Tutt and Mr. Tutt Part 20

"No, sir."

"Do you know where he got it?"

"My wife told me--"

"Never mind what your wife told you. Do you--"

"He don't know where the dog came from, judge!" suddenly called out Mrs.

Tunnygate in strident tones from where she was sitting. "But I know!"

she added venomously. "That woman of his got it from--"

Judge Witherspoon fixed her coldly with an impa.s.sive and judicial eye.

"Will you kindly be silent, madam? You will no doubt be given an opportunity to testify as fully as you wish. That is all, sir, unless Mr. Tutt has some more questions."

Tutt waved the witness from the stand contemptuously.

"Well, I'd like a chance to testify!" shrilled Mrs. Tunnygate, rising in full panoply.

"This way, madam," said the clerk, motioning her round the back of the jury box. And she swept ponderously into the offing like a full-rigged bark and came to anchor in the witness chair, her chin rising and falling upon her heaving bosom like the figurehead of a vessel upon a heavy harbor swell.

Now it has never been satisfactorily explained just why the character of an individual should be in any way deducible from such irrelevant attributes as facial anatomy, bodily structure or the shape of the cranium. Perhaps it is not, and in reality we discern disposition from something far more subtle--the tone of the voice, the expression of the eyes, the lines of the face or even from an aura unperceived by the senses. However that may be, the wisdom of the Const.i.tutional safeguard guaranteeing that every person charged with crime shall be confronted by the witnesses against him was instantly made apparent when Mrs.

Tunnygate took the stand, for without hearing a word from her firmly compressed lips the jury simultaneously swept her with one comprehensive glance and turned away. Students of women, experienced adventurers in matrimony, these plumbers, bird merchants "delicatessens" and the rest looked, perceived and comprehended that here was the very devil of a woman--a virago, a shrew, a termagant, a natural-born trouble-maker; and they s.h.i.+vered and thanked G.o.d that she was Tunnygate's and not theirs; their unformulated sentiment best expressed in Pope's immortal couplet:

Oh woman, woman! when to ill thy mind Is bent, all h.e.l.l contains no fouler fiend.

She had said no word. Between the judge and jury nothing had pa.s.sed, and yet through the alpha rays of that mysterious medium of communication by which all men as men are united where woman is concerned, the thought was directly transmitted and unanimously acknowledged that here for sure was a h.e.l.l cat!

It was as naught to them that she testified to the outrageous illegality of the Appleboys' territorial ambitions, the irascibility of the wife, the violent threats of the husband; or that Mrs. Appleboy had been observed to mail a suspicious letter shortly before the date of the canine a.s.sault. They disregarded her. Yet when Tutt upon cross-examination sought to attack her credibility by asking her various pertinent questions they unhesitatingly accepted his implied accusations as true, though under the rules of evidence he was bound by her denials.

Peck 1: "Did you not knock Mrs. Appleboy's flower pots off the piazza?"

he demanded significantly.

"Never! I never did!" she declared pa.s.sionately

But they knew in their hearts that she had.

Peck 2: "Didn't you steal her milk bottles?"

"What a lie! It's absolutely false!"

Yet they knew that she did.

Peck 3: "Didn't you tangle up their fish lines and take their thole-pins?"

"Well, I never! You ought to be ashamed to ask a lady such questions!"

They found her guilty.

"I move to dismiss, Your Honor," chirped Tutt blithely at the conclusion of her testimony.

Judge Witherspoon shook his head.

"I want to hear the other side," he remarked. "The mere fact that the defendant put up a sign warning the public against the dog may be taken as some evidence that he had knowledge of the animal's vicious propensities. I shall let the case go to the jury unless this evidence is contradicted or explained. Reserve your motion."

"Very well, Your Honor," agreed Tutt, patting himself upon the abdomen.

"I will follow your suggestion and call the defendant. Mr. Appleboy, take the stand."

Mr. Appleboy heavily rose and the heart of every fat man upon the jury, and particularly that of the Abyssinian brother upon the back row, went out to him. For just as they had known without being told that the new Mrs. Tunnygate was a vixen, they realized that Appleboy was a kind, good-natured man--a little soft, perhaps, like his clams, but no more dangerous. Moreover, it was plain that he had suffered and was, indeed, still suffering, and they had pity for him. Appleboy's voice shook and so did the rest of his person as he recounted his ancient friends.h.i.+p for Tunnygate and their piscatorial a.s.sociation, their common matrimonial experiences, the sudden change in the temperature of the society of Throggs Neck, the malicious destruction of their property and the unexplained aggressions of Tunnygate upon the lawn. And the jury, believing, understood.

Then like the sword of Damocles the bessemer voice of Pepperill severed the general atmosphere of amiability: "Where did you get that dog?"

Mr. Appleboy looked round helplessly, distress pictured in every feature.

"My wife's aunt lent it to us."

"How did she come to lend it to you?"

"Bashemath wrote and asked for it."

"Oh! Did you know anything about the dog before you sent for it?"

"Of your own knowledge?" interjected Tutt sharply.

"Oh, no!" returned Appleboy.

"Didn't you know it was a vicious beast?" sharply challenged Pepperill.

"Of your own knowledge?" again warned Tutt.

"I'd never seen the dog."

"Didn't your wife tell you about it?"

Tutt sprang to his feet, wildly waving his arms: "I object; on the ground that what pa.s.sed between husband and wife upon this subject must be regarded as confidential."

"I will so rule," said Judge Witherspoon, smiling. "Excluded."

Pepperill shrugged his shoulders.

"I would like to ask a question," interpolated the editor of Baby's World.

"Do!" exclaimed Tutt eagerly.

The editor, who was a fat editor, rose in an embarra.s.sed manner.

"Mr. Appleboy!" he began.