The Crime and the Criminal Part 61

The governor observed the prisoner, as it was, reflectively. Certainly Mr. Tennant had become on a sudden a different man. He had lost his awkwardness. He was no longer ill at ease. He held himself erect. His eyes were clear, his glance unwavering. His bearing was simple--the simplicity of the man was what struck one first of all--yet a.s.sured. He spoke with a calmness, and even with a dignity which, considering that sentence of ignominious death had just been p.r.o.nounced upon him, could scarcely fail to be impressive.

"Tennant, so far as it concerns your fate, whatever you may have to say will be without effect. For you in this world there is no hope. You had better prepare yourself for the world which is to come. Do not buoy yourself up with any hopes that anything you may say will prevent the sentence which has been p.r.o.nounced upon you being executed. That sentence will certainly be carried out."

The condemned man would have spoken, but the governor went on.

"But the warder has just told me what you told him, and in discharge of what I hold to be my duty I have requested the detective who has been in charge of the case to come and hear what you may have to say. Here he is."

And there he was--Matthew Holman, the man who looked so like a sailor.

"Well, Tennant, what c.o.c.k-and-bull story have you to tell us now?"

"None. I have to tell you the truth."

"It is time."

Mr. Holman's tone was biting, his glance was keen.

Mr. Tennant re-told the story of his famous journey. The detective seemed not so much to be listening to the words he uttered as searching for what might be behind them.

"So you did know her? What was her name?"

"I knew her as Ellen Howth. But she may have had half a dozen names before I knew her and since."

The detective made a note in his pocket-book.

"Where did she live?"

"I have no notion. As I have told you before that night I had not seen or heard of her for years."

"Describe her."

Mr. Tennant described her.

"You understand that, until I heard the medical evidence, I supposed that she had been killed by the fall from the carriage. When I heard what the doctors had to say I began to wonder. It became clearer and clearer to me that they could not be talking of Ellen Howth. The two descriptions did not tally. I did not believe that she was pregnant. I knew that she was over thirty, and it seemed inconceivable that a medical man could mistake a woman of considerably over thirty for a girl under twenty-one. When I saw Ellen Howth standing up there and smiling at me, in an instant it was all made plain."

"What was all made plain?"

"Many things. For one, it explained what seemed to me to be the discrepancies between the evidence and what I knew to be the facts--the facts, that is, so far as they concerned myself."

"Where was the woman whom you say you saw standing--tell me exactly."

Mr. Tennant paused to think. The detective's eyes were on him, and the governor's and the warder's at the back.

"She was on the bench. She was on the last row of seats. She sat either second or third from the judge, to his right. When he had p.r.o.nounced sentence I noticed her rising and I noticed her remove her veil, and she looked at me, I have no doubt with the deliberate design of attracting my attention."

"I believe I noticed the woman to whom you refer."

This was the governor. The detective said nothing. He continued to look at the prisoner for a moment or two in silence. Then from a pocket in his coat he took an envelope.

"There is a portrait of Ellen Howth."

He handed a photograph to Mr. Tennant.

"This is not Ellen Howth."

"Then that is."

He pa.s.sed the prisoner a second photograph.

"Nor is this. Neither of these photographs in the least resembles Ellen Howth. Not in any one particular. I have never seen the woman whose portrait this purports to be. Of that I am sure."

"It beats me, my lad, to think how a man circ.u.mstanced as you are, can lie so glibly. You know as well as I do, and indeed better, that you are holding in your hands portraits of the poor young woman whose life you took."

"That is not so. Neither of these portraits at all resembles the woman, Ellen Howth, with whom I travelled from Brighton. If they are photographs of the woman who was found dead, then it is certain that I had no hand whatever in killing her."

"You have seen those portraits before."

"Never!"

"Do you mean to tell me that no one, neither your counsel nor your solicitor, nor any one else showed you them?"

"I do. You appear surprised."

"It is not a question of surprise. I don't believe you."

"You can soon ascertain for yourself that what I tell you is a fact.

You must remember that from the first I told my solicitor the actual facts. I took it for granted that the woman who had been found dead was Ellen Howth. Under those circ.u.mstances there was no reason why I should be shown or why I should wish to be shown her photograph. I have not seen that portrait before. The woman whose portrait it is is a complete stranger to me. Were she here she would tell you that I am equally a stranger to her. There is some mystery which, at present, I do not profess to understand. But of one thing I am certain, that the woman, Ellen Howth, whom I supposed was dead, is as much alive as you are or as I am."

"Give me those portraits. It strikes me that you are one of those men who will go even to face their G.o.d with a lie upon their lips. I don't believe a word that you have said."

"Then you wrong me cruelly. I hope, for your sake, as well as for my own, that you will learn that you do, before it is too late."

The detective made no reply. He went out of the cell without a word.

The governor followed him. The door was clanged. The condemned man was left alone to get himself, if he could, into a mood in which he should be able to look the gallows squarely and without flinching in the face.

The governor spoke to the detective as they walked side by side.

"What do you think of it?"

"Queer-street."

"I certainly noticed myself the woman of whom he speaks. I wonder you didn't. Her action was most marked. She certainly did cast at him what seemed to me to be a glance of exultant recognition, while the sight of her seemed to fill him with stupefied amazement. I wondered when I saw it what the scene might mean."

"What was she like?"

"He describes her very fairly."

"If she's still in Lewes I'll leave no stone unturned to find her."