Mrs. Halliburton's Troubles Part 104

"What state, as to sobriety, was the deceased in then?"

"He was what may be called half-seasover," replied the witness. "He could talk, but his words were not very distinct."

"Could he walk alone?"

"After a fas.h.i.+on. He stumbled as he walked."

"What time was this?"

"About half-past eleven. I think the half-hour struck directly after I left him, but I am not quite sure."

"As you returned, did you see anything of the man who had accosted the deceased?"

"Not anything."

Strange to say the very man thus spoken of was in court, listening to the trial. Upon hearing the evidence given by Mr. Brittle, he voluntarily came forward as a witness. He said he had been "having a drop," and it had made him abusive, but that Anthony Dare had owed him money long for work done, mending and making. He was a jobbing tailor, and the bill was a matter of fourteen pounds. Anthony Dare had only put him off and off; he was a poor man, with a wife and family to keep, and he wanted the money badly; but now, he supposed, he should never be paid. He lived close to the spot where he met the deceased and the gentleman who had just given evidence, and he could prove that he went home as soon as they were out of sight, and was in bed at half-past eleven. What with debts and various other things, he concluded the town had had enough to rue in young Anthony Dare. Still, the poor fellow didn't deserve such a shocking fate as murder, and he would have been the first to protect him from it.

That the evidence was given in good faith, was undoubted. He was known to the town as a harmless, inoffensive man, addicted, though upon rare occasions, to taking more than was good for him, when he was apt to dilate upon his grievances.

The constable who had been on duty that night near Mr. Dare's residence was the next witness called. "Did you see the deceased that night?" was asked of him.

"Yes, sir, I did," was the reply. "I saw him walking home with the gentleman who has given evidence--Mr. Brittle. I noticed that young Mr.

Dare talked thick, as if he had been drinking."

"Did they appear to be on good terms?"

"Very good terms, sir. Mr. Brittle was laughing when he opened the gate for the deceased, and told him to mind he did not kiss the gra.s.s; or something to that effect."

"Were you close to them?"

"Quite close, sir. I said 'Good night' to the deceased, but he seemed not to notice it. I stood and watched him over the gra.s.s. He reeled as he walked."

"What time was this?"

"Nigh upon half-past eleven, sir."

"Did you detect any signs of people moving within the house?"

"Not any, sir. The house seemed quite still, and the blinds were down before the windows."

"Did you see any one enter the gate that night besides the deceased?"

"Not any one."

"Not the prisoner?"

"Not any one," repeated the policeman.

"Did you see anything of the prisoner later, between half-past one and two, the time he alleges as that of his going home?"

"I never saw the prisoner at all that night, sir."

"He could have gone in, as he states, without your seeing him?"

interposed the prisoner's counsel.

"Yes, certainly, a dozen times over. My beat extended to half-a-mile beyond Mr. Dare's."

One witness, who was placed in the box, created a profound sensation: for it was the unhappy father, Anthony Dare. Since the deed was committed, two months ago, Mr. Dare had been growing old. His brow was furrowed, his cheeks were wrinkled, his hair was turning white, and he looked, as he obeyed the call to the witness-box, as a man sinking under a heavy weight of care. Many of the countenances present expressed deep commiseration for him.

He was sworn, and various questions were asked him. Amongst others, whether he knew anything of the quarrel which had taken place between his two sons.

"Personally, nothing," was the reply. "I was not at home."

"It has been testified that when they were parted, your son Herbert threatened his brother. Is he of a revengeful disposition?"

"No," replied Mr. Dare, with emotion; "that, I can truly say, he is not.

My poor son, Anthony, was somewhat given to sullenness; but Herbert never was."

"There had been a great deal of ill-feeling between them of late, I believe."

"I fear there had been."

"It is stated that you yourself, upon leaving home that evening, left them a warning not to quarrel. Was it so?"

"I believe I did. Anthony entered the house as we were leaving it, and I did say something to him to that effect."

"The prisoner was not present?"

"No. He had not returned."

"It is proved that he came home later, dined, and went out again at dusk. It does not appear that he was seen afterwards by any member of your household, until you yourself went up to his room and found him there, after the discovery of the body. His own account is, that he had only recently returned. Do you know where he was, during his absence?"

"No."

"Or where he went to?"

"No," repeated the witness in sadly faltering tones, for he knew that this was the one weak point in the defence.

"He will not tell you?"

"He declines to do so. But," the witness added, with emotion, "he has denied his guilt to me from the first, in the most decisive manner: and I solemnly believe him to be innocent. Why he will not state where he was, I cannot conceive; but not a shade of doubt rests upon my mind that he could state it if he chose, and that it would be the means of establis.h.i.+ng the fact of his absence. I would not a.s.sert this if I did not believe it," said the witness, raising his trembling hand. "They were both my boys: the one destroyed was my eldest, perhaps my dearest; and I declare that I would not, knowingly, screen his a.s.sa.s.sin, although that a.s.sa.s.sin were his brother."

The case for the prosecution concluded, and the defence was entered upon. The prisoner's counsel--two of them eminent men, Mr. Chattaway himself being no secondary light in the forensic world--laboured under one disadvantage, as it appeared to the crowded court. They exerted all their eloquence in seeking to divert the guilt from the prisoner: but they could not--distort facts as they might, call upon imagination as they would--they could not conjure up the ghost of any other channel to which to direct suspicion. There lay the weak point, as it had lain throughout. If Herbert Dare was not guilty, who was? The family, quietly sleeping in their beds, were beyond the pale of suspicion; the household equally so; and no trace of any midnight intruder to the house could be found. It was a grave stumbling-block for the prisoner's counsel; but such stumbling-blocks are as nothing to an expert pleader. Bit by bit Mr. Chattaway disposed, or seemed to dispose, of every argument that could tell against the prisoner. The presence of the cloak in the dining-room, from which so much appearance of guilt had been deduced, he converted into a negative proof of innocence. "Had he been the one engaged in the struggle," argued the learned Q.C., "would he have been mad enough to leave his own cloak there, underneath his victim, a d.a.m.ning proof of guilt? No! that, at any rate, he would have taken away.

The very fact of the cloak being under the murdered man was a most indisputable proof, as he regarded it, that the prisoner remained totally ignorant of what had happened--ignorant of his unfortunate brother's being at all in the dining-room. Why! had he only surmised that his brother was lying, wounded or dead, in the room, would he not have hastened to remove his cloak out of it, before it should be seen there, knowing, as he must know, that, from the very terms on which he and his brother had been, it would be looked upon as a proof of his guilt?" The argument told well with the jury--probably with the judge.

Bit by bit, so did he thus dispose of the suspicious circ.u.mstances: of all, except one. And that was the great one, the one that n.o.body could get over: the refusal of the prisoner to state where he was that night.

"All in good time, gentlemen of the jury," said Mr. Chattaway, some murmured words reaching his ear that the omission was deemed ominous. "I am coming to that later; and I shall prove as complete and distinct an _alibi_ as it was ever my lot to submit to an enlightened court."