The Man Who Knew Part 25

CHAPTER XII

THE TRIAL OF FRANK MERRILL

The trial of Frank Merrill on the charge that he "did on the twenty-eighth day of June in the year of our Lord one thousand nine hundred--wilfully and wickedly kill and slay by a pistol shot John Minute" was the sensation of a season which was unusually prolific in murder trials. The trial took place at the Lewes a.s.sizes in a crowded courtroom, and lasted, as we know, for sixteen days, five days of which were given to the examination in chief and the cross-examination of the accountants who had gone into the books of the bank.

The prosecution endeavored to establish the fact that no other person but Frank Merrill could have access to the books, and that therefore no other person could have falsified them or manipulated the transfer of moneys. It cannot be said that the prosecution had wholly succeeded; for when Brandon, the bank manager, was put into the witness box he was compelled to admit that not only Frank, but he himself and Jasper Cole, were in a position to reach the books.

The opening speech for the crown had been a masterly one. But that there were many weak points in the evidence and in the a.s.sumptions which the prosecution drew was evident to the merest tyro.

Sir George Murphy Jackson, the attorney general, who prosecuted, attempted to dispose summarily of certain conflictions, and it had to be confessed that his explanations were very plausible.

"The defense will tell us," he said, in that shrill, clarion tone of his which has made to quake the hearts of so many hostile witnesses, "that we have not accounted for the fourth man who drove up in his car ten minutes after Merrill had entered the house, and disappeared, but I am going to tell you my theory of that incident.

"Merrill had an accomplice who is not in custody, and that accomplice is Rex Holland. Merrill had planned and prepared this murder, because from some statement which his uncle had made he believed that not only was his whole future dependent upon destroying his benefactor and silencing forever the one man who knew the extent of his villainy, but he had in his cold, shrewd way accurately foreseen the exact consequence of such a shooting. It was a big criminal's big idea.

"He foresaw this trial," he said impressively; "he foresaw, gentlemen of the jury, his acquittal at your hands. He foresaw a reaction which would not only give him the woman he professes to love, but in consequence place in his hands the disposal of her considerable fortune.

"Why should he shoot John Minute? you may ask; and I reply to that question with another: What would have happened had he not shot his uncle? He would have been a ruined man. The doors of his uncle's house would have been closed to him. The legacy would have been revoked, the marriage for which he had planned so long would have been an unrealized dream.

"He knew the extent of the fortune which was coming to Miss Nuttall. Mr.

Minute made two wills, in both of which he left an identical sum to his ward. The first of these, revoked by the second and containing the same provision, was witnessed by the man in the dock! He knew, too, that the Rhodesian gold mine, the shares of which were held by John Minute on the girl's behalf, was likely to prove a very rich proposition, and I suggest that the information coming to him as Mr. Minute's secretary, he deliberately suppressed that information for his own purpose.

"What had he to gain? I ask you to believe that if he is acquitted he will have achieved all that he ever hoped to achieve."

There was a little murmur in the court. Frank Merrill, leaning on the ledge of the dock, looked down at the girl in the body of the court, and their eyes met. He saw the indignation in her face and nodded with a little smile, then turned again to the counsel with that eager, half-quizzical look of interest which the girl had so often seen upon his handsome face.

"Much will be made, in the course of this trial, of the presence of another man, and the defense will endeavor to secure capital out of the fact that the man Crawley, who it was suggested was in the house for an improper purpose, has not been discovered. As to the fourth man, the driver of the motor car, there seems little doubt but that he was an accomplice of Merrill. This mysterious Rex Holland, who has been identified by Mrs. Totney, of Uckfield, spent the whole of the day wandering about Suss.e.x, obviously having one plan in his mind, which was to arrive at Mr. Minute's house at the same time as his confederate.

"You will have the taxi-driver's evidence that when Merrill stepped down, after being driven from the station, he looked left and right, as though he were expecting somebody. The plan to some extent miscarried.

The accomplice arrived ten minutes too late. On some pretext or other Merrill probably left the room. I suggest that he did not go into the dining room, but that he went out into the garden and was met by his accomplice, who handed him the weapon with which this crime was committed.

"It may be asked by the defense why the accomplice, who was presumably Rex Holland, did not himself commit the crime. I could offer two or three alternative suggestions, all of which are feasible. The deceased man was shot at close quarters, and was found in such an att.i.tude as to suggest that he was wholly unprepared for the attack. We know that he was in some fear and that he invariably went armed; yet it is fairly certain that he made no attempt to draw his weapon, which he certainly would have done had he been suddenly confronted by an armed stranger.

"I do not pretend that I am explaining the strange relationship between Merrill and this mysterious forger. Merrill is the only man who has seen him and has given a vague and somewhat confused description of him. 'He was a man with a short, close-clipped beard' is Merrill's description.

The woman who served him with tea near Uckfield describes him as a 'youngish man with a dark mustache, but otherwise clean shaven.'

"There is no reason, of course, why he should not have removed his beard, but as against that suggestion we will call evidence to prove that the man seen driving with the murdered chauffeur was invariably a man with a mustache and no beard, so that the balance of probability is on the side of the supposition that Merrill is not telling the truth. An unknown client with a large deposit at his bank would not be likely constantly to alter his appearance. If he were a criminal, as we know him to be, there would be another reason why he should not excite suspicion in this way."

His address covered the greater part of a day--but he returned to the scene in the garden, to the supposed meeting of the two men, and to the murder.

Saul Arthur Mann, sitting with Frank's solicitor, scratched his nose and grinned.

"I have never heard a more ingenious piece of reconstruction," he said; "though, of course, the whole thing is palpably absurd."

As a theory it was no doubt excellent; but men are not sentenced to death on theories, however ingenious they may be. Probably n.o.body in the court so completely admired the ingenuity as the man most affected. At the lunch interval on the day on which this theory was put forward he met his solicitor and Saul Arthur Mann in the bare room in which such interviews are permitted.

"It was really fascinating to hear him," said Frank, as he sipped the cup of tea which they had brought him. "I almost began to believe that I had committed the murder! But isn't it rather alarming? Will the jury take the same view?" he asked, a little troubled.

The solicitor shook his head.

"Unsupported theories of that sort do not go well with juries, and, of course, the whole story is so flimsy and so improbable that it will go for no more than a piece of clever reasoning."

"Did anybody see you at the railway station?"

Frank shook his head.

"I suppose hundreds of people saw me, but would hardly remember me."

"Was there any one on the train who knew you?"

"No," said Frank, after a moment's thought. "There were six people in my carriage until we got to Lewes, but I think I told you that, and you have not succeeded in tracing any of them."

"It is most difficult to get into touch with those people," said the lawyer. "Think of the scores of people one travels with, without ever remembering what they looked like or how they were dressed. If you had been a woman, traveling with women, every one of your five fellow pa.s.sengers would have remembered you and would have recalled your hat."

Frank laughed.

"There are certain disadvantages in being a man," he said. "How do you think the case is going?"

"They have offered no evidence yet. I think you will agree, Mr. Mann,"

he said respectfully, for Saul Arthur Mann was a power in legal circles.

"None at all," the little fellow agreed.

Frank recalled the first day he had seen him, with his hat perched on the back of his head and his shabby, genteel exterior.

"Oh, by Jove!" he said. "I suppose they will be trying to fasten the death of that man upon me that we saw in Gray Square."

Saul Arthur Mann nodded.

"They have not put that in the indictment," he said, "nor the case of the chauffeur. You see, your conviction will rest entirely upon this present charge, and both the other matters are subsidiary."

Frank walked thoughtfully up and down the room, his hands behind his back.

"I wonder who Rex Holland is," he said, half to himself.

"You still have your theory?" asked the lawyer, eying him keenly.

Frank nodded.

"And you still would rather not put it into words?"

"Much rather not," said Frank gravely.

He returned to the court and glanced round for the girl, but she was not there. The rest of the afternoon's proceedings, taken up as they were with the preliminaries of the case, bored him.

It was on the twelfth day of the trial that Jasper Cole stepped on to the witness stand. He was dressed in black and was paler than usual, but he took the oath in a firm voice and answered the questions which were put to him without hesitation.

The story of Frank's quarrel with his uncle, of the forged checks, and of his own experience on the night of the crime filled the greater part of the forenoon, and it was in the afternoon when Bryan Bennett, one of the most brilliant barristers of his time, stood up to cross-examine.