The Crime and the Criminal

CHAPTER XXXI

THE CASE FOR THE CROWN CONCLUDES

After that the court adjourned till to-morrow. Mr. Alexander Taunton's performance wound up the programme of the day's entertainment, as it appeared to me, with adequate spirit.

At the inn or hotel, or whatever they called it, at which I was stopping, every one was talking of the trial. The chambermaid, who waited on me at dinner, could talk of nothing else. She went gabble, gabble all the time that she was in the room, and it seemed to me that she stopped in the room as much as she possibly could. Her manners, if rustic, were familiar.

She had witnessed Tommy's arrival at the court.

"A more dreadful-looking wretch I never saw. It gave me quite a feeling to look at him. He's got pig's eyes. And cruel! There was cruelty all over him!"

Poor Tommy! She must have had an insufficient view, or she was prejudiced. A milder-mannered man was never charged with having cut a throat, nor, I verily believe, a tenderer-hearted one.

"And they tell me his wife was in court. I never! She must be a one! I'd have drowned myself sooner than let people know I was the wife of a man like that. She must be almost as bad as he is, or she would never have dared to show her face."

Alas for the rarity of Christian charity! Dear, dear, how these Christians do love each other! To think that that sweet-faced, true-hearted woman should have been spoken of like that!

"They're sure to hang him, that's one comfort. I think it's a shame they don't hang him out of hand, without making all this fuss about it. I think such creatures ought to be hung directly they catch 'em."

"Before ascertaining if they are guilty?"

"He's guilty, safe enough. The wretch!"

Well, of course, she knew best. Still, what a funny world it is.

At dinner I ordered a bottle of wine. The landlord brought it up himself, as an excuse for a gossip. He was a shrivelled-up little man, about sixty, not at all like the typical Boniface.

"I thought that I should have been on the jury. But I was on the jury yesterday instead. But there are two cousins of mine who are-got heads screwed on their shoulders both of 'em."

"Indeed? Will you have a glass of wine?"

"Thank you, ma'am, you're very kind. I don't mind if I do." He did not mind.

"I can recommend this port wine. I've had it in my cellars over twenty years. Your very good health, ma'am. Yes." He shook his head. "Neither of them holds with this chap's little games." I had not the faintest notion to what little games he alluded. "I saw you in court, ma'am. Might I ask if you're interested in any of the parties?"

"Not at all. I am an American. While I was staying in England I thought that I would not lose an opportunity of seeing one of your great trials."

"Ay, this is a very great trial, this is. It won't soon be forgotten. Do you think he's guilty?"

"Do you?"

"Well, what I say is just this. I wouldn't be locked up alone with a strange woman in a railway carriage all the way from Brighton to London, not for-not for any amount of money."

"You are flattering."

"I don't mean nothing-not at all. Only, in this case, how are we to say what happened? He seems to be a decent kind of chap. She might have been nasty, there might have been a rumpus, he might have tried to get away from her, she might have fallen out upon the line. How is any one to tell?"

My friend, the landlord, in spite of his somewhat unpromising appearance, seemed to be one of the few sensible persons I had recently encountered. I pressed him to take another glass of wine. He yielded to the pressure.

"Don't you think they'll find him guilty, then?"

"Oh, they'll find him guilty, safe enough, and I daresay they'll hang him, too. That's just the best of it. When a man gets mixed up with a woman in a thing like this they're sure to think the worse of him. But it doesn't follow that he did it, any the more for that. As for that chap Taunton, I'd hang him!"

It seemed that my friend the gentleman had good cause to congratulate himself on the possession of such a relative. He seemed to be held in general esteem.

When the court reopened the next day I changed my seat. I had taken careful stock of the scene of action the day before. The result had been that I came to one or two conclusions. I perceived, for one thing, that one might very easily sit upon the bench and yet preserve one's anonymity. If I wore a cloak, kept my veil down, sat on the back row, and kept myself in the shade, I need fear no recognition from Tommy.

I quite hungered for a sight of the prisoner. I had not dared to turn and look at him from where I sat the day before. The action might not improbably have attracted his attention.

Besides, I wanted to have a good view of what might, not improperly, be described as the closing tableau.

So when I entered the court this time I presented the usher with a sovereign for a seat on the bench. I had a seat on the bench-quite in the shade.

The place was, if anything, more crowded than ever. It was understood that the trial was to conclude in the course of the day. Perhaps that proved an extra attraction. Anyhow, we were uncomfortably crowded on the bench, and the court, everywhere, was as full as it could hold. I wondered how much-in a theatrical sense-the house was worth to a some one-say the usher.

The judge came in. Then Tommy. They let him have a chair. I had a good look at him. He badly wanted shaving; there was a month's growth of hair upon his cheeks and chin. But he looked better than I expected-and braver. His wife sat in front of him, as she had done the day before. She turned as he came in, and greeted him with a smile. Such a brave one! Without a suspicion of a tear! He smiled back at her.

Poor dears! Their smiling days were nearly done.

When he was seated and had recovered from the excitement of his entry, after all, the expression began to creep into his face, which I had expected to see there all along. The expression of stupor, of mental paralysis, of shame, of horror at the position in which he found himself, and at the things which were to come.

Poor, dear Tommy! He looked to me as if there was no fight left in him.

I need not have feared his recognition. He never looked at any one. He just glanced now and then at his wife, and every time he did so there came into his face a something which was a curious commingling of pleasure with pain. But, with the exception of Mrs. Tennant, I doubt if he clearly realised the personality of any other creature there.

The first witness called was a man named Stephen Rodman. He said he was a "tapper," which, I suppose, had something to do with railway work, though I don't know what. Early on the morning of Monday, November 9th, he was walking in the six-foot way of the arrival platform of Victoria Station. He saw a handkerchief lying on the ground. He picked it up. It was soaked with blood, and was still damp. In the corner was a name, "T. Tennant." The 8.40 from Brighton had been drawn up at that platform the night before. Sir Haselton Jardine's colleague, who was examining, handed witness a handkerchief-still unwashed. That was the one he found.

Jane Parsons followed, actually the girl who had been in Mrs. Tennant's service and who had applied for my situation. Certainly the prosecution were fitting the rope round Tommy's neck, as if they did not mean to leave him a loophole of escape. I wondered what she had to say.

Not much. She began by showing an inclination to cry, which inclination she presently gave way to. The tears trickled down her cheeks. She kept dabbling at them with a handkerchief, which she had squeezed into the shape and size of a penny ball.

She was a parlourmaid. Had been, till recently, in Mrs. Tennant's service. Remembered November 8th. Mr. Tennant went to spend the day at Brighton. Mrs. Tennant told her he had gone. Miss Minna was not well, so missus stayed to nurse her. Admitted Mr. Tennant on his return. It was pretty late. After eleven. Mr. Tennant did not seem to be himself at all. He seemed all anyhow-as if he had been fighting. There was a great cut on his cheek. Helped him off with his overcoat. It was all torn and rumpled about the collar. The top button had been torn right off, and a piece of cloth torn with it. It was spotted with blood. Shown an overcoat; recognised it as the overcoat which Mr. Tennant had worn. His collar and tie were disarranged. As a rule he was a most particular gentleman about his clothes.

Mr. Bates asked a question or two.

Had been in Mrs. Tennant's employ more than two years. Mr. Tennant was a very good master-no one could want a better. Lived a quiet, regular life. Was very fond of his wife, and she of him. Made a perfect idol of his little girl.

At this point poor Tommy covered his face with his hands.

She didn't believe he had ever done it, and she never would-she didn't care what nobody said. This statement was volunteered, amidst a burst of sobbing. Mr. Tennant was very nervous. They used to make a joke of it in the kitchen. The least thing put him off. She meant that he was easily flustered. He was a tender and a loving husband and father, a gentle and a kind master, and she didn't believe that, willingly, he would hurt a fly. Jane's tears burst forth afresh.

Mr. Bates sat down.

The detective who had arrested Tommy next appeared. His name was Matthew Holman. He was a sinewy, greybearded, greyheaded, not unkindly-looking man, looking more like a sailor than anything else. His evidence was purely cut and dried, and formal. Prisoner had made no statement on being arrested. All efforts to trace the identity of the dead woman had been unsuccessful. Mr. Bates allowed the witness to depart unquestioned.

The medical evidence which followed revived the flagging interest. It roused Tommy more than anything which had gone before. As well it might.

Two doctors were called. The first was a country doctor. A middle-aged man, with a fatherly sort of manner, and something of the milk of human kindness about his mouth, and in the twinkling of his eyes. His name was Gresham.

Dr. Gresham had examined the body twice. First at the Three Bridges, afterwards in the mortuary at East Grinstead. The first occasion was between nine and ten on the morning of Monday, November 9th. Life had been extinct some hours, probably twelve. The body was that of a well-nourished, healthy young woman, probably under twenty-one years of age.

When he heard this Tommy started. Certainly no doctor could have mistaken me for under one-and-twenty.

She was far advanced in pregnancy.

Tommy started again. I fancied that Mrs. Tennant started too.

The cause of death was strangulation.

Tommy started more and more. Leaning over the rail of the dock, he stared at the witness with all his eyes.

He was sure of it. He had no doubt upon the point whatever. Unfortunately, there was no room for doubt. She had been killed by the pressure of a man's hands and fingers. Great violence must have been used. In fact, extraordinary violence. The skin of the throat was discoloured. Marks of a man's hands and fingers were most distinct. Indeed, so distinct, that when he first saw them they amounted almost to a model. There were slight bruises on the body, such as might have been caused by a fall. There was a livid bruise which ran from shoulder to shoulder across the back. It had probably been caused by pressure. For instance, by pressure against the edge of a carriage seat. His theory was that she had been forced back against the edge of the carriage seat, and in that position strangled. Falling from the train had not been the cause of death. The fall had nothing to do with it.

When Sir Haselton Jardine sat down Tommy and Mr. Bates had quite a long confabulation. Tommy seemed half beside himself with excitement-I very well knew why! It struck me, however, that Mr. Bates did not seem very much impressed.

Still, acting no doubt on his client's strenuous instructions, he subjected the doctor to a rigorous cross-examination.

But it was all in vain.

Poor Tommy!

Mr. Bates first of all suggested, as it were, casually, that the woman was more than one-and-twenty. The doctor did not think it possible. Everything went to show that she was not. Then, after some fencing, he tried to induce the doctor to admit that she might have been strangled after she had fallen from the train. That she might have fallen from the train by accident. Been stupefied by the fall, and, on recovering from her stupor, that some one might have come along and strangled her. The doctor would have none of it, He deemed the thing incredible. Mr. Bates hammered away, but the doctor held his own.

Tommy was done!

He was done still more when it came to the second doctor's turn. He was a Dr. Braithwaite, a great swell from London. He had examined the body at East Grinstead. He corroborated all that Dr. Gresham had had to say, putting things, if anything, a little stronger against poor Tommy. He declined to move a hair's-breadth from his fixed conviction that the woman had been strangled-in the train.

When he left the box every creature in court was aware that, unless something amounting almost to a miracle intervened, Tommy's fate was sealed.

Sir Haselton Jardine, half rising from his seat, announced that that was the case for the Crown.

CHAPTER XXXII

MRS. CARRUTH REMOVES HER VEIL

After luncheon came the speeches.

Sir Haselton Jardine's was as deadly as it very well could have been. He was not a bit of an orator. He reminded one of an automatic figure as much as anything, as if he had been wound up to go. He went quietly on, in the same placid, passionless sort of whisper, but as clear as a bell. One never lost a syllable he uttered. He never faltered or stumbled. The words, as they flowed from him, were exactly adapted to the meaning they were intended to convey. He fitted them together with the dexterity of an artist in mosaic.

One began almost to feel that one was listening to the voice of doom.

He recounted the story. He observed that it did not appear to be disputed that the prisoner had travelled in the same compartment with the woman who was dead. He did not know what the defence would be. But if it was intended to suggest that death had been the result of accident, he asked the attention of the jury to the medical evidence. It was shown by that that death had not been caused by falling from the train. The woman had been strangled-strangled by a man's two hands. The degree of violence which had been used not only inevitably suggested premeditation, but also great resolution in carrying out what had been premeditated. The murderer had resolved to kill, and he did kill.

They could not say with certainty what happened after the train left Brighton. A feature of the case was that the efforts of the police had failed in establishing the dead woman's identity. So far as they could discover she was nameless. No one had come forward to claim her-to say who she was. She seemed to have come from nowhere. No one seemed to have missed her now that she had gone. It was a mystery. He could not say if the prisoner had it in his power to supply them with the key to that mystery. Men live double lives. The witness Taunton had told them that what he had heard had caused him to conclude that the man and woman in the next compartment were acquaintances. That might have been the case. In that connection he would merely remark-that the prisoner was a married man; that the woman was young and pretty; that she was far advanced in pregnancy; that she wore no wedding-ring.

In these facts they might, possibly, find a motive for the crime.

A great crime had been committed. A young woman, scarcely more than a girl, who would shortly have become a mother, had been done to death. So far as one could perceive, there were no palliating circumstances. It was the other way. The crime was the act of a coward, as well as of a criminal. He did not desire to press the case unduly against the prisoner. It was his duty to ask them, as jurymen, if the facts which had been presented were not adequate to bring the crime home to him. If they deemed them inadequate, then, without showing fear or favour, it was their duty to say so.

Sir Haselton Jardine sat down.

And Mr. Bates got up.

Mr. Bates began by remarking that he did not propose to call any witnesses for the defence.

Then, in that case, in view of the body of evidence which had been called for the other side, Tommy's goose was cooked, and he was done for. Mr. Bates might have as well kept still. A general movement which took place in the court seemed to be a voiceless expression of this consensus of opinion.

Mr. Bates said that, in taking this course, he was almost overwhelmed by a sense of responsibility. That was chiefly owing to the fact that the law of England was still in such a state that the prisoner could not go into the box and testify. He was exceedingly anxious to give his testimony, but it could not be received as evidence. If he had spoken out at first he might not, and probably would not, have been in the position which he was occupying now. But he had shrunk from the course which a wiser man would have pursued-shrunk from it for reasons which were natural enough, but which still, he was bound to say, were insufficient. Now it was too late. His voice could not be heard.