Hand and Ring by Anna Katharine Green (good book club books TXT) 📖

THE few minutes that elapsed before the formal opening of court the next morning were marked by great cheerfulness. The crisp frosty air had put everybody in a good-humor. Even the prisoner looked less sombre than before, and for the first time since the beginning of his trial, deigned to turn his eyes toward the bench where Imogene sat, with a look that, while it was not exactly kind, had certainly less disdain in it than before he saw his way to a possible acquittal on the theory advanced by his counsel.

But this look, though his first, did not prove to be his last. Something in the attitude of the woman he gazed at—or was it the mystery of the heavy black veil that enveloped her features?—woke a strange doubt in his mind. Beckoning to Mr. Orcutt, he communicated with him in a low tone.

"Can it be possible," asked he, "that any thing new could have transpired since last night to give encouragement to the prosecution?"

The lawyer, startled, glanced hastily about him and shook his head.

"No," he cried; "impossible! What could have transpired?"

"Look at Mr. Ferris," whispered the prisoner, "and then at the witness who wears a veil."

With an unaccountable feeling of reluctance, Mr. Orcutt hastily complied. His first glance at the District Attorney made him thoughtful. He recognized the look which his opponent wore; he had seen it many a time before this, and knew what it indicated. As for Imogene, who could tell what went on in that determined breast? The close black veil revealed nothing. Mr. Orcutt impatiently turned back to his client.

"I think you alarm yourself unnecessarily," he whispered. "Ferris means to fight, but what of that? He wouldn't be fit for his position if he didn't struggle to the last gasp even for a failing cause."

Yet in saying this his lip took its sternest line, and from the glitter of his eye and the close contraction of his brow it looked as if he were polishing his own weapons for the conflict he thus unexpectedly saw before him.

Meantime, across the court-room, another whispered conference was going on.

"Hickory, where have you been ever since last night? I have not been able to find you anywhere."

"I was on duty; I had a bird to look after."

"A bird?"

"Yes, a wild bird; one who is none too fond of its cage; a desperate one who might find means to force aside its bars and fly away."

"What do you mean, Hickory? What nonsense is this?"

"Look at Miss Dare and perhaps you will understand."

"Miss Dare?"

"Yes."

Horace's eyes opened in secret alarm.

"Do you mean——"

"I mean that I spent the whole night in tramping up and down in front of her window. And a dismal task it was too. Her lamp burned till daylight."

Here the court was called to order and Byrd had only opportunity to ask:

"Why does she wear a veil?"

To which the other whisperingly retorted:

"Why did she spend the whole night in packing up her worldly goods and writing a letter to the Congregational minister to be sent after the adjournment of court to-day?"

"Did she do that?"

"She did."

"Hickory, don't you know—haven't you been told what she is expected to say or do here to-day?"

"No."

"You only guess?"

"No, I don't guess."

"You fear, then?"

"Fear! Well, that's a big word to a fellow like me. I don't know as I fear any thing; I'm curious, that is all."

Mr. Byrd drew back, looked over at Imogene, and involuntarily shook his head. What was in the mind of this mysterious woman? What direful purpose or shadow of doom lay behind the veil that separated her from the curiosity and perhaps the sympathy of the surrounding crowd? It was in vain to question; he could only wait in secret anxiety for the revelations which the next few minutes might bring.

The defence having rested the night before, the first action of the Judge on the opening of the court was to demand whether the prosecution had any rebuttal testimony to offer.

Mr. Ferris instantly rose.

"Miss Dare, will you retake the stand," said he.

Immediately Mr. Orcutt, who up to the last moment had felt his case as secure as if it had indeed been founded on a rock, bounded to his feet, white as the witness herself.

"I object!" he cried. "The witness thus recalled by the counsel of the prosecution has had ample opportunity to lay before the court all the evidence in her possession. I submit it to the court whether my learned opponent should not have exhausted his witness before he rested his case."

"Mr. Ferris," asked the Judge, turning to the District Attorney, "do you recall this witness for the purpose of introducing fresh testimony in support of your case or merely to disprove the defence?"

"Your honor," was the District Attorney's reply, "I ought to say in fairness to my adversary and to the court, that since the case was closed a fact has come to my knowledge of so startling and conclusive a nature that I feel bound to lay it before the jury. From this witness alone can we hope to glean this fact; and as I had no information on which to base a question concerning it in her former examination, I beg the privilege of reopening my case to that extent."

"Then the evidence you desire to submit is not in rebuttal?" queried the Judge.

"I do not like to say that," rejoined the District Attorney, adroitly. "I think it may bear directly upon the question whether the prisoner could catch the train at Monteith Quarry if he left the widow's house after the murder. If the evidence I am about to offer be true, he certainly could."

Thoroughly alarmed now and filled with the dismay which a mysterious threat is always calculated to produce, Mr. Orcutt darted a wild look of inquiry at Imogene, and finding her immovable behind her thick veil, turned about and confronted the District Attorney with a most sarcastic smile upon his blanched and trembling lips.

"Does my learned friend suppose the court will receive any such ambiguous explanation as this? If the testimony sought from this witness is by way of rebuttal, let him say so; but if it is not, let him be frank enough to admit it, that I may in turn present my objections to the introduction of any irrelevant evidence at this time."

"The testimony I propose to present through this witness is in the way of rebuttal," returned Mr Ferris, severely. "The argument advanced by the defence, that the prisoner could not have left Mrs. Clemmens' house at ten minutes before twelve and arrived at Monteith Quarry Station at twenty minutes past one, is not a tenable one, and I purpose to prove it by this witness."

Mr. Orcutt's look of anxiety changed to one of mingled amazement and incredulity.

"By this witness! You have chosen a peculiar one for the purpose," he ironically exclaimed, more and more shaken from his self-possession by the quiet bearing of his opponent, and the silent air of waiting which marked the stately figure of her whom, as he had hitherto believed, he thoroughly comprehended. "Your Honor," he continued, "I withdraw my objections; I should really like to hear how Miss Dare or any lady can give evidence on this point."

And he sank back into his seat with a look at his client in which professional bravado strangely struggled with something even deeper than alarm.

"This must be an exciting moment to the prisoner," whispered Hickory to Byrd.

"So, so. But mark his control, will you? He is less cut up than Orcutt."

"Look at his eyes, though. If any thing could pierce that veil of hers, you would think such a glance might."

"Ah, he is trying his influence over her at last."

"But it is too late."

Meantime the District Attorney had signified again to Miss Dare his desire that she should take the stand. Slowly, and like a person in a dream, she arose, unloosed her veil, dragged it from before her set features, and stepped mechanically forward to the place assigned her. What was there in the face thus revealed that called down an instantaneous silence upon the court, and made the momentary pause that ensued memorable in the minds of all present? It was not that she was so pale, though her close-fitting black dress, totally unrelieved by any suspicion of white, was of a kind to bring out any startling change in her complexion; nor was there visible in her bearing any trace of the feverish excitement which had characterized it the evening before; yet of all the eyes that were fixed upon her—and there were many in that crowd whose only look a moment before had been one of heartless curiosity—there were none which were not filled with compassion and more or less dread.

Meanwhile, she remained like a statue on the spot where she had taken her stand, and her eyes, which in her former examination had met the court with the unflinching gaze of an automaton, were lowered till the lashes swept her cheek.

"Miss Dare," asked the District Attorney, as soon as he could recover from his own secret emotions of pity and regret, "will you tell us where you were at the hour of noon on the morning Mrs. Clemmens was murdered?"

Before she could answer, before in fact her stiff and icy lips could part, Mr. Orcutt had risen impetuously to his feet, like a man bound to contend every step of the way with the unknown danger that menaced him.

"I object!" he cried, in the changed voice of a deeply disturbed man, while those who had an interest in the prisoner at this juncture, could not but notice that he, too, showed signs of suppressed feeling, and for the first time since the beginning of the trial, absolutely found his self-command insufficient to keep down the rush of color that swept up to his swarthy cheek.

"The question," continued Mr. Orcutt, "is not to elicit testimony in rebuttal."

"Will my learned friend allow the witness to give her answer, instead of assuming what it is to be?"

"I will not," retorted his adversary. "A child could see that such a question is not admissible at this stage of the case."

"I am sure my learned friend would not wish me to associate him with any such type of inexperience?" suggested Mr. Ferris, grimly.

But the sarcasm, which at one time would have called forth a stinging retort from Mr. Orcutt, passed unheeded. The great lawyer was fighting for his life, for his heart's life, for the love and hand of Imogene—a recompense which at this moment her own unconsidered action, or the constraining power of a conscience of whose might he had already received such heart-rending manifestation, seemed about to snatch from his grasp forever. Turning to the Judge, he said:

"I will not delay the case by bandying words with my esteemed friend, but appeal at once to the Court as to