The Trail of the Serpent/Book 6/Chapter 6
Chapter VI.
The End of the dark Road.
Once more Slopperton-on-the-Sloshy rang with a subject dismissed from the public mind eight years ago, and now revived with a great deal more excitement and discussion than ever. That subject was, the murder of Mr. Montague Harding. All Slopperton made itself into one voice, and spoke but upon one theme—the pending trial of another man for that very crime of which Richard Marwood had been found guilty years ago—Richard, who, according to report, had died in an attempt to escape from the county asylum.
Very little was known of the criminal, but a great deal was conjectured; a great deal more was invented; and ultimately, most conflicting reports were spread abroad by the citizens of Slopperton, every one of whom had his particular account of the seizure of De Marolles, and every one of whom stood to his view of the case with a pertinacity and fortitude worthy of a better cause. Thus, if you went into High Street, entering that thoroughfare from the Market-place, you would hear how this De Marolles was a French nobleman, who had crossed the Channel in an open boat on the night of the murder, walked from Dover to Slopperton—(not above two hundred miles by the shortest cut)—and gone back to Calais in the same manner. If, staggered by the slight discrepancies of time and place in this account of the transaction, you pursued your inquiries a little further down the same street, you would very likely be told that De Marolles was no Frenchman at all, but the son of a clergyman in the next county, whose unfortunate mother was at that moment on her knees in the throne-room at Buckingham Palace, soliciting his pardon on account of his connection with the clerical interest. If this story struck you as more romantic than probable, you had only to turn the corner into Little Market Street—(rather a low neighbourhood, and chiefly inhabited by butchers and the tripe and cow-heel trade)—and you might sup full of horrors, the denizens of this locality labouring under the fixed conviction that the prisoner then lying in Slopperton gaol was neither more nor less than a distinguished burglar, long the scourge of the united kingdoms of Great Britain and Ireland, and guilty of outrages and murders innumerable.
There were others who confined themselves to animated and detailed descriptions of the attempted escape and capture of the accused. These congregated at street-corners, and disputed and gesticulated in little groups, one man often dropping back from his companions, and taking a wide berth on the pavement, to give his particular story the benefit of illustrative action. Some stories told how the prisoner had got half-way to America concealed in the paddle wheel of a screw steamer; others gave an animated account of his having been found hidden in the corner of the engine-room, where he had lain concealed for fourteen days without either bite or sup. Others told you he had been furled up in the foretopsail of an American man-of-war; others related how he had made the passage in the maintop of the same vessel, only descending in the dead of the night for his meals, and paying the captain of the ship a quarter of a million of money for the accommodation. As to the sums of money he had embezzled in his capacity of banker, they grew with every hour; till at last Slopperton turned up its nose at anything under a billion for the sum total of his plunder.
The assizes were looked forward to with such eager expectation and interest as never had been felt about any other assizes within the memory of living Slopperton; and the judges and barristers on this circuit were the envy of judges and barristers on other circuits, who said bitterly, that no such case ever came across their way, and that it was like Prius Q.C.'s luck to be counsel for the prosecution in such a trial; and that if Nisi, whom the Count de Marolles had intrusted with his defence, didn't get him off, he, Nisi, deserved to be hung in lieu of his client.
It seemed a strange and awful instance of retributive justice that Raymond Marolles, having been taken in his endeavour to escape in the autumn of the year, had to await the spring assizes of the following year for his trial, and had, therefore, to drag out even a longer period in his solitary cell than Richard Marwood, the innocent victim of circumstantial evidence, had done years before.
Who shall dare to enter this man's cell? Who shall dare to look into this hardened heart? Who shall follow the dark and terrible speculations of this perverted intellect?
At last the time, so welcome to the free citizens of Slopperton, and so very unwelcome to some of the denizens in the gaol, who preferred awaiting their trial in that retreat to crossing the briny ocean for an unlimited period as the issue of that trial—at last, the assize time came round once more. Once more the tip-top Slopperton hotels were bewilderingly gay with elegant young barristers and grave grey-headed judges. Once more the criminal court was one vast sea of human heads, rising wave on wave to the very roof; and once more every eager eye was turned towards the dock in which stood the elegant and accomplished Raymond, Count de Marolles, alias Jabez North, sometime pauper of the Slopperton-on-the-Sloshy Union, afterwards usher in the academy of Dr. Tappenden, charged with the wilful murder of Montague Harding, also of Slopperton, eight years before.
The first point the counsel for the prosecution endeavoured to prove to the minds of the jury was the identity of Raymond de Marolles, the Parisian, with Jabez North, the pauper school-boy. This hinged chiefly upon his power to disprove the supposed death of Jabez North, in which all Slopperton had hitherto firmly believed. Dr. Tappenden had stood by his usher's corpse. How, then, could that usher be alive and before the Slopperton jury to-day? But there were plenty to certify that here he was in the flesh—this very Jabez North, whom so many people remembered, and had been in the habit of seeing, eight years ago. They were ready to identify him, in spite of his dark hair and eyebrows. On the other hand, there were some who had seen the body of the suicide, found by Peters the detective, on the heath outside Slopperton; and these were as ready to declare that the afore-mentioned body was the body of Jabez North, the usher to Dr. Tappenden, and none other. But when a rough-looking man, with a mangy fur cap in his band, and two greasy locks of hair carefully twisted into limp curls on either side of his swarthy face, which curls were known to his poetically and figuratively-disposed friends as Newgate knockers—when this man, who gave his name to the jury as Slithery Bill—or, seeing the jury didn't approve of this cognomen, Bill Withers, if they liked it better—was called into the witness-box, his evidence, sulkily and rather despondingly given, as from one who says, "It may be my turn next," threw quite a new light upon the subject.
Bill Withers was politely asked if he remembered the summer of 18—. Yes; Mr. Withers could remember the summer of 18—; was out of work that summer, and made the marginal remark that "them as couldn't live might starve or steal, for all Slopperton folks cared."
Was again politely asked if he remembered doing one particular job of work that summer.
Did remember it—made the marginal remark, "and it was a jolly queer dodge as ever a cove had a hand in."
Was asked to be good enough to state what the particular job was.
Assented to the request with a polite nod of the head, and proceeded to smooth his Newgate knockers, and fold his arms on the ledge of the witness-box prior to stating his case; then cleared his throat, and commenced discursively, thus,—
"Vy, it vas as this 'ere—I vas out of work. I does up small gent's gardens in the spring, and tidies and veeds and rakes and hoes 'em a bit, back and front, vhen I can get it to do, vich ain't often; and bein' out of vork, and old Mother Thingamy, down Blind Peter, she ses to me, vich she vas a vicked old 'ag, she ses to me, 'I've got a job for them as asks no questions, and don't vant to be told no lies;' by vich remark, and the vay of her altogether, I knowed she veren't up to no good; so I ses, 'You looks here, mother; if it's a job a respectable young man, vot's out o' vork, and ain't had a bite or sup since the day afore yesterday, can do vith a clear conscience, I'll do it—if it ain't, vy I von't. There!'" Having recorded which heroic declaration, Mr. William Withers wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, and looked round the court, as much as to say, "Let Slopperton be proud of such a citizen."
"'Don't you go to flurry your tender constitution and do yourself a unrecoverable injury,' the old cat made reply; 'it's a job as the parson of the parish might do, if he'd got a truck.' 'A truck?' I ses; 'is it movin' boxes you're making this 'ere palaver about?' 'Never you mind vether it's boxes or vether it ain't; vill you do it?' she ses; 'vill you do it, and put a sovring in your pocket, and never go for to split, unless you vant that precious throat of yours slit some fine evenin'?'"
"And you consented to do what she required of you?" suggested the counsel.
"Vell, I don't know about that," replied Mr. Withers, "but I undertook the job. 'So,' ses she, that's the old un, she ses, 'you bring a truck down by that there broken buildin' ground at the back of Blind Peter at ten o'clock to-night, and you keep yourself quiet till you hears a vhistle; ven you hears a vhistle,' she ses, 'bring your truck around agin our front door. This here's all you've got to do,' she ses, 'besides keepin' your tongue between your teeth.' 'All right,' I ses, and off I goes to see if there was any cove as would trust me with a truck agen the evenin'. Vell, I finds the cove, vich, seein' I wanted it bad, he stood out for a bob and a tanner for the loan of it."
"Perhaps the jury would wish to be told what sum of money—I conclude it is money—a bob and a tanner represent?" said the counsel.
"They must be a jolly ignorant lot, then, anyways," replied Mr. Withers, with more candour than circumlocution. "Any infant knows eighteenpence ven it's showed him."
"Oh, a bob and a tanner are eighteenpence? Very good," said the counsel, encouragingly; "pray go on, Mr. Withers."
"Vell, ten o'clock come, and veren't it a precious stormy night, that's all; and there I was a-vaitin' a-sittin' on this blessed truck at the back of Blind Peter, vich vos my directions. At last the vhistle come, and a precious cautious vhistle it vas too, as soft as a niteingel vot's payin' its addresses to another niteingel; and round I goes to the front, as vos my directions. There, agen' her door, stands the old 'ag, and agen her stands a young man in an old ragged pair of trousis an' a shirt. Lookin' him hard in the face, who does I see but Jim, the old un's grandson; so I ses, 'Jim!' friendly like, but he makes no reply; and then the old un ses, 'Lend this young gent a 'and 'ere, vill yer?' So in I goes, and there on the bed I sees something rolled up very careful in a old counterpane. It giv' me a turn like, and I didn't much like the looks of it; but I ses nothink; and then the young man, Jim, as I thinks, ses, 'Lend us a hand with this 'ere, vill yer?' and it giv'd me another turn like, for though it's Jim's face, somehow it ain't quite Jim's voice—more genteel and fine like; but I goes up to the bed, and I takes hold of von end of vot lays there; and then I gets turn number three— for I find my suspicions was correct—it was a dead body!"
"A dead body?"
"Yes; but who's it vos there vos no knowin', it vos wrapped up in that manner. But I feels myself turn dreadful vhite, and I ses, 'If this ere's anythink wrong, I vashes my hands ov it, and you may do your dirty vork yourself.' I hadn't got the vords out afore this 'ere young man, as I thought at first vos Jim, caught me by the throat sudden, and threw me down on my knee. I ain't a baby; but, lor', I vos nothink in his grasp, though his hand vos as vite and as deliket as a young lady's. 'Now, you just look 'ere,' he says; and I looked, as vell as I could, vith my eyes a-startin' out ov of my head in cosekence of bein' just upon the choke, 'you see vot this is,' and vith his left hand he takes a pistol out ov his pocket; 'you refuse to do vot ve vant done, or you go for to be noisy or in any vay ill-conwenient, and it's the last time as ever you'll have the chance ov so doing. Get up,' he says, as if I vos a dog; and I gets up, and I agrees to do vot he vants, for there vas that there devil in that young man's hye, that I began to think it vos best not to go agen him."
Here Mr. Withers paused for refreshment after his exertion and blew his nose very deliberately on a handkerchief which, from its dilapidated condition, resembled a red cotton cabbage-net. Silence reigned throughout the crowded court, broken only by the scratching of the pen with which the counsel for the defence was taking notes of the evidence, and the fluttering of the leaves of the reporters' pocket-books, as they threw off page after page of flimsy paper.
The prisoner at the bar looked straight before him; the firmly-compressed lips had never once quivered, the golden fringed eyelashes had never drooped.
"Can you tell me," said the counsel for the prosecution, "whether you have ever, since that night, seen this young man, who so closely resembled your old friend, Jim?"
"Never seen him since, to my knowledge"—there was a flutter in the crowded court, as if every spectator had simultaneously drawn a long breath—"till to-day."
"Till to-day?" said the counsel. This time it was more than a flutter, it was a subdued murmur that ran through the listening crowd.
"Be good enough to say if you can see him at this present moment."
"I can," replied Mr. Withers. "That's him! or my name ain't vot I've been led to believe it is." And he pointed with a dirty but decided finger at the prisoner at the bar.
The prisoner slightly elevated his arched eyebrows superciliously, as if he would say, "This is a pretty sort of witness to hang a man of my standing."
"Be so good as to continue your story," said the counsel.
"Vell, I does vot he tells me, and I lays the body, vith his 'elp, on the truck. 'Now,' he ses, 'follow this 'ere old voman and do everythink vot she tells you, or you'll find it considerably vorse for your future 'appiness;' vith vich he slams the door upon me, the old un, and the truck, and I sees no more of 'im. Vell, I follows the old un through a lot o' lanes and back slums, till ve leaves the town behind, and gets right out upon the 'eath; and ve crosses over the 'eath, till ve comes to vere it's precious lonely, yet the hedge of the pathway like; and 'ere she tells me as ve're to leave the body, and 'ere ve shifts it off the truck and lays it down upon the grass, vich it vas a-rainin' 'eavens 'ard, and a-thunderin' and a-lightnin' like von o'clock. 'And now,' she ses, 'vot you've got to do is to go back from vheres you come from, and lose no time about it; and take notice,' she ses, 'if ever you speaks or jabbers about this 'ere business, it'll be the end of your jabberin' in this world,' vith vitch she looks at me like a old vitch as she vos, and points vith her skinny arm down the road. So I valks my chalks, but I doesn't valk 'em very far, and presently I sees the old 'ag a-runnin' back tovards the town as fast as ever she could tear. 'Ho!' I ses, 'you are a nice lot, you are; but I'll see who's dead, in spite of you.' So I crawls up to vere ve'd left the body, and there it vos sure enuff, but all uncovered now, the face a-starin' up at the black sky, and it vos dressed, as far as I could make out, quite like a gentleman, all in black, but it vos so jolly dark I couldn't see the face, vhen all of a sudden, vhile I vos a-kneelin' down and lookin' at it, there comes von of the longest flashes of lightnin' as I ever remember, and in the blue light I sees the face plainer than I could have seen it in the day. I thought I should have fell down all of a-heap. It vos Jim! Jim hisself, as I knowed as well as I ever knowed myself, dead at my feet! My first thought vos as how that young man as vos so like Jim had murdered him; but there vorn't no marks of wiolence novheres about the body. Now, I hadn't in my own mind any doubts as how it vos Jim; but still, I ses to myself, I ses, 'Everythink seems topsy-turvy like this night, so I'll be sure;' so I takes up his arm, and turns up his coat-sleeve. Now, vy I does this is this 'ere: there vos a young voman Jim vos uncommon fond ov, vhich her name vos Bess, though he and many more called her, for short, Sillikens: and von day vhen me and Jim vos at a public, ve happened to fall in vith a sailor, vot ve'd both knowed afore he vent to sea. So he vos a-tellin' of us his adventures and such-like, and then he said promiscus, 'I'll show you somethin' pretty;' and sure enuff, he slipped up the sleeve ov his Garnsey, and there, all over his arm, vos all manner ov sort ov picters done vith gunpowder, such as ankers, and Rule Britannias, and ships in full sail on the backs of flyin' alligators. So Jim takes quite a fancy to this 'ere, and he ses, 'I vish, Joe (the sailor's name bein' Joe), I vish, Joe, as how you'd do me my young voman's name and a wreath of roses on my arm, like that there.' Joe ses, 'And so I vill, and velcome.' And sure enuff, a veek or two artervards, Jim comes to me vith his arm like a picter-book, and Bess as large as life just above the elber-joint. So I turns up his coat-sleeve, and vaits for a flash ov lightnin'. I hasn't to vait long, and there I reads, 'B.E.S.S.' 'There ain't no doubt now,' I ses, 'this 'ere's Jim, and there's some willany or other in it, vot I ain't up to.'"
"Very good," said the counsel; "we may want you again by-and-by, I think, Mr. Withers; but for the present you may retire."
The next witness called was Dr. Tappenden, who related the circumstances of the admission of Jabez North into his household, the high character he had from the Board of the Slopperton Union, and the confidence reposed in him.
"You placed great trust, then, in this person?" asked the counsel for the prosecution.
"The most implicit trust," replied the schoolmaster; "so much so, that he was frequently employed by me to collect subscriptions for a public charity of which I was the treasurer—the Slopperton Orphan Asylum. I think it only right to mention this, as on one occasion it was the cause of his calling upon the unfortunate gentleman who was murdered."
"Indeed! Will you be so good as to relate the circumstance?"
"I think it was about three days before the murder, when, one morning, at a little before twelve o'clock—that being the time at which my pupils are dismissed from their studies for an hour's recreation—I said to him, 'Mr. North, I should like you to call upon this Indian gentleman, who is staying with Mrs. Marwood, and whose wealth is so much talked of"
"Pardon me. You said, 'whose wealth is so much talked of.' Can y ou swear to having made that remark?"
"I can."
"Pray continue," said the counsel.
"'I should like you,' I said, 'to call upon this Mr. Harding, and solicit his aid for the Orphan Asylum; we are sadly in want of funds. I know, North, your heart is in the work, and you will plead the cause of the orphans successfully. You have an hour before dinner; it is some distance to the Black Mill, but you can walk fast there and back.' He went accordingly, and on his return brought a five-pound note, which Mr. Harding had given him."
Dr. Tappenden proceeded to describe the circumstance of the death of the little boy in the usher's apartment, on the very night of the murder. One of the servants was examined, who slept on the same floor as North, and who said she had heard strange noises in his room that night, but had attributed the noises to the fact of the usher sitting up to attend upon the invalid. She was asked what were the noises she had heard.
"I heard some one open the window, and shut it a long while after."
"How long do you imagine the interval to have been between the opening and shutting of the window?" asked the counsel.
"About two hours," she replied, "as far as I could guess."
The next witness for the prosecution was the old servant, Martha.
"Can you remember ever having seen the prisoner at the bar?"
The old woman put on her spectacles, and steadfastly regarded the elegant Monsieur de Marolles, or Jabez North, as his enemies insisted on calling him. After a very deliberate inspection of that gentleman's personal advantages, rather trying to the feelings of the spectators, Mrs. Martha Jones said, rather obscurely—
"He had light hair then."
"'He had light hair then.' You mean, I conclude," said the counsel, "that at the time of your first seeing the prisoner, his hair was of a different colour from what it is now. Supposing that he had dyed his hair, as is not an uncommon practice, can you swear that you have seen him before to-day?"
"I can."
"On what occasion?" asked the counsel.
"Three days before the murder of my mistress's poor brother. I opened the gate for him. He was very civil-spoken, and admired the garden very much, and asked me if he might look about it a little."
"He asked you to allow him to look about the garden? Pray was this as he went in, or as he went out?"
"It was when I let him out."
"And how long did he stay with Mr. Harding?"
"Not more than ten minutes. Mr. Harding was in his bedroom; he had a cabinet in his bedroom in which he kept papers and money, and he used to transact all his business there, and sometimes would be there till dinner-time."
"Did the prisoner see him in his bedroom?"
"He did. I showed him upstairs myself."
"Was anybody in the bedroom with Mr. Harding when he saw the prisoner?"
"Only his coloured servant: he was always with him."
"And when you showed the prisoner out, he asked to be allowed to look at the garden? Was he long looking about?"
"Not more than five minutes. He looked more at the house than the garden. I noticed him looking at Mr. Harding's window, which is on the first floor; he took particular notice of a very fine creeper that grows under the window."
"Was the window, on the night of the murder, fastened, or not?"
"It never was fastened. Mr. Harding always slept with his window a little way open."
After Martha had been dismissed from the witness-box, the old servant of Mr. Harding, the Lascar, who had been found living with a gentleman in London, was duly sworn, prior to being examined.
He remembered the prisoner at the bar, but made the same remark as Martha had done, about the change in colour of his hair,
"You were in the room with your late master when the prisoner called upon him?" asked the counsel.
"I was."
"Will you state what passed between the prisoner and your master?"
"It is scarcely in my power to do so. At that time I understood no English. My master was seated at his cabinet, looking over papers and accounts. I fancy the prisoner asked him for money. He showed him papers both printed and written. My master opened a pocket-book filled with notes, the pocket-book afterwards found on his nephew, and gave the prisoner a bank note. The prisoner appeared to make a good impression on my late master, who talked to him in a very cordial manner. As he was leaving the room, the prisoner made some remark about me, and I thought from the tone of his voice, he was asking a question."
"You thought he was asking a question?"
"Yes. In the Hindostanee language we have no interrogative form of speech, we depend entirely on the inflexion of the voice; our ears are therefore more acute than an Englishman's. I am certain he asked my master some questions about me."
"And your master?"
"After replying to him, turned to me, and said, 'I am telling this gentleman what a faithful fellow you are, Mujeebez, and how you always sleep in my dressing-room.'"
"You remember nothing more?"
"Nothing more."
The Indian's deposition, taken in the hospital at the time of the trial of Richard Marwood, was then read over to him. He certified to the truth of this deposition, and left the witness-box.
The landlord of the Bargeman's Delight, Mr. Darley, and Mr. Peters (the latter by an interpreter), were examined, and the story of the quarrel and the lost Indian coin was elicited, making considerable impression on the jury.
There was only one more witness for the crown, and this was a young man, a chemist, who had been an apprentice at the time of the supposed death of Jabez North, and who had sold to him a few days before that supposed suicide the materials for a hair-dye.
The counsel for the prosecution then summed up.
It is not for us to follow him through the twistings and windings of a very complicated mass of evidence; he had to prove the identity of Jabez North with the prisoner at the bar, and he had to prove that Jabez North was the murderer of Mr. Montague Harding. To the mind of every spectator in that crowded court he succeeded in proving both.
In vain the prisoner's counsel examined and cross-examined the witnesses.
The witnesses for the defence were few. A Frenchman, who represented himself as a Chevalier of the Legion of Honour, failed signally in an endeavour to prove an alibi, and considerably damaged the defence. Other witnesses appeared, who swore to having known the prisoner in Paris the year of the murder. They could not say they had seen him during the November of that year—it might have been earlier, it might have been later. On being cross-examined, they broke down ignominiously, and acknowledged that it might not have been that year at all. But they had known him in Paris about that period. They had always believed him to be a Frenchman. They had always understood that his father fell at Waterloo, in the ranks of the Old Guard. On cross-examination they all owned to having heard him at divers periods speak English. He had, in fact, spoken it fluently, yes, even like an Englishman. On further cross-examination it also appeared that he did not like being thought an Englishman; that he would insist vehemently upon his French extraction; that nobody knew who he was, or whence he came; and that all any one did know of him was what he himself had chosen to state.
The defence was long and laboured. The prisoner's counsel did not enter into the question of the murder having been committed by Jabez North, or not having been committed by Jabez North. What he endeavoured to show was, that the prisoner at the bar was not Jabez North; but that he was a victim to one of those cases of mistaken identity of which there are so many on record both in English and foreign criminal archives. He cited the execution of the Frenchman Joseph Lesurges, for the murder of the Courier of Lyons. He spoke of the case of Elizabeth Canning, in which a crowd of witnesses on either side persisted in supporting entirely conflicting statements, without any evident motive whatsoever. He endeavoured to dissect the evidence of Mr. William Withers; he sneered at that worthy citizen's wholesale slaughter of the English of her most gracious Majesty and subjects. He tried to overthrow that gentleman by ten minutes on the wrong side of the Slopperton clocks; he did his best to damage him by puzzling him as to whether the truck he spoke of had two legs and one wheel, or two wheels and one leg: but he tried in vain. Mr. Withers was not to be damaged; he stood as firm as a rock, and still swore that he carried the dead body of Jim Lomax out of Blind Peter and on to the heath, and that the man who commanded him so to do was the prisoner at the bar. Neither was Mr. Augustus Darley to be damaged; nor yet the landlord of the Bargeman's Delight, who, in spite of all cross-examination, preserved a gloomy and resolute attitude, and declared that "that young man at the bar, which his hair was then light, had a row with a young woman in the tap-room, and throwed that there gold coin to her, which she chucked it back savage." In short, the defence, though it lasted two hours and a half, was a very lame one; and a close observer might have seen one flash from the blue eyes of the man standing at the bar, which glanced in the direction of the eloquent Mr. Prius, Q.C., as he uttered the last words of his peroration, revengeful and murderous enough, brief though it was, to give to the spectator some idea that the Count de Marolles, innocent and injured victim of circumstantial evidence as he might be, was not the safest person in the world to offend.
The judge delivered his charge to the jury, and they retired.
There was breathless impatience in the court for three-quarters of an hour; such impatience that the three-quarters seemed to be three entire hours, and some of the spectators would have it that the clock had stopped. Once more the jury took their places.
"Guilty!" A recommendation to mercy? No! Mercy was not for such as he. Not man's mercy. Oh, Heaven be praised that there is One whose mercy is as far above the mercy of the tenderest of earth's creatures as heaven is above that earth. Who shall say where is the man so wicked he may not hope for compassion there?
The judge put on the black cap and delivered the sentence.
"To be hanged by the neck!"
The Count de Marolles looked round at the crowd. It was beginning to disperse, when he lifted his slender ringed white hand. He was about to speak. The crowd, swaying hither and thither before, stopped as one man. As one man, nay, as one surging wave of the ocean, changed, in a breath, to stone. He smiled a bitter mocking defiant smile.
"Worthy citizens of Slopperton," he said, his clear enunciation ringing through the building distinct and musical, "I thank you for the trouble you have taken this day on my account. I have played a great game, and I have lost a great stake; but, remember, I first won that stake, and for eight years held it and enjoyed it. I have been the husband of one of the most beautiful and richest women in France. I have been a millionaire, and one of the wealthiest merchant princes of the wealthy south. I started from the workhouse of this town; I never in my life had a friend to help me or a relation to advise me. To man I owe nothing. To God I owe only this, a will as indomitable as the stars He made, which have held their course through all time. Unloved, unaided, unprayed for, unwept; motherless, fatherless, sisterless, brotherless, friendless; I have taken my own road, and have kept to it; defying the earth on which I have lived, and the unknown Powers above my head. That road has come to an end, and brought me—here! So be it! I suppose, after all, the unknown Powers are strongest! Gentlemen, I am ready." He bowed and followed the officials who led him from the dock to a coach waiting for him at the entrance to the court. The crowd gathered round him with scared faces and eager eyes.
The last Slopperton saw of the Count de Marolles was a pale handsome face, a sardonic smile, and the delicate white hand which rested upon the door of the hackney-coach.
Nex tmorning, very early, men with grave faces congregated at street-corners, and talked together earnestly. Through Slopperton like wildfire spread the rumour of something, which had only been darkly hinted at the gaol.
The prisoner had destroyed himself!
Later in the afternoon it was known that he had bled himself to death by means of a lancet not bigger than a pin, which he had worn for years concealed in a chased gold ring of massive form and exquisite workmanship.
The gaoler had found him, at six o'clock on the morning after his trial, seated, with his bloodless face lying on the little table of his cell, white, tranquil, and dead.
The agents from an exhibition of wax-works, and several phrenologists, came to look at and to take casts of his head, and masks of the handsome and aristocratic face. One of the phrenologists, who had given an opinion on his cerebral development ten years before, when Mr. Jabez North was considered a model of all Sloppertonian virtues and graces, and who had been treated with ignominy for that very opinion, was now in the highest spirits, and introduced the whole story into a series of lectures, which were afterwards very popular. The Count de Marolles, with very long eyelashes, very small feet, and patent-leather boots, a faultless Stultsian evening costume, a white waistcoat, and any number of rings, was much admired in the Chamber of Horrors at the eminent wax-work exhibition above mentioned, and was considered well worth the extra sixpence for admission. Young ladies fell in love with him, and vowed that a being—they called him a being—with such dear blue glass eyes, with beautiful curly eyelashes, and specks of lovely vermilion in each corner, could never have committed a horrid murder, but was, no doubt, the innocent victim of that cruel circumstantial evidence. Mr. Splitters put the Count into a melodrama in four periods—not acts, but periods: 1. Boyhood—the Workhouse. 2. Youth—the School. 3. Manhood—the Palace. 4. Death—the Dungeon. This piece was very popular, and as Mr. Percy Cordonner had prophesied, the Count was represented as living en permanence in Hessian boots with gold tassels; and as always appearing, with a spirited disregard for the unities of time and space, two or three hundred miles distant from the spot in which he had appeared five minutes before, and performing in scene four the very action which his foes had described as being already done in scene three. But the transpontine audiences to whom the piece was represented were not in the habit of asking questions, and as long as you gave them plenty of Hessian boots and pistol-shots for their money, you might snap your fingers at Aristotle's ethics, and all the Greek dramatists into the bargain. What would they have cared for the classic school? Would they have given a thank-you for "Zaire, vous pleurez!" or "Qu'il mourut!" No; give them enough blue fire and honest British sentiment, with plenty of chintz waistcoats and top-boots, and you might laugh Corneille and Voltaire to scorn, and be sure of a long run on the Surrey side of the water.
So the race was run, and, after all, the cleverest horse was not the winner. Where was the Countess de Marolles during her husband's trial? Alas! Valerie, thine has been a troubled youth, but it may be that a brighter fate is yet in store for thee!