The House of the Whispering Pines (29 page)

A moment's pause followed, during which some of Mr. Moffat's nervousness
returned. He eyed the prisoner doubtfully, found him stoical and as
self-contained as at the beginning of his examination, and plunged into a
topic which most people had expected him to avoid. I certainly had, and
felt all the uncertainty and secret alarm which an unexpected move
occasions where the issue is momentous with life or death. I was filled
with terror, not for the man on trial, but for my secret. Was it shared
by the defence? Was Mr. Moffat armed with the knowledge I thought
confined to myself and Arthur? Had the latter betrayed the cause I had
been led to believe he was ready to risk his life to defend? Had I
mistaken his gratitude to myself; or had I underrated Mr. Moffat's
insight or powers of persuasion? We had just been made witness to one
triumph on the part of this able lawyer in a quarter deemed unassailable
by the prosecution. Were we about to be made witnesses of another? I felt
the sweat start on my forehead, and was only able to force myself into
some show of self-possession by the evident lack of perfect assurance
with which this same lawyer now addressed his client.

The topic which had awakened in me these doubts and consequent agitation
will appear from the opening question.

"Mr. Cumberland, to return to the night of your sister's death. Can you
tell us what overcoat you put on when leaving your house?"

Arthur was as astonished and certainly as disconcerted, if not as
seriously alarmed, as I was, by this extraordinary move. Surprise, anger,
then some deeper feeling rang in his voice as he replied:

"I cannot. I took down the first I saw and
the first hat."

The emphasis placed on the last three words may have been meant as a
warning to his audacious counsel, but if so, it was not heeded.

"Took down? Took down from where?"

"From the rack in the hall where I hang my things; the side hall leading
to the door where we usually go out."

"Have you many coats—overcoats, I mean?"

"More than one."

"And you do not know which one you put on that cold night?"

"I do not."

"But you know what one you wore back?"

"No."

Short, sharp, and threatening was this
no
. A war was on between this
man and his counsel, and the wonder it occasioned was visible in every
eye. Perhaps Mr. Moffat realised this; this was what he had dreaded,
perhaps. At all events, he proceeded with his strange task, in apparent
oblivion of everything but his own purpose.

"You do not know what one you wore back?"

"I do not."

"You have seen the hat and coat which have been shown here and sworn to
as being the ones in which you appeared on your return to the house, the
day following your sister's murder?"

"I have."

"Also the hat and coat found on a remote hook in the closet under the
stairs, bearing the flour-mark on its under brim?"

"Yes, that too."

"Yet cannot say which of these two overcoats you put on when you left
your home, an hour or so after finishing your dinner?"

Trapped by his own lawyer—visibly and remorselessly trapped! The blood,
shooting suddenly into the astounded prisoner's face, was reflected on
the cheeks of the other lawyers present. Even Mr. Fox betrayed his
surprise; but it was a surprise not untinged by apprehension. Mr. Moffat
must feel very sure of himself to venture thus far. I, who feared to ask
myself the cause of this assurance, could only wait and search the
partially visible face of little Ella for an enlightenment, which was no
more to be found there than in the swollen features of the outraged
Arthur. The excitement which this event caused, afforded the latter some
few moments in which to quell his own indignation; and when he spoke, it
was passionately, yet not without some effort at restraint.

"I cannot. I was in no condition to notice. I was bent on going into
town, and immediately upon coming downstairs went straight to the rack
and pulled on the first things that offered."

It appeared to be a perfect give-a-way. And it was, but it was a
give-a-way which, I feared, threatened Carmel rather than her brother.

Mr. Moffat, still nervous, still avoiding the prisoner's eye,
relentlessly pursued his course, unmindful—wilfully so, it appeared—of
the harm he was doing himself, as well as the witness.

"Mr. Cumberland, were a coat and hat all that you took from that hall?"

"No, I took a key—a key from the bunch which I saw lying on the table."

"Did you recognise this key?"

"I did."

"What key was it?"

"It belonged to Mr. Ranelagh, and was the key to the club-house
wine-vault."

"Where did you put it after taking it up?"

"In my trousers' pocket."

"What did you do then?"

"Went out, of course."

"Without seeing anybody?"

"Of course. Whom should I see?"

It was angrily said, and the flush, which had begun to die away, slowly
made its way back into his cheeks.

"Are you willing to repeat that you saw no one?"

"There was no one."

A lie! All knew it, all felt it. The man was perjuring himself, under his
own counsel's persistent questioning on a point which that counsel had
evidently been warned by him to avoid. I was assured of this by the way
Moffat failed to meet Arthur's eye, as he pressed on hastily, and in a
way to forestall all opposition.

"There are two ways of leaving your house for the city. Which way did
you take?"

"The shortest. I went through my neighbour's grounds to Huested Street."

"Immediately?"

"As soon as I could. I don't know what you mean by immediately."

"Didn't you stop at the stable?"

A pause, during which more than one person present sat breathless. These
questions were what might be expected from Mr. Fox in cross-examination.
They seemed totally unsuited to a direct examination at the hands of his
own counsel. What did such an innovation mean?

"Yes, I stopped at the stable."

"What to do?"

"To look at the horses."

"Why?"

"One of them had gone lame. I wanted to see his condition."

"Was it the grey mare?"

Had the defence changed places with the prosecution? It looked like it;
and Arthur looked as if he considered Mr. Moffat guilty of the unheard
of, inexplainable act, of cross-examining his own witness. The situation
was too tempting for Mr. Fox to resist calling additional attention to
it. With an assumption of extreme consideration, he leaned forward and
muttered under his breath to his nearest colleague, but still loud enough
for those about him to hear:

"The prisoner must know that he is not bound to answer questions when
such answers tend to criminate him.".

A lightning glance, shot in his direction, was the eloquent advocate's
sole reply.

But Arthur, nettled into speaking, answered the question put him, in a
loud, quick tone: "It was not the grey mare; but I went up to the grey
mare before going out; I patted her and bade her be a good girl."

"Where was she then?"

"Where she belonged—in her stall."

The tones had sunk; so had the previously lifted head; he no longer
commanded universal sympathy or credence. The effect of his former
avowals was almost gone.

Yet Mr. Moffat could smile. As I noticed this, and recognised the
satisfaction it evinced, my heart went down, in great trouble. This
esteemed advocate, the hero of a hundred cases, was not afraid to have it
known that Arthur had harnessed that mare; he even wanted it known. Why?
There could be but one answer to that—or, so I thought, at the moment.
The next, I did not know what to think; for he failed to pursue this
subject, and simply asked Arthur if, upon leaving, he had locked the
stable-door.

"Yes—no,—I don't remember," was the bungling, and greatly
confused reply.

Mr. Moffat glanced at the jury, the smile still on his lips. Did he wish
to impress that body with the embarrassment of his client?

"Relate what followed. I am sure the jury will be glad to hear your story
from your own lips."

"It's a beastly one, but if I've got to tell it, here it is: I went
straight down to Cuthbert Road and across the fields to the club-house. I
had not taken the key to the front door, because I knew of a window I
could shake loose. I did this and went immediately down to the
wine-vault. I used an electric torch of my own for light. I pulled out
several bottles, and carried them up into the kitchen, meaning to light
the gas, kindle a fire, and have a good time generally. But I soon found
that I must do without light if I stayed there. The meter had been taken
out; and to drink by the flash of an electric torch was anything but a
pleasing prospect. Besides—" here he flashed at his counsel a glance,
which for a moment took that gentleman aback—"I had heard certain vague
sounds in the house which alarmed me, as well as roused my curiosity.
Choosing the bottle I liked best, I went to investigate these sounds."

Mr. Moffat started. His witness was having his revenge. Kept in
ignorance of his counsel's plan of defence, he was evidently advancing
testimony new to that counsel. I had not thought the lad so subtle, and
quaked in secret contemplation of the consequences. So did some others;
but the interest was intense. He had heard sounds—he acknowledged it.
But what sounds?

Observing the excitement he had caused, and gratified, perhaps, that he
had succeeded in driving that faint but unwelcome smile from Mr. Moffat's
lips, Arthur hastened to add:

"But I did not complete my investigations. Arrived at the top of the
stairs, I heard what drove me from the house at once. It was my sister's
voice—Adelaide's. She was in the building, and I stood almost on a
level with her, with a bottle in my pocket. It did not take me a minute
to clamber through the window. I did not stop to wonder, or ask why she
was there, or to whom she was speaking. I just fled and made my way as
well as I could across the golf-links to a little hotel on Cuthbert Road,
where I had been once before. There I emptied my bottle, and was so
overcome by it that I did not return home till noon the next day. It was
on the way to the Hill that I was told of the awful occurrence which had
taken place in the club-house after I had left it. That sobered me. I
have been sober ever since."

Mr. Moffat's smile came back. One might have said that he had been rather
pleased than otherwise by the introduction of this unexpected testimony.

But I doubt if any one but myself witnessed this evidence of
good-humour on his part. Arthur's attitude and Arthur's manner had
drawn all eyes to himself. As the last words I have recorded left his
lips, he had raised his head and confronted the jury with a
straightforward gaze. The sturdiness and immobility of his aspect were
impressive, in spite of his plain features and the still unmistakable
signs of long cherished discontent and habitual dissipation. He had
struck bottom with his feet, and there he would stand,—or so I
thought as I levelled my own glances at him.

But I had not fully sounded all of Alonzo Moffat's resources. That
inscrutable lawyer and not-easily-to-be-understood man seemed determined
to mar every good impression his unfortunate client managed to make.

Ignoring the new facts just given, undoubtedly thinking that they would
be amply sifted in the coming cross-examination, he drew the attention of
the prisoner to himself by the following question:

"Will you tell us again how many bottles of wine you took from the
club-house?"

"One. No—I'm not sure about that—I'm not sure of anything. I had only
one when at the inn in Cuthbert Road."

"You remember but one?"

"I had but one. One was enough. I had trouble in carrying that."

"Was the ground slippery?"

"It was snowy and it was uneven. I stumbled more than once in crossing
the links."

"Mr. Cumberland, is there anything you would like to say in your own
defence before I close this examination?"

The prisoner thus appealed to, let his eye rest for a moment on the
judge, then on the jury, and finally on one little white face lifted from
the crowd before him as if to meet and absorb his look. Then he
straightened himself, and in a quiet and perfectly natural voice, uttered
these simple words:

"Nothing but this: I am innocent."

I alit
On a great ship lightning-split,
And speeded hither on the sigh
Of one who gave an enemy
His plank, then plunged aside to die.

Prometheus Unbound
.

Recess followed. Clifton and I had the opportunity of exchanging a few
words. He was voluble; I was reticent. I felt obliged to hide from him
the true cause of the deep agitation under which I was labouring.
Attached as he was to me, keenly as he must have felt my anomalous
position, he was too full of Moffat's unwarrantable introduction of
testimony damaging to his client, to think or talk of anything else.

"He has laid him open to attack on every side. Fox has but to follow his
lead, and the thing is done. Poor Arthur may be guilty, but he certainly
should have every chance a careful lawyer could give him. You can see—he
makes it very evident—that he has no further use for Moffat. I wonder
under whose advice he chose him for his counsel. I have never thought
much of Moffat, myself. He wins his cases but—"

"He will win this," I muttered.

Clifton started; looked at me very closely for a minute, paled a
little—I fear that I was very pale myself—but did not ask the question
rising to his lips.

"There is method in the madness of a man like that," I pursued with a
gloom I could not entirely conceal. "He has come upon some evidence which
he has not even communicated to his client. At least, I fear so. We must
be prepared for any untoward event." Then, noticing Clifton's alarm and
wishing to confine it within safe bounds, I added: "I feel that I am
almost as much on trial as Arthur himself. Naturally I am anxious at the
appearance of anything I do not understand."