.

They were actually in possession of a large number of stolen horses, many of which were of great value. Some had since been identified by their owners, who were chiefly miners and working-men connected with the diggings. He had no desire, he might a.s.sure them, to prejudice their minds in any way; he would merely furnish his evidence for the Crown as he was bound to do, and trust to the intelligent jury he saw before him to do their duty without fear or favour. It was a painful sight to him, as it doubtless was to them, to see two such fine specimens of early manhood arraigned for so serious an offence. But no consideration of that sort must be suffered to influence their minds. He would not detain them longer, but would call the first witness.'

As in all trials, the same witnesses as on the preliminary examinations were heard, the difference being that no written depositions were taken, the judge only recording in his notes the evidence with care and exactness. Mr. England cross-examined the witnesses with increased rigour and more searching scrutiny. Every fact or fiction in their previous history which could tend to weaken or discredit their testimony in the eyes of the jury was fully ventilated. Every motive which could possibly colour this testimony against the prisoners was suggested or exposed.

Sergeant Dayrell's evidence was unsparingly criticised. To his calm and carefully worded statements, studiously colourless, but little exception could be taken. Still, more than one _historiette_ had been elicited from the distant part of the colony where he once was stationed which tended to establish his reputation for unscrupulousness, for desire for conviction at all risks. He was forced to acknowledge that he had been the apprehending constable in a well-known stock case near the New South Wales border, as well as to admit that his zeal on that occasion being in conflict with the law, had caused the committing magistrate to be mulcted in heavy costs and damages. These and other facts being mercilessly dragged forth somewhat detracted from the value of his evidence.

Then Catharine Lawless was once more called. Again it seemed that the spectators, as upon the appearance on the stage of a favourite actress, awoke to more than common excitement and intensity of interest. All eyes were upon her as she walked composedly up to the witness-box. Dressed quietly but in perfect taste as before, there was so much grace and freedom about the girl's every movement--such self-possession in her bearing--that she looked superior to her surroundings.

She was evidently on her guard against such a display of emotion or merely feminine weakness as had occurred at the first trial. Calmly and imperturbably she gave her evidence, and as before deposed to having seen Lance Trevanion in the companionship of her brother at Eumeralla, and also at Balooka long before the day of arrest.

If there be any force in the modern doctrines of the projection of nerve force--of the subtle relation between the mesmeric will power and the object of its current--then, as for one moment she turned towards the dock and confronted the lurid light that blazed in Lance Trevanion's haughty and contemptuous regard, she should have trembled and fallen to the earth.

But no such effect followed. She gazed back for an instant with a glance fierce and tameless as his own, then coldly averted her face as she repeated her lesson, as Mr. England vehemently characterised her statement.

'Then you still persist, Catharine Lawless,' said that gentleman, turning with unchivalrous suddenness upon his fair antagonist, 'you persist in declaring that you saw Lance Trevanion both at Balooka and Eumeralla on the date you have stated?'

'I have sworn I did see him,' she replied, while a shade of sullenness commenced to overspread her countenance.

'If these witnesses, Mr. Stirling, Mrs. Delf, Mrs. Polwarth and her husband, besides several others, have sworn that they saw him at Growlers' at a date which makes it absolutely impossible that he could have been within a hundred miles of the localities you mention, is that true or false?'

'I don't care what they swear, I have told the truth.'

'That is what they have sworn. Now, you know Mr. Stirling, Mrs. Delf, Jack Polwarth, and the rest, don't you?'

'Well, yes, I have seen them.'

'Do you think they are people likely to swear to an untruth?'

'I can't say. What I said was the truth.'

'And what they say--false!'

'I suppose so.'

As before, she was the last witness for the Crown. When her evidence was completed, she faced Mr. England, with one indignant, half-revengeful expression on her face, then walked slowly, and with coolest composure, from the court.