by Grant Allen
Sir Gilbert breathed again. He had been recognised to no purpose. Even this positive identification fell flat upon everybody.
At last the examination and cross-examination were finished, and Guy’s counsel began his hopeless task of unravelling this tangled mass of suggestion and coincidence. He had no witnesses to call; the very nature of the case precluded that. All he could do was to cavil over details, to point out possible alternatives, to lay stress upon the absence of direct evidence, and to ask that the jury should give the prisoner the benefit of the doubt, if any doubt at all existed in their minds as to his guilt or innocence. Counsel had meant when he first undertook the case to lay great stress also on the presumed absence of motive; but, after the fatal accident which resulted in the disclosure of Montague Nevitt’s pocket-book, any argument on that score would have been worse than useless. Counsel elected rather to pass the episode by in discreet silence, and to risk everything on the uncertainty of the actual encounter.
At last he sat down, wiping his brow in despair, after what he felt himself to be a most feeble performance.
Then Sir Gilbert began, and in a very tremulous and failing voice summed briefly up the whole of the evidence.
Men who remember Gildersleeve’s old blustering manner stood aghast at the timidity with which the famous lawyer delivered himself on this, the first capital charge ever brought before him. He reminded the jury, in very solemn and almost warning tones, that where a human life was at stake, mere presumptive evidence should always carry very little weight with it. And the evidence here was all purely presumptive. The prosecution had shown nothing more than a physical possibility that the prisoner at the bar might have committed the murder. There was evidence of animus, it was true; but that evidence was weak; there was partial identification; but that identification lay open to the serious objection that all the persons who now swore to Guy Waring’s personality had sworn just as surely and confidently before to his brother Cyril’s. On the whole, the judge summed up strongly in Guy’s favour. He wiped his clammy brow and looked appealingly at the bar. As the jury would hope for justice themselves, let them remember to mete out nothing but strict justice to the accused person who now stood trembling in the dock before them.
All the court stood astonished. Could this be Gildersleeve? Atkins would never have summed up like that. Atkins would have gone in point-blank for hanging him. And everybody thought Gildersleeve would hang with the best. Nobody had suspected him till then of any womanly weakness about capital punishment. There was a solemn hush as the judge ended. Then everybody saw the unhappy man was seriously ill. Great streams of sweat trickled slowly down his brow. His eyes stared in front of him. His mouth twitched horribly. He looked like a person on the point of apoplexy. The prisoner at the bar gazed hard at him and pitied him.
“He’s dying himself, and he wants to go out with a clear conscience at last,” some one suggested in a low voice at the barristers’ table. The explanation served. It was whispered round the court in a hushed undertone that the judge to-day was on his very last legs, and had summed up accordingly. Late in life, he had learned to show mercy, as he hoped for it.
There was a deadly pause. The jury retired to consider their verdict. Two men remained behind in court, waiting breathless for their return. Two lives hung at issue in the balance while the jury deliberated. Elma Clifford, glancing with a terrified eye from one to the other, could hardly help pitying the guiltiest most. His look of mute suffering was so inexpressibly pathetic.
The twelve good men and true were gone for a full half-hour. Why, nobody knew. The case was as plain as a pikestaff, gossipers said in court. If he had been caught red-handed, he’d have been hanged without remorse. It was only the eighteen months and the South African episode that could make the jury hesitate for one moment about hanging him.
At last, a sound, a thrill, a movement by the door. Every eye was strained forward. The jury trooped back again. They took their places in silence. Sir Gilbert scanned their faces with an agonized look. It was a moment of ghastly and painful suspense. He was waiting for their verdict — on himself, and Guy Waring.
CHAPTER XLIV.
AT BAY.
Only two people in court doubted for one moment what the verdict would be. And those two were the pair who stood there on their trial. Sir Gilbert couldn’t believe the jury would convict an innocent man of the crime he himself had half unwittingly committed. Guy Waring couldn’t believe the jury would convict an innocent man of the crime he had never been guilty of. So those two doubted. To all the rest the verdict was a foregone conclusion.
Nevertheless, dead silence reigned everywhere in the court as the clerk of arraigns put the solemn question, “Gentlemen, do you find the prisoner at the bar guilty or not guilty?”
And the foreman, clearing his throat huskily, answered in a very tremulous tone, “We find him guilty of wilful murder.”
There was a long, deep pause. Every one looked at the prisoner. Guy Waring stood like one stunned by the immensity of the blow. It was an awful moment. He knew he was innocent; but he knew now the English law would hang him.
One pair of eyes in the court, however, was not fixed on Guy. Elma Clifford, at that final and supreme moment, gazed hard with all her soul at Sir Gilbert Gildersleeve. Her glance went through him. She sat like an embodied conscience before him. The judge rose slowly, his eyes riveted on hers. He was trembling with remorse, and deadlier pale than ever. An awful lividness stole over his face. His lips were contorted. His eyebrows quivered horribly. Still gazing straight at Elma, he essayed to speak. Twice he opened his parched lips. Then his voice failed him.
“I cannot accept that finding,” he said at last, in a very solemn tone, battling hard for speech against some internal enemy. “I cannot accept it. Clerk, you will enter a verdict of not guilty.”
A deep hum of surprise ran round the expectant court. Every mouth opened wide, and drew a long hushed breath. Senior counsel for the Crown jumped to his feet astonished. “But why, my lord?” he asked tartly, thus baulked of his success. “On what ground does your lordship decide to override the plain verdict of the jury?”
The pause that followed was inexpressibly terrible. Guy Waring waited for the answer in an agony of suspense. He knew what it meant now. With a rush it all occurred to him. He knew who was the murderer. But he hoped for nothing. Sir Gilbert faltered: Elma Clifford’s eyes were upon him still, compelling him. “Because,” he said at last, with a still more evident and physical effort, pumping the words out slowly, “I am here to administer justice, and justice I will administer…. This man is innocent. It was I myself who killed Montague Nevitt that day at Mambury.”
At those awful words, uttered in a tone so solemn that no one could doubt either their truth or their sincerity, a cold thrill ran responsive through the packed crowd of auditors. The silence was profound. In its midst, a boy’s voice burst forth all at once, directed, as it seemed, to the counsel for the Crown, “I said it was him,” the voice cried, in a triumphant tone. “I knowed ‘um! I knowed ‘um! Thik there’s the man that axed me the way down the dell the marnin’ o’ the murder.”
The judge turned towards the boy with a ghastly smile of enforced recognition. “You say the truth, my lad,” he answered, without any attempt at concealment. “It was I who asked you. It was I who killed him. I went round by the far gate after hearing he was there, and, cutting across the wood, I met Montague Nevitt in the path by The Tangle. I went there to meet him; I went there to confront him; but not of malice prepense to murder him. I wanted to question him about a family matter. Why I needed to question him no one henceforth shall ever know. That secret, thank Heaven, rests now in Montague Nevitt’s grave. But when I did question him, he answered me back with so foul an aspersion upon a lady who was very near and dear to me” — the judge paused a moment; he was fighting hard for breath; something within was evidently choking him. Then he went on more excitedly— “an aspersion upon a lady whom I love more
than life — an insult that no man could stand — an unspeakable foulness; and I sprang at him, the cur, in the white heat of my anger, not meaning or dreaming to hurt him seriously. I caught him by the throat.” The judge held up his hands before the whole court appealingly. “Look at those hands, gentlemen,” he cried, turning them about. “How could I ever know how hard and how strong they were? I only seemed to touch him. I just pushed him from my path. He fell at once at my feet — dead, dead unexpectedly. Remember how it all came about. The medical evidence showed his heart was weak, and he died in the scuffle. How was I to know all that? I only knew this — he fell dead before me.”
With a face of speechless awe, he paused and wiped his brow. Not a soul in court moved or breathed above a whisper. It was evident the judge was in a paroxysm of contrition. His face was drawn up. His whole frame quivered visibly. Even Elma pitied him.
“And then I did a grievous wrong,” the judge continued once more, his voice now very thick and growing rapidly thicker. “I did a grievous wrong, for which here to-day, before all this court, I humbly ask Guy Waring’s pardon. I had killed Montague Nevitt, unintentionally, unwittingly, accidentally almost, in a moment of anger, never knowing I was killing him. And if he had been a stronger or a healthier man, what little I did to him would never have killed him. I didn’t mean to murder him. For that my remorse is far less poignant. But what I did after was far worse than the murder. I behaved like a sneak — I behaved like a coward. I saw suspicion was aroused against the prisoner, Guy Waring. And what did I do then? Instead of coming forward like a man, as I ought, and saying ‘I did it,’ and standing my trial on the charge of manslaughter, I did my best to throw further suspicion on an innocent person. I made the case look blacker and worse for Guy Waring. I don’t condone my own crime. I did it for my wife’s sake and my daughter’s, I admit — but I regret it now bitterly — and am I not atoning for it? With a great humiliation, am I not amply atoning for it? I wrote an unsigned letter warning Waring at once to fly the country, as a warrant was out against him. Waring foolishly took my advice, and fled forthwith. From that day to this” — he gazed round him appealingly— “oh, friends, I have never known one happy moment.”
Guy gazed at him from the dock, where he still stood guarded by two strong policemen, and felt a fresh light break suddenly in upon him. Their positions now were almost reversed. It was he who was the accuser, and Sir Gilbert Gildersleeve, the judge in that court, who stood charged to-day on his own confession with causing the death of Montague Nevitt.
“Then it was YOU” Guy said slowly, breaking the pause at last, “who sent me that anonymous letter at Plymouth?”
“It was I,” the judge answered, in an almost inaudible, gurgling tone. “It was I who so wronged you. Can you ever forgive me for it?”
Guy gazed at him fixedly. He himself had suffered much. Cyril and Elma had suffered still more. But the judge, he felt sure, had suffered most of all of them. In this moment of relief, this moment of vindication, this moment of triumph, he could afford to be generous. “Sir Gilbert Gildersleeve, I forgive you,” he answered slowly.
The judge gazed around him with a vacant stare. “I feel cold,” he said, shivering; “very cold, very faint, too. But I’ve made all right HERE,” and he held out a document. “I wrote this paper in my room last night — in case of accident — confessing everything. I brought it down here, signed and witnessed, unread, intending to read it out if the verdict went against me — I mean, against Waring…. But I feel too weak now to read anything further…. I’m so cold, so cold. Take the paper, Forbes-Ewing. It’s all in your line. You’ll know what to do with it.” He could hardly utter a word, breath failed him so fast. “This thing has killed me,” he went on, mumbling. “I deserved it. I deserved it.”
“How about the prisoner?” the authority from the gaol asked, as the judge collapsed rather than sat down on the bench again.
Those words roused Sir Gilbert to full consciousness once more. The judge rose again, solemnly, in all the majesty of his ermine. “The prisoner is discharged,” he said, in a loud, clear voice. “I am here to do justice — justice against myself. I enter a verdict of not guilty.” Then he turned to the polices “I am your prisoner,” he went on, in a broken, rambling way. “I give myself in charge for the manslaughter of Montague Nevitt. Manslaughter, not murder. Though I don’t even admit myself, indeed, it was anything more than justifiable homicide.”
He sank back again once more, and murmured three times in his seat, as if to himself, “Justifiable homicide! Justifiable homicide! Just — ifiable homicide!”
Somebody rose in court as he sank, and moved quickly towards him. The judge recognised him at once.
“Granville Kelmscott,” he said; in a weary voice, “help me out of this. I am very, very ill. You’re a friend. I’m dying. Give me your arm! Assist me!”
CHAPTER XLV.
ALL’S WELL THAT ENDS WELL.
Granville helped him on his arm into the judge’s room amid profound silence. All the court was deeply stirred. A few personal friends hurried after him eagerly. Among them were the Warings, and Mrs. Clifford, and Elma.
The judge staggered to a seat, and held Granville’s hand long and silently in his. Then his eye caught Elma’s. He turned to her gratefully. “Thank you, young lady,” he said, in a very thick voice. “You were extremely good. I forget your name. But you helped me greatly.”
There was such a pathetic ring in those significant words, “I forget your name,” that every eye about stood dimmed with moisture. Remorse had clearly blotted out all else now from Sir Gilbert Gildersleeve’s powerful brain save the solitary memory of his great wrong-doing.
“Something’s upon his mind still,” Elma cried, looking hard at him. “He’s dying! he’s dying! But he wants to say something else before he dies, I’m certain. … Mr. Kelmscott, it’s to you. Oh, Cyril, stand back! Mother, leave them alone! I’m sure from his eye he wants to say something to Mr. Kelmscott.”
They all fell back reverently. They stood in the presence of death and of a mighty sorrow. Sir Gilbert still held Granville’s hand fast bound in his own. “It’ll kill her,” he muttered. “It’ll kill her! I’m sure it’ll kill her! She’ll never get over the thought that her father was — was the cause of Montague Nevitt’s death. And you’ll never care to marry a girl of whom people will say, either justly or unjustly, ‘She’s a murderers daughter’…. And that will kill her, too. For, Kelmscott, she loved you!”
Granville held the dying man’s hand still more gently than ever. “Sir Gilbert,” he said, leaning over him with very tender eyes, “no event on earth could ever possibly alter Gwendoline’s love for me, or my love for Gwendoline. I know you can’t live. This shock has been too much for you. But if it will make you die any the happier now to know that Gwendoline and I will still be one, I give you my sacred promise at this solemn moment, that as soon as she likes I will marry Gwendoline.” He paused for a second. “I don’t understand all this story just yet,” he went on. “But of one thing I’m certain. The sympathy of every soul in court to-day went with you as you spoke out the truth so manfully. The sympathy of all England will go with you to-morrow when they come to learn of it…. Sir Gilbert, till this morning I never admired you, much as I love Gwendoline. As you made that confession just now in court, I declare, I admired you. With all the greater confidence now will I marry your daughter.”
They carried him to the judge’s lodgings in the town, and laid him there peaceably for the doctors to tend him. For a fortnight the shadow of Gildersleeve still lingered on, growing feebler and feebler in intellect every day. But the end was certain. It was softening of the brain, and it proceeded rapidly. The horror of that unspeakable trial had wholly unnerved him. The great, strong man cried and sobbed like a baby. Lady Gildersleeve and Gwendoline were with him all through. He seldom spoke. When he did, it was generally to murmur those fixed words of exculpation, in a tremulous undertone, “It was my hands that did
it — these great, clumsy hands of mine — not I — not I. I never, never meant it. It was an accident. An accident. Justifiable homicide…. What I really regret is for that poor fellow Waring.”
And at the end of a fortnight he died, once smiling, with Gwendoline’s hand locked tight in his own, and Granville Kelmscott kneeling in tears by his bedside.
The Kelmscott property was settled by arrangement. It never came into court. With the aid of the family lawyers the three half-brothers divided it amicably. Guy wouldn’t hear of Granville’s giving up his claim to the house and park at Tilgate. Granville was to the manner born, he said, and brought up to expect it; while Cyril and he, mere waifs and strays in the world, would be much better off, even so, with their third of the property each, than they ever before in their lives could have counted upon. As for Cyril, he was too happy in Guy’s exculpation from the greater crime, and his frank explanation of the lesser — under Nevitt’s influence — to care very much in his own heart what became of Tilgate.
The only one man who objected to this arrangement was Mr. Reginald Clifford, C.M.G., of Craighton. The Companion of the Militant Saints was strongly of opinion that Cyril Waring oughtn’t to have given up his prior claim to the family mansion, even for valuable consideration elsewhere. Mr. Clifford drew himself up to the full height of his spare figure, and caught in the tight skin of his mummy-like face rather tighter than before, as he delivered himself of this profound opinion. “A man should consult his own dignity,” he said stiffly, and with great precision; “if he’s born to assume a position in the county, he should assume that position as a sacred duty. He should remember that his wife and children—”
