Hand and Ring

Hickory's face assumed a somewhat quizzical expression.

"Byrd," said he, "whom were you looking at during the time Mr. Orcutt was making his speech?"

"At the speaker, of course."

"Bah!"

"Whom were you looking at?"

"At the person who would be likely to give me some return for my pains."

"The prisoner?"

"No."

"Whom, then?"

"Miss Dare."

Byrd shifted uneasily to the other side of his companion.

"And what did you discover from her, Hickory?" he asked.

"Two things. First, that she knew no more than the rest of us what the defence was going to be. Secondly, that she regarded it as a piece of great cleverness on the part of Orcutt, but that she didn't believe in it anymore – well, any more than I do."

"Hickory!"

"Yes, sir! Miss Dare is a smart woman, and a resolute one, and could have baffled the penetration of all concerned if she had only remembered to try. But she forgot that others might be more interested in making out what was going on in her mind at this critical moment than in watching the speaker or noting the effect of his words upon the court. In fact, she was too eager herself to hear what he had to say to remember her rôle, I fancy."

"But, I don't see – " began Byrd.

"Wait," interrupted the other. "You believe Miss Dare loves Craik Mansell?"

"Most certainly," was the gloomy response.

"Very well, then. If she had known what the defence was going to be she would have been acutely alive to the effect it was going to have upon the jury. That would have been her first thought and her only thought all the time Mr. Orcutt was speaking, and she would have sat with her eyes fixed upon the men upon whose acceptance or non-acceptance of the truth of this argument her lover's life ultimately depended. But no; her gaze, like yours, remained fixed upon Mr. Orcutt, and she scarcely breathed or stirred till he had fully revealed what his argument was going to be. Then – "

"Well, then?"

"Instead of flashing with the joy of relief which any devoted woman would experience who sees in this argument a proof of her lover's innocence, she merely dropped her eyes and resumed her old mask of impassiveness."

"From all of which you gather – "

"That her feelings were not those of relief, but doubt. In other words, that the knowledge she possesses is of a character which laughs to scorn any such subterfuge of defence as Orcutt advances."

"Hickory," ventured Byrd, after a long silence, "it is time we understood each other. What is your secret thought in relation to Miss Dare?"

"My secret thought? Well," drawled the other, looking away, "I think she knows more about this crime than she has yet chosen to reveal."

"More than she evinced to-day in her testimony?"

"Yes."

"I should like to know why you think so. What special reasons have you for drawing any such conclusions?"

"Well, one reason is, that she was no more shaken by the plausible argument advanced by Mr. Orcutt. If her knowledge of the crime was limited to what she acknowledged in her testimony, and her conclusions as to Mansell's guilt were really founded upon such facts as she gave us in court to-day, why didn't she grasp at the possibility of her lover's innocence which was held out to her by his counsel? No facts that she had testified to, not even the fact of his ring having been found on the scene of murder, could stand before the proof that he left the region of Mrs. Clemmens' house before the moment of assault; yet, while evincing interest in the argument, and some confidence in it, too, as one that would be likely to satisfy the jury, she gave no tokens of being surprised by it into a reconsideration of her own conclusions, as must have happened if she told the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, when she was on the stand to-day."

"I see," remarked Byrd, "that you are presuming to understand Miss Dare after all."

Hickory smiled.

"You call this woman a mystery," proceeded Byrd; "hint at great possibilities of acting on her part, and yet in a moment, as it were, profess yourself the reader of her inmost thoughts, and the interpreter of looks and expressions she has manifestly assumed to hide those thoughts."

Hickory's smile broadened into a laugh.

"Just so," he cried. "One's imbecility has to stop somewhere." Then, as he saw Byrd look grave, added: "I haven't a single fact at my command that isn't shared by you. My conclusions are different, that is all."

Horace Byrd did not answer. Perhaps if Hickory could have sounded his thoughts he would have discovered that their conclusions were not so far apart as he imagined.

"Hickory," Byrd at last demanded, "what do you propose to do with your conclusions?"

"I propose to wait and see if Mr. Orcutt proves his case. If he don't, I have nothing more to say; but if he does, I think I shall call the attention of Mr. Ferris to one question he has omitted to ask Miss Dare."

"And what is that?"

"Where she was on the morning of Mrs. Clemmens' murder. You remember you took some interest in that question yourself a while ago."

"But – "

"Not that I think any thing will come of it, only my conscience will be set at rest."

"Hickory," – Byrd's face had quite altered now – "where do you think Miss Dare was at that time?"

"Where do I think she was?" repeated Hickory.

"Well, I will tell you. I think she was not in Professor Darling's observatory."

"Do you think she was in the glade back of Widow Clemmens' house?"

"Now you ask me conundrums."

"Hickory!" Byrd spoke almost violently, "Mr. Orcutt shall not prove his case."

"No?"

"I will make the run over the ground supposed to have been taken by Mansell in his flight, and show in my own proper person that it can be done in the time specified."

Hickory's eye, which had taken a rapid survey of his companion's form during the utterance of the above, darkened, then he slowly shook his head.

"You couldn't," he rejoined laconically. "Too little staying power; you'd give out before you got clear of the woods. Better delegate the job to me."

"To you?"

"Yes. I'm of the make to stand long runs; besides I am no novice at athletic sports of any kind. More than one race has owed its interest to the efforts of your humble servant. 'Tis my pet amusement, you see, as off-hand drawing is yours, and is likely to be of as much use to me, eh?"

"Hickory, you are chaffing me."

"Think so? Do you see that five-barred gate over there? Well, now keep your eye on the top rail and see if I clear it without a graze or not."

"Stop!" exclaimed Mr. Byrd, "don't make a fool of yourself in the public street. I'll believe you if you say you understand such things."

"Well, I do, and what is more, I'm an adept at them. If I can't make that run in the time requisite to show that Mansell could have committed the murder, and yet arrive at the station the moment he did, I don't know of a chap who can."

"Hickory, do you mean to say you will make this run?"

"Yes."

"With a conscientious effort to prove that Orcutt's scheme of defence is false?"

"Yes."

"When?"

"To-morrow."

"While we are in court?"

"Yes."

Byrd turned square around, gave Hickory a look and offered his hand.

"You are a good fellow," he declared, "May luck go with you."

Hickory suddenly became unusually thoughtful.

"A little while ago," he reflected, "this fellow's sympathies were all with Mansell; now he would risk my limbs and neck to have the man proved guilty. He does not wish Miss Dare to be questioned again, I see."

"Hickory," resumed Byrd, a few minutes later, "Orcutt has not rested the defence upon this one point without being very sure of its being unassailable."

"I know that."

"He has had more than one expert make that run during the weeks that have elapsed since the murder. It has been tested to the uttermost."

"I know that."

"If you succeed then in doing what none of these others have, it must be by dint of a better understanding of the route you have to take and the difficulties you will have to overcome. Now, do you understand the route?"

"I think so."

"You will have to start from the widow's door, you know?"

"Certain."

"Cross the bog, enter the woods, skirt the hut – but I won't go into details. The best way to prove you know exactly what you have to do is to see if you can describe the route yourself. Come into my room, old fellow, and let us see if you can give me a sufficiently exact account of the ground you will have to pass over, for me to draw up a chart by it. An hour spent with paper and pencil to-night may save you from an uncertainty to-morrow that would lose you a good ten minutes."

"Good! that's an idea; let's try it," rejoined Hickory.

And being by this time at the hotel, they went in. In another moment they were shut up in Mr. Byrd's room, with a large sheet of foolscap before them.

"Now," cried Horace, taking up a pencil, "begin with your description, and I will follow with my drawing."

"Very well," replied Hickory, setting himself forward in a way to watch his colleague's pencil. "I leave the widow's house by the dining-room door – a square for the house, Byrd, well down in the left-hand corner of the paper, and a dotted line for the path I take, – run down the yard to the fence, leap it, cross the bog, and make straight for the woods."

"Very good," commented Byrd, sketching rapidly as the other spoke.

"Having taken care to enter where the trees are thinnest, I find a path along which I rush in a bee-line till I come to the glade – an ellipse for the glade, Byrd, with a dot in it for the hut. Merely stopping to dash into the hut and out again – "

"Wait!" put in Byrd, pausing with his pencil in mid-air; "what did you want to go into the hut for?"

"To get the bag which I propose to leave there to-night."

"Bag?"

"Yes; Mansell carried a bag, didn't he? Don't you remember what the station-master said about the curious portmanteau the fellow had in his hand when he came to the station?"

"Yes, but – "

"Byrd, if I run that fellow to his death it must be fairly. A man with an awkward bag in his hand cannot run like a man without one. So I handicap myself in the same way he did, do you see?"

"Yes."

"Very well, then; I rush into the hut, pick up the bag, carry it out, and dash immediately into the woods at the opening behind the hut. – What are you doing?"

"Just putting in a few landmarks," explained Byrd, who had run his pencil off in an opposite direction. "See, that is the path to West Side which I followed in my first expedition through the woods – the path, too, which Miss Dare took when she came to the hut at the time of the fearful thunderstorm. And wait, let me put in Professor Darling's house, too, and the ridge from which you can see Mrs. Clemmens' cottage. It will help us to understand – "

"What?" cried Hickory, with quick suspiciousness, as the other paused.

But Byrd, impatiently shaking his head, answered:

"The whole situation, of course." Then, pointing hastily back to the hut, exclaimed: "So you have entered the woods again at this place? Very well; what then?"

"Well, then," resumed Hickory, "I make my way along the path I find there – run it at right angles to the one leading up to the glade – till I come to a stony ledge covered with blackberry bushes. (A very cleverly drawn blackberry patch that, Byrd.) Here I fear I shall have to pause."

"Why?"

"Because, deuce take me if I can remember where the path runs after that."

"But I can. A big hemlock-tree stands just at the point where the woods open again. Make for that and you will be all right."

"Good enough; but it's mighty rough travelling over that ledge, and I shall have to go at a foot's pace. The stones are slippery as glass, and a fall would scarcely be conducive to the final success of my scheme."

"I will make the path serpentine."

"That will be highly expressive."

"And now, what next?"

"The Foresters' Road, Byrd, upon which I ought to come about this time. Run it due east and west – not that I have surveyed the ground, but it looks more natural so – and let the dotted line traverse it toward the right, for that is the direction in which I shall go."

"It's done," said Byrd.

"Well, description fails me now. All I know is, I come out on a hillside running straight down to the river-bank and that the highway is visible beyond, leading directly to the station; but the way to get to it – "

"I will show you," interposed Byrd, mapping out the station and the intervening river with a few quick strokes of his dexterous pencil. "You see this point where you issue from the woods? Very good; it is, as you say, on a hillside overlooking the river. Well, it seems unfortunate, but there is no way of crossing that river at this point. The falls above and below make it no place for boats, and you will have to go back along its banks for some little distance before you come to a bridge. But there is no use in hesitating or looking about for a shorter path. The woods just here are encumbered with a mass of tangled undergrowth which make them simply impassable except as you keep in the road, while the river curves so frequently and with so much abruptness – see, I will endeavor to give you some notion of it here – that you would only waste time in attempting to make any short cuts. But, once over the bridge – "

"I have only to foot it," burst in Hickory, taking up the sketch which the other had now completed, and glancing at it with a dubious eye. "Do you know, Byrd," he remarked in another moment, "that it strikes me Mansell did not take this roundabout road to the station?"

"Why?"

"Because it is so roundabout, and he is such a clearheaded fellow. Couldn't he have got there by some shorter cut?"

"No. Don't you remember how Orcutt cross-examined the station-master about the appearance which Mansell presented when he came upon the platform, and how that person was forced to acknowledge that, although the prisoner looked heated and exhausted, his clothes were neither muddied nor torn? Now, I did not think of it at the time, but this was done by Orcutt to prove that Mansell did take the road I have jotted down here, since any other would have carried him through swamps knee-deep with mud, or amongst stones and briers which would have put him in a state of disorder totally unfitting him for travel."

"That is so," acquiesced Hickory, after a moment's thought. "Mansell must be kept in the path. Well, well, we will see to-morrow if wit and a swift foot can make any thing out of this problem."

"Wit? Hickory, it will be wit and not a swift foot. Or luck, maybe I should call it, or rather providence. If a wagon should be going along the highway, now – "

"Let me alone for availing myself of it," laughed Hickory. "Wagon! I would jump on the back of a mule sooner than lose the chance of gaining a minute on these experts whose testimony we are to hear to-morrow. Don't lose confidence in old Hickory yet. He's the boy for this job if he isn't for any other."

And so the matter was settled.

XXXI.

THE CHIEF WITNESS FOR THE DEFENCE

Your If is the only peace-maker; much virtue in If. – As You Like It.

THE crowd that congregated at the court-house the next morning was even greater than at any previous time. The opening speech of Mr. Orcutt had been telegraphed all over the country, and many who had not been specially interested in the case before felt an anxiety to hear how he would substantiate the defence he had so boldly and confidently put forth.

To the general eye, however, the appearance of the court-room was much the same as on the previous day. Only to the close observer was it evident that the countenances of the several actors in this exciting drama wore a different expression. Mr. Byrd, who by dint of the most energetic effort had succeeded in procuring his old seat, was one of these, and as he noted the significant change, wished that Hickory had been at his side to note it with him.

The first person he observed was, naturally, the Judge.

Judge Evans, who has been but barely introduced to the reader, was a man of great moral force and discretion. He had occupied his present position for many years, and possessed not only the confidence but the affections of those who came within the sphere of his jurisdiction. The reason for this undoubtedly lay in his sympathetic nature. While never accused of weakness, he so unmistakably retained the feeling heart under the official ermine that it was by no means an uncommon thing for him to show more emotion in uttering a sentence than the man he condemned did in listening to it.

His expression, then, upon this momentous morning was of great significance to Mr. Byrd. In its hopefulness and cheer was written the extent of the effect made upon the unprejudiced mind by the promised defence.

As for Mr. Orcutt himself, no advocate could display a more confident air or prepare to introduce his witnesses with more dignity or quiet assurance. His self-possession was so marked, indeed, that Mr. Byrd, who felt a sympathetic interest in what he knew to be seething in this man's breast, was greatly surprised, and surveyed, with a feeling almost akin to awe, the lawyer who could so sink all personal considerations in the cause he was trying.

Miss Dare, on the contrary, was in a state of nervous agitation. Though no movement betrayed this, the very force of the restraint she put upon herself showed the extent of her inner excitement.

The prisoner alone remained unchanged. Nothing could shake his steady soul from its composure, not the possibility of death or the prospect of release. He was absolutely imposing in his quiet presence, and Mr. Byrd could not but admire the power of the man even while recoiling from his supposed guilt.

The opening of the defence carried the minds of many back to the inquest. The nice question of time was gone into, and the moment when Mrs. Clemmens was found lying bleeding and insensible at the foot of her dining-room clock, fixed at three or four minutes past noon. The next point to be ascertained was when she received the deadly blow.

And here the great surprise of the defence occurred. Mr. Orcutt rose, and in clear, firm tones said:

"Gouverneur Hildreth, take the stand."

Instantly, and before the witness could comply, Mr. Ferris was on his feet.

"Who? what?" he cried.

"Gouverneur Hildreth," repeated Mr. Orcutt.

"Did you know this gentleman has already been in custody upon suspicion of having committed the crime for which the prisoner is now being tried?"

"I do," returned Mr. Orcutt, with imperturbable sang froid.

"And is it your intention to save your client from the gallows by putting the halter around the neck of the man you now propose to call as a witness?"

"No," retorted Mr. Orcutt; "I do not propose to put the halter about any man's neck. That is the proud privilege of my learned and respected opponent."

With an impatient frown Mr. Ferris sat down, while Mr. Hildreth, who had taken advantage of this short passage of arms between the lawyers to retain his place in the remote corner where he was more or less shielded from the curiosity of the crowd, rose, and, with a slow and painful movement that at once attracted attention to his carefully bandaged throat and the general air of debility which surrounded him, came hesitatingly forward and took his stand in face of the judge and jury.

Necessarily a low murmur greeted him from the throng of interested spectators who saw in this appearance before them of the man who, by no more than a hair's-breadth, had escaped occupying the position of the prisoner, another of those dramatic incidents with which this trial seemed fairly to bristle.

It was hushed by one look from the Judge, but not before it had awakened in Mr. Hildreth's weak and sensitive nature those old emotions of shame and rage whose token was a flush so deep and profuse it unconsciously repelled the gaze of all who beheld it. Immediately Mr. Byrd, who sat with bated breath, as it were, so intense was his excitement over the unexpected turn of affairs, recognized the full meaning of the situation, and awarded to Mr. Orcutt all the admiration which his skill in bringing it about undoubtedly deserved. Indeed, as the detective's quick glance flashed first at the witness, cringing in his old unfortunate way before the gaze of the crowd, and then at the prisoner sitting unmoved and quietly disdainful in his dignity and pride, he felt that, whether Mr. Orcutt succeeded in getting all he wished from his witness, the mere conjunction of these two men before the jury, with the opportunity for comparison between them which it inevitably offered, was the master-stroke of this eminent lawyer's legal career.

Mr. Ferris seemed to feel the significance of the moment also, for his eyes fell and his brow contracted with a sudden doubt that convinced Mr. Byrd that, mentally, he was on the point of giving up his case.

The witness was at once sworn.

"Orcutt believes Hildreth to be the murderer, or, at least, is willing that others should be impressed with this belief," was the comment of Byrd to himself at this juncture.

He had surprised a look which had passed between the lawyer and Miss Dare – a look of such piercing sarcasm and scornful inquiry that it might well arrest the detective's attention and lead him to question the intentions of the man who could allow such an expression of his feelings to escape him.

But whether the detective was correct in his inferences, or whether Mr. Orcutt's glance at Imogene meant no more than the natural emotion of a man who suddenly sees revealed to the woman he loves the face of him for whose welfare she has expressed the greatest concern and for whose sake, while unknown, she has consented to make the heaviest of sacrifices, the wary lawyer was careful to show neither scorn nor prejudice when he turned toward the witness and began his interrogations.

On the contrary, his manner was highly respectful, if not considerate, and his questions while put with such art as to keep the jury constantly alert to the anomalous position which the witness undoubtedly held, were of a nature mainly to call forth the one fact for which his testimony was presumably desired. This was, his presence in the widow's house on the morning of the murder, and the fact that he saw her and conversed with her and could swear to her being alive and unhurt up to a few minutes before noon. To be sure, the precise minute of his leaving her in this condition Mr. Orcutt failed to gather from the witness, but, like the coroner at the inquest, he succeeded in eliciting enough to show that the visit had been completed prior to the appearance of the tramp at the widow's kitchen-door, as it had been begun after the disappearance of the Danton children from the front of the widow's house.

This fact being established and impressed upon the jury, Mr. Orcutt with admirable judgment cut short his own examination of the witness, and passed him over to the District Attorney, with a grim smile, suggestive of his late taunt, that to this gentleman belonged the special privilege of weaving halters for the necks of unhappy criminals.

Mr. Ferris who understood his adversary's tactics only too well, but who in his anxiety for the truth could not afford to let such an opportunity for reaching it slip by, opened his cross-examination with great vigor.

The result could not but be favorable to the defence and damaging to the prosecution. The position which Mr. Hildreth must occupy if the prisoner was acquitted, was patent to all understandings, making each and every admission on his part tending to exculpate the latter, of a manifest force and significance.

Mr. Ferris, however, was careful not to exceed his duty or press his inquiries beyond due bounds. The man they were trying was not Gouverneur Hildreth but Craik Mansell, and to press the witness too close, was to urge him into admissions seemingly so damaging to himself as, in the present state of affairs, to incur the risk of distracting attention entirely from the prisoner.

Mr. Hildreth's examination being at an end, Mr. Orcutt proceeded with his case, by furnishing proof calculated to fix the moment at which Mr. Hildreth had made his call. This was done in much the same way as it was at the inquest. Mrs. Clemmens' next-door neighbor, Mrs. Danton, was summoned to the stand, and after her her two children, the testimony of the three, taken with Mr. Hildreth's own acknowledgments, making it very evident to all who listened that he could not have gone into Mrs. Clemmens' house before a quarter to twelve.