HF - 03 - Mistress of Darkness

by Christopher Nicole

  But now Mr. Malahine was waiting for him, willing him to concentrate. They were in a unique position. Matt could add nothing to what had already been said, but he had brought the original indictment, and everyone in the room had heard of Gislane; was he not being called by the prosecution, he would certainly have been called as a witness for the defence. 'Would you state your full name, and present address, please.'

  'Matthew George Hilton, of Plantation Hilltop, in Jamaica.'

  'Thank you, Mr. Hilton. Are you known to the defendant?'

  'I have never met the defendant,' Matt said. 'I know of him. I imagine he knows of me.'

  'Thank you, Mr. Hilton. You are, however, aware that the defendant stands charged with several monstrous crimes?'

  'I am.'

  'Would you tell us how you became aware of them?'

  He had already been warned to keep his answer precise. 'I was approached by Mr. Charles Manton, a gentleman who had previously worked as an overseer on Hodges.'

  'Thank you, Mr. Hilton. Now, of course, you are not in a position to give this court any testimony regarding these alleged crimes.' Mr. Malahine smiled at Mr. Corder, the Defence Counsel, who was poised to stand at the hint of an incorrect question. ‘We have, indeed, already heard a considerable recital of the miserable occurrences on Hodges, not only through the depositions of Mr. Manton, who is now unhappily deceased, and of Mistress Nelson, who is unable to be present, but also of various other witnesses. Yet it is of Mr. Manton that I would have you speak. You say he approached you. May I ask why?'

  'With a view to having the defendant prosecuted.'

  'Indeed sir. But why you, in particular?'

  'Because my opposition to the very idea of slavery is well known I would say.'

  'Ah. You were the champion he sought. Yes, indeed, and the result was that you approached the authorities and persuaded them to indict Mr. Hodge. Now, sir, would you tell us how Mr. Manton died.'

  'He was murdered by a mob, in Kingston, but two months ago.'

  'Murdered, you say. Struck down, by a blackguard. Have you an opinion as to what this mob was about?'

  'Their intention appeared to be to prevent Mr. Manton and myself from travelling to Nevis to give evidence in this case.'

  'Ah. A very one-sided mob. Would you suppose they had been instigated to this act?'

  Mr. Corder was on his feet. ‘I must protest, Your Lordship.'

  Sir Ralph Payne scratched his wig with the tip of his quill; burly and red-faced, the Chief Justice was as much a planter as anyone in the room.

  ‘I am but asking witness for an opinion, Your Lordship.' Mr. Malahine protested in turn. 'Which he is surely qualified to give, as he was one of the objectives of this very mob, and was indeed only rescued by a regiment of cavalry.'

  ‘Is that so?' asked Sir Ralph. 'None the less, I think you have made the point that the mob intended to prevent Mr. Hilton's departure. To investigate the causes of the crowd gathering would be to embark upon an entirely irrelevant course. Objection sustained.'

  'Very good, My Lord. I have but one more question to ask of you, Mr. Hilton. Your opinion of the man Manton. He had been an overseer, on Hodges, for some time. Until at last events there grew too strong for his stomach. Or so he claims in his deposition. Was he an honest man?' 'In my opinion, yes,' Matt said.

  'Would you have any reason to suppose that Mr. Manton should lie about his former employer?'

  'No,' Matt said. 'In the four years I knew Mr. Manton, I always found him a very reliable fellow.'

  'Thank you, Mr. Hilton.' Mr. Malahine sat down, but immediately took out a large pocket handkerchief to mop his brow. As Mr. Corder rose to his feet an immense rustie went right round the courtroom. Everyone was aware that here was the true crisis of the trial. As indeed Mr. Malahine had warned Matt in advance. And as Mr. Corder clearly intended to illustrate to the jury.

  For the moment he was smiling, if a trifle sadly. He read from his notes. 'Matthew George Hilton,' he remarked. 'Yours is a famous name in these islands, sir.'

  Matt did not consider this to be a question.

  'Indeed,' said Mr. Corder, 'were a roll call to be taken of every family which has ever planted cane here in the Carribean, the name Hilton would occur very near the top. But more, are you not related to the Warners?'

  'Distantly.'

  'Oh, indeed. Your great-grandmother was a Warner. And that family was the very first to plant cane in the British Islands. One could almost say that cane juice might run in your veins instead of blood, Mr. Hilton.' He smiled, and the court smiled with him.

  'One might,' Matt agreed.

  'But you, the very last of this long and famous and indeed glorious line of planters and leaders of planters, have lost interest in the ancient and profitable art.'

  ‘I would prefer to say that my interest has been redirected,' Matt said.

  'Oh, indeed. How stupid of me. Because if you refuse to manage a sugar plantation yourself, you yet enjoy the luxury offered by your cousin's plantation, which you give as your address.'

  ‘I live there, yes,' Matt said.

  'Of course. It is your home. And believe me, sir, I have nothing but sympathy for a man who must continually be undergoing the most frightful pangs of conscience. But now, Mr. Hilton, I am going to ask you for your assistance. Oh, I am well aware that you are a prosecution witness. But then, sir, you see, this is an unusual, indeed, a unique case. What normally happens in the case of a murder? Suppose a man kills his wife. She is missed, perhaps, or the neighbours hear screams, and they hurry along to the magistrates who in turn instruct the constables, who descend upon the criminal's house with a warrant and search it, and either fail to find the wife altogether, in which case a more general search may be inaugurated, supposing the accused cannot provide them with a satisfactory account of her disappearance, or they find traces of the unhappy woman, perhaps even a body, and thus take the husband into custody. And the conduct of thus straightforward a case is even so a long and difficult business. Mr. Hilton, I must confess myself to be entirely in a fog in this present instance.' Mr. Corder continued to smile as if to indicate he enjoyed fogs. 'Because here, sir, we have a man accused of a crime, not against his wife, or some stranger, but against his own chattels. I was quite unaware that such a crime was possible.'

  He paused for breath, and Mr. Malahine was on his feet. 'Is my learned friend addressing the jury, Your Lordship?' he inquired. 'Or is he in fact asking witness a question?'

  Sir Reginald snorted. 'Mr. Corder?'

  'My apologies, Your Lordship. I was but endeavouring to make witness understand my questions better. Surely I cannot be accused of leading a prosecution witness?'

  'Hm,' remarked the Chief Justice. 'Well, I suppose you cannot. But make it brief, man. Make it brief.'

  'I was merely going to point out, Mr. Hilton,' said Mr. Corder, 'that supposing such a crime were possible, in this case we have no bodies, nor any search for bodies, as I understand it. We have in fact, a single accuser, the late Charles Manton. Oh, I am well aware that my learned friend has introduced a whole host of evidence consisting entirely of suggestion and innuendo. It has been suggested, time and again, that there was an atmosphere of terror on Hodges Plantation. This is not a criminal matter. We have had the admirably written testimony of Mistress Nelson that her first husband, Dr. Nisbet, told her of treating the most frightful injuries on Hodges Plantation, but there has been not one jot of evidence to indicate that those injuries were received as other than normal punishment for insubordination, for stealing, or for downright mutiny. There is no crime. No, sir, Mr. Hilton, the prosecution case, your case, rests entirely on the testimony sworn by the late Charles Manton. I must therefore cross-examine you, sir, as if you were indeed that gentleman, as it is you who introduced his evidence in the first place, as I understand it.'

  'That is correct,' Matt agreed.

  'Well, sir, still is my difficulty not resolved. I cannot ask you questions of fact, as you were not pr
esent at any of the incidents described by Mr. Manton. I can only attempt to arrive at a valuation of the truth of these accusations, at the truth, indeed, of the entire statement. For instance, sir, you have testified that you never knew Charles Manton before he appeared in Kingston and offered this testimony. May I ask why he selected you?'

  'I have already answered that question.'

  'I would like you to do so again, if you would be so kind.'

  'My opposition to the ill-treatment of slaves, and indeed of the concept of slavery, and my Wesleyan principles, were well known,' Matt said.

  'That is equally true of Dr. Coke, surely. But Manton approached you:

  'Well, sir, he approached us jointly,' Matt said. 'Dr. Coke felt, equally with Manton, that the matter would best be left to me.'

  'Because you are a Hilton? Or because you might have some ulterior motive, some much stronger motive, for wishing to see James Hodge reduced?'

  Matt silently cursed the heat he could feel gathering in his cheeks.

  'Tell the court, Mr. Hilton, if you have ever heard the name, Gislane Nicholson?' invited Mr. Corder. ‘I have heard the name,' Matt said. 'Have you met the young woman?' 'I have met her.'

  'Perhaps you knew her better than we suppose, Mr. Hilton. Did you ever, perhaps, propose marriage to the young lady?'

  There was a murmur around the court; here was a decade of rumour being turned into crystal hard fact. 'Yes, I did,' Matt said.

  'But she was a lady of colour, and a slave, to boot, absconded from Hodges, and before you could proceed with your plans she was returned to Hodge, to be punished, quite justifiably as a runaway slave. Mr. Manton says that on one occasion it was commanded by Mrs. Hodge that she be flogged, as he puts it, to death. This we may dismiss as an exaggeration, a remark of temper, as the girl was by all accounts quite incorrigible, so incorrigible, indeed, that shortly afterwards she was sold by James Hodge.' Mr. Corder allowed himself another smile. 'No doubt this was after she had been flogged to death, Mr. Hilton.'

  The court tittered.

  ‘I would presume that Mr. Hodge intervened,' Matt said.

  'What, this black-hearted murderer who is on trial here today? I find that difficult to believe. But alas, you cannot tell me, Mr. Hilton. You can tell me, however, whether I am right in supposing that it was the fact that this girl, this Gislane Nicholson, had been a slave on Hodges and the other fact that she was the same girl with whom you had planned marriage, that first encouraged Mr. Manton to bring his tale of imagined ills to you.'

  'I cannot answer for Mr. Manton's motives,' Matt said.

  Corder's smile disappeared, and his face grew red with passion. 'But you can answer for your own, sir,' he shouted. 'Come, sir, be honest with us. Tell this court, sir, whether or not you would have been prepared to indict any planter save James Hodge, whether you are not entirely driven in this matter by a desire to avenge yourself on a man who never did you any harm, sir, who but owned a slave girl to whom you had taken a fancy. Come, sir, you are under oath to speak the truth.'

  Matt stared at the lawyer.

  'Well, sir?' demanded Corder. 'Well, sir?'

  'I am trying to decide,' Matt said, speaking very carefully. 'As you say, I am under oath. Mr. Hodge's reputation for harshness is well known, and I was determined to bring the worst usages of slavery before the public notice. I think I would have proceeded against him in any event. But I would be dishonest were I not to admit there was personal feeling involved.'

  Again the rustle round the court, but now Corder was smiling once more.

  'My thanks, Mr. Hilton. You may step down.' But he remained standing, facing Payne. 'Your Lordship,' he said, 'I understand that Mr. Hilton is the last prosecution witness, and I feel that at this stage I can do nothing better than repeat the plea I made at the very beginning of this trial. I wish to save the court's time, sir, and the public money. Your Lordship, I submit there is no case here for my client to answer. The prosecudon has submitted a written testimony charging my client with the most horrific crimes, but I fail to see that they have substantiated a single one of them, that they have indeed done anything more than prove that the gentleman who instigated this accusation, Mr. Matthew Hilton, was motivated by a very personal hatred for James Hodge, which I submit must at the least have coloured his attitude towards Manton, and may sir, it is no more than a suggestion, have caused him to influence what Manton had to say. My Lord, James Hodge has committed no crime. I ask that he be dismissed.'

  'Hm,' said Sir Reginald. 'Hm.' He looked at Mr Malahine. 'There is much in what Mr. Corder says. It occurs to me that Mr. Hodge is being accused of being a planter, not a murderer. Well, then, Mr. Malahine, where would we all stand then, eh?'

  Mr. Malahine did not look particularly troubled. 'My learned friend is in error, Your Lordship, in supposing that I have finished presenting my case. I have another witness, and can only offer my apologies that I did not make this clear. But as he has deprecated the lack of any evidence against his client from planting sources, he will welcome my last testimony. Call Mr. Robert Hilton to the stand.'

  There was a moment of utterly shocked silence in the crowded courtroom which ended in a hum of muttered comment as Robert limped up the stairs and into the witness-box, and took the oath. Sir Reginald banged his desk with his gavel, and gradually the noise subsided.

  'Your full name, please, sir,' invited Mr. Malahine.

  'Robert Anthony Hilton, of Plantation Hilltop, in Jamaica.'

  'Your occupation. Mr. Hilton?' 'Planter.'

  'Have you ever met the accused, Mr. Hilton?' 'Three times. On the occasion of visits to Hodges Plantation.'

  'And will you tell the court if you ever saw any ill-treatment of the slaves, beyond what you as a planter, would consider necessary discipline?'

  'On the occasion of my first visit,' Robert said, his voice expressionless, 'I saw a young woman of mixed blood, a house slave, I believe, suspended from a triangle under sentence of death by the whip.'

  'For what offence, Mr. Hilton? Had she struck her mistress?'

  'She had attended a voodoo ceremony, I believe,' Robert said.

  'And for this she was to be flogged to death. What of your second visit?'

  'I should prefer to discuss my third. My second visit was extremely brief.' 'Yes?'

  'On this third occasion, I saw nothing myself, but I was told of events on Hodges which seemed to me to be unnecessarily harsh.'

  Corder, hitherto leaning forward with a frown, gave a short laugh and leaned back in his seat. Clearly he apprehended no danger from evidence which was but a recital of what the court had already been told, of second and third-hand rumours.

  'Will you tell the court, Mr. Hilton, who it was told you of these events?'

  Robert looked at Hodge for the first time, and almost smiled; his expression was quite terrible. 'It was Janet Hodge.'

  Corder sat bolt upright, and once again there was a complete silence in the courtroom. But heads turned, to look at Janet Hodge. She stared at them for a moment, then rose and left the room.

  'You are speaking of the defendant's wife,' Mr. Malahine said.

  'I am.'

  'Will you relate the circumstances to the court?'

  'I happened to be in Nevis on business some years after the incident I described before, and visited Hodges. I should say that I was on bad terms with Mr. and Mrs. Hodge, in that I had prevented the ill-treatment of the young woman I have spoken of, and on this occasion Mrs. Hodge took some pleasure in giving me examples, as she put it, "of her way with the blacks". She showed me a girl whose ears had been split, and a man whose member had been beaten with a stick until it was quite unable to perform its proper function.'

  'Did she mention a slave named Jeremiah?'

  'Indeed she did. Jeremiah was quite a joke with the Hodges. He had been thrown into a vat of molten molasses and there drowned. They supposed, as the molasses were later refiltered and reprocessed, that Jeremiah was now sweetening coffee throughout
Great Britain. They found this very amusing.'

  'Mr. Hilton, in your judgement, having regard to what you saw and what you were told on Hodges, is the testimony offered by Mr. Charles Manton in this statement substantially true?'

  The paper was passed up to Robert, who read it slowly and carefully, aware that every eye in the courtroom was upon him. 'I see no reason to suppose that there is any exaggeration in this statement,' he said at last.

  'I thank you, Mr. Hilton.' Mr. Malahine sat down.

  Corder stood up, moving slowly. He had in fact been whispering over the edge of the dock with his client, but clearly he did not like his situation. 'Mr. Hilton,' he said. 'Surely, sir, you do not expect this court to accept in evidence the memory of a conversation with the defendant's wife?'