Part 7

A few days brought the intelligence that Mr. Howard had died intestate, and that consequently his daughter was now his sole heir. His untimely fate had frustrated his design of disinheriting his only child. But oh! at what a cost had Ellen purchased his fortune. Could wealth bring any joy to that almost heart-broken wife? Willingly would she have surrendered it to have been as they were the day before, poor but unsuspected. Not that for a moment she doubted her husband’s innocence—no! she felt that the bosom on which she had so often leaned could never have been that of a murderer—but she saw that the evidence, so circumstantially adduced against him, was almost unanswerable. Alas! the public sentiment sufficiently forewarned her of her husband’s fate. No one even whispered the possibility of his innocence. One universal cry of indignation attested the horror with which the crime, and he as its reputed author, were regarded.

But how did Stanhope deport himself in these trying circumstances? From the first he had asserted his innocence, and accounted for the tracks leading to his house, by stating that he had met three men, whom he supplicated, in his agony, for aid,—and that one of them had hurriedly thrown him the purse which he brought home. Every one shook their heads at this story. Yet the general incredulity did not produce any show of weakness in Stanhope. His character seemed to rise in majesty as his fortunes grew darker, and he prepared himself to breast the storm with fortitude at least, if not with resignation. Yet the sight of his sweet wife, almost unnerved him at times; and his greatest consolation was in reflecting that, if he should perish ignominiously, she would not be left a penniless outcast. And oh! how bitterly, and with what scalding tears did that wife weep upon his bosom.

Meantime, however, another examination of Stanhope’s case was to take place, preparatory to fully committing him for trial at the next oyer and terminer. It was at this stage of the transaction that I was called in as counsel for the accused. We had known each other in society, in our younger days, and nothing ever more startled me than the news of his arrest. I could not believe him guilty of such an appalling crime. And yet I had fearful doubts. Could it be, that, stung to madness by approaching starvation, and recognising the author of his miseries in Mr. Howard, he had yielded to a momentary hallucination, and become a murderer?

Never shall I forget my first interview with him in my new capacity of his counsel. It was in a damp, narrow cell, little better than a dungeon. I had not seen Stanhope for years. When we last met it had been in a gay ball-room, where my poor client was “the admired of all observers.” Now how changed. His face no longer wore the hue of health; care had ploughed his brow across with many a furrow; and his wan cheek told of the long hours of agony through which he had passed. Yet his mien was collected, even lofty. I felt an innate conviction of his innocence, and hastened to assure him that I came not only as a professional adviser, but as a friend. He grasped my hand eagerly, but could not for a moment speak. At length he said with a faint smile in reply,

“We meet under far different circumstances than when we met last.”

“Yes!—but we shall soon, I hope, acquit you,” said I, expressing what I scarcely believed. “There is some extraordinary mistake in this matter.”

“Oh! can you indeed save us?” said his wife, eagerly advancing—I had only noticed that a female was in the back-ground of the cell, and never having seen Stanhope’s bride, I did not know her until she spoke—“God in heaven bless you, if you can!” and after a vain effort at composure, the sweet being burst into tears, and fell upon her husband’s bosom. Stanhope did not speak; he bent over her and folded her to his heart; and I thought I saw a tear-drop fall sparkling upon her dark raven hair. My own eyes were scarcely dry.

But why protract these painful scenes? Suffice it to say that I retired from that solitary cell, more than ever convinced of my client’s innocence, and full of admiration at the generous devotion of that sweet, angelic wife.

The examination of Stanhope took place on the next morning—and it was only then that I became fully aware of the terrible evidence against him. Indeed the chain of testimony was so thoroughly welded together in every link, that, for a moment, I not only despaired, but almost recanted my belief in the prisoner’s innocence. I am sure that I was the only one present who did not believe him guilty.

The evidence against him was much the same as that given on the morning after the murder. Many additional facts, however, were elicited, which materially strengthened the case for the prosecution. A purse which was found on Stanhope’s person at the time of his arrest was identified, by a passenger, as having been seen in Mr. Howard’s hands on the evening of the murder, when he paid for a bottle of wine which they drank together. Mr. Howard’s house-keeper also knew the purse. Neither of the passengers could recognise the murderer’s countenance; but both concurred in making oath that the figure of the murderer was similar to that of Stanhope. Here was a mass of testimony which was sufficient, if unanswered, to condemn any man; and when the personal interest which Stanhope had in Mr. Howard’s death was taken into consideration, was not his situation really alarming? And what had he to oppose to this? Nothing, positively nothing, except his oft repeated explanation, and his continued asseverations of innocence.

Meanwhile I spared no effort to elucidate the mystery which seemed to hang over this catastrophe. Believing, as I did, in Stanhope’s innocence, I longed for some clue which might lead to the detection of the real murderer. But in vain. As a last resort I wrote a letter to the most eminent counsel at the —— bar, earnestly urging him to join me in the case. He replied favorably.

“Speak to me freely, D——,” said Stanhope to me, the day before his trial, “for my wife is absent now, and I can hear the worst. Am I without hope? God knows it is hard enough to part with all you love; it is hard for an innocent man to die a felon’s death; it is hard to leave behind you a stain on your children’s name,—but yet, if it is to be, let me not be deceived. As you would, in my situation, wish to be done by, so do by me. Tell me frankly—tell me all.”

I hesitated; I evaded his question.

“It is enough, D——,” said he, with a quivering lip, “God help my wife and little ones,” and, overcome by his emotion, he buried his face in his hands. It was the first time I had seen him give way to his feelings. But it was soon past. He looked up, “This is weakness,—it is over now. My enemies shall not, at least, triumph in beholding my agony.”

This stoicism was even more affecting than his agitation. My eyes involuntarily filled with tears, and I pressed his hand in silence.

“God bless you,” said he, with renewed emotion, “except my poor family you are my only friend.”

The morning of the trial dawned without a cloud. Never had such an excitement pervaded the village. The atrocity of the deed; the standing of the parties; the high talent arrayed on the part of the prosecution; and a rumor which had got afloat that the prisoner intended to confess his guilt, had awakened such an intense interest, that, long before the hour of trial, the court-room was crowded to overflowing. The whole town seemed alive. From every lane and street, from every house and hovel, they poured along, rich and poor, old and young, crowding and jostling each other, until the court-room was densely packed with the spectators, and farther admittance was impossible. The windows were blocked up with the multitude; the bar, and even the bench were full of people; and hundreds of eager faces, peered one above another in the back-ground, until they terminated in the gallery above. The hall without was noisy with the populace, and crowds, unable to obtain an entrance, waited breathlessly in the yard to learn, by the murmurs from within, the fluctuations of the trial.

The prisoner entered with a firm, composed bearing, and bowing to the bench, glanced a moment round the room. There was a lofty pride in his demeanor which I shall never forget. A death-like silence pervaded the hundreds there, and scarcely an eye but quailed beneath that fearless glance. He then took his seat. A murmur ran around the room. The impression made by the prisoner’s demeanor was evidently favorable. Pity usurped the place of idle curiosity. His sweet wife’s presence did not lessen this favorable sentiment. She had insisted on being present during the whole of the trial, and she now sat beside her husband, clasping his hand in hers, and looking up into his face with a glance which told, that whatever others might think, she at least knew him to be innocent. Thank God! there is such a thing in this world as woman’s love.

The jury was impanelled; the indictment read; and the prisoner pleaded “not guilty,” putting himself, in the words of the law, “upon God and his country.” The attorney general then arose and opened his case; and rarely have I listened to a more artful address. The history of the prisoner’s love, his marriage with the daughter of the deceased, the separation which had ever since existed betwixt the families, and the natural irritation which the accused must have felt toward the murdered man, and which might have led to the sudden sacrifice of his life in a moment of passion, even without any premeditated design against him, were all worked up with such consummate skill, that, when the evidence came to be detailed, the jury looked knowingly at each other, as if satisfied that the prisoner was the only person who could have been guilty of the murder. Indeed, the circumstances were unanswerable. Look at them. Here is a man wronged, deeply wronged by the deceased—that man is stung to madness by the horrors of approaching starvation—he leaves his house, at the dead of night and does not return until morning, and he brings with him on his return a purse which is subsequently identified as having been in the possession of the murdered man. Nor is this all. The murderer obviously committed the crime under a sudden impulse, for on recognising the deceased he made a passionate exclamation, and discharged his pistol. After the deed, he, as well as his companions, terrified at what had been done, fled in dismay. They are tracked until one of their number left them, and the footsteps of that one led to Stanhope’s door. What could be more conclusive? Such was the substance of the argument against the prisoner, an argument so compact, candid, and devoid of declamation as to be irresistibly convincing; and when it was finished I trembled—and not without cause—for the life of the accused.

The evidence was the same as that upon the examination prior to the commitment of the prisoner. There was no discrepancy in the statements of the witnesses. All was clear, truth-like, and irresistible. Even the talents of my colleague failed to elicit any thing material on the cross-examination, although he subjected the witnesses severally to as severe a scrutiny as I ever saw exercised. The man especially who testified to having examined the tracks of the robbers in the snow underwent the most searching probing. The efforts of the defence were directed to establish the possibility that there might have been three fugitives on the first track even after the separation—in short, to overthrow the view taken by the prosecution that the robbers separated at this point.

“Did you,” said my colleague, “inspect the tracks of the larger body of fugitives after the supposed defection of one of their number?”

The man answered in the affirmative, and said that he was certain there could not have been more than two, by the number of foot-marks.

“How far did you follow the tracks?”

“To the neighboring creek.”

“And why did you not pursue them farther?”

“Because the creek being frozen over, the ice was what is called glip, and the wind had consequently so drifted the snow off from the surface, that we lost all sight of the path pursued by the robbers.”

“Did you examine the opposite bank in order to recover the trail?”

“Yes!—for a quarter of a mile, but to no purpose.” My colleague was foiled.

We opened our case as we best could. The gigantic difficulties against which we had to contend almost disheartened us; but one look at the prisoner and his sweet wife inspired us with renewed energy. Poor Ellen! how eagerly she hung on every word, gazing now on her husband and then on the speaker, and seeming to say in every look, that though all the world might desert the accused, she at least would cling to him to the last.

Our evidence was confined almost wholly to the character of the accused, although the account which he gave of himself on the night of the murder was skilfully introduced by my colleague, as a portion of a conversation between the prisoner and one of the commonwealth’s witnesses, which had been given only in part by the prosecution. It was in substance as follows:

Stung to madness on the night of the murder, by the horrors of approaching starvation, Stanhope had left his home, scarcely knowing whither to bend his steps for aid. For several hours he wandered about in the wintry night, and at length found himself on the borders of the creek, back of the village. While standing there moodily, it began to snow. All was silent around. As the white flakes drove in his face, and the biting air swept over his cheek, his feelings became gradually less excited, and he was on the point of returning home, when he perceived three men rapidly approaching through the snow-storm. For the first time in his life he stooped to beg. The nearest man turned sharply around on him as he spoke, seemed to hesitate a moment, and then, as if by a sudden impulse, flung him the purse, which was subsequently identified as Mr. Howard’s. The men then dashed down the bank toward the stream, and vanished as rapidly as they had appeared.

Such was the substance of our defence. It met with nothing but sneers from the prosecuting officer, who, in his address to the jury, treated it as a story fabricated solely for the occasion. Too many of the spectators appeared to agree with him, and when he sat down, the ominous faces of the jury chilled my very heart. At this moment, however, my colleague rose to reply.

Never shall I forget the impression made by this rejoinder. Few men of his day possessed so much eloquence, and on the present occasion it was exerted to the utmost. Skilfully availing himself of the course of argument adopted by the attorney general, he drew in the darkest colors, the unnatural conduct of Mr. Howard to his daughter, and her subsequent destitution owing thereto, and then, by one of those bursts of passion for which he was remarkable, picturing her as she now sat, almost heart-broken, by her husband’s side, he succeeded in awakening the deepest pity in his audience toward the accused. Then, by a sudden transition, he seized upon the testimony of the last witness of the prosecution, and in a few rapid, lightning-like sentences, tore it into shreds. “Yes! gentlemen of the jury,” continued my impassioned colleague, “there is no evidence whatever to criminate the defendant. The grand error of all prosecutions is in thinking a certain man guilty, and then proceeding to account for his conduct. But you must proceed in a manner directly the reverse of this. You must start with the murder and trace up, from that point, the perpetrator. Take the present case, dismiss the idea that Stanhope is the murderer—start afresh on the search after the guilty man—follow up the fugitives to the moment when these other footsteps are met with, and then before God and your own consciences, is there any proof—I repeat it, is there any _proof_, that James Stanhope left the path, or even whether any man left it? You start. But here is the gist of the argument. Here is the broken link in the chain of testimony against us. Unless you are satisfied that some one of the robbers _did_ leave the gang, you must acquit the prisoner. Might not the unfortunate man at the bar have been, as he says, on the spot when these men passed? The finding of the purse on the prisoner proves nothing, for might he not have obtained it in alms? Would not the murderer, indeed, gladly rid himself of this tell-tale, in order to divert suspicion from himself? The character, the relationship, the honor, the common sense of my client forbid the supposition that he would commit so frightful a crime, and yet instantly seek his home, although the ground was covered with snow, and he knew that detection, under such circumstances would be inevitable. Gentlemen, it could not be. On your oaths you will say it could not be. And as you value a fellow creature’s life, as you value your eternal peace, I conjure you to remember that the least doubt must acquit the prisoner. Convict him—and you destroy an innocent man. Acquit him—and you give peace to a broken-hearted wife. If you condemn him, oh! what will be your pangs of remorse when the real criminal is detected. I leave you to your God and yourselves. I implore heaven to guide you aright.”

He took his seat. A dead silence hung over the vast assembly. The effect was too deep for words. At length a heavy, long-protracted sigh was heard throughout the crowd, as if men had held their breaths in awe, and found relief, only that moment, from the spell which bound them. Oh! how I longed that the verdict might then be taken. The sweet wife of the prisoner felt a hope which hitherto she had scarcely ventured to cherish, and clasping her husband’s hand, looked up into his face with a love no language can express, while the tears rolled fast and thick down her cheeks.

At length the attorney general rose to reply. Guarding the jury against being led away by their feelings, he plunged as soon as possible into the argument, and keeping constantly before their minds the fact of the possession of Mr. Howard’s purse by the accused, and the exclamation used by the murderer at the moment of committing the deed, he soon succeeded in removing from their minds at least, the impression of the prisoner’s innocence. How my heart sickened as I saw them turn from one to the other, with those significant glances. And when the prosecuting officer sat down, after his adroit and effective harangue, I felt almost as if my own doom was at hand.

The judge proceeded to charge the jury. Long afterward that judicial effort was talked of as a model of clear and comprehensive logic. It was as I feared. He bore terribly upon the prisoner, treated the story of the accused as of no credibility, and concluded by a powerful appeal to the jury not to be misled by the eloquence of counsel. Yet, even when thus performing what he deemed his duty, his eye happened to fall upon the prisoner’s wife, and I noticed that his lip quivered.

The jury arose and retired. The anxiety, not to say excitement of the spectators, was wound up to an unusual pitch, and increased momentarily. Whatever might be the sentiment of those who were the arbiters of the prisoner’s fate, but one feeling seemed to pervade that vast assembly—and a deep, intense sympathy for the accused, had supplanted the almost universal opinion of his guilt with which the trial had opened. Men eagerly leaned forward to catch a sight of the proud bearing of Stanhope, or the touching demeanor of his wife, and more than one hand brushed away a tear as its owner beheld that melancholy group, awaiting the decision of its fate. As time passed on, the audience grew restless with impatience, glancing now at the clock and now at the door where the jury were expected to enter,—and when at length the bearers of the prisoner’s fate entered, one by one, with slow and solemn steps, like mourners on the shores of Styx, a deep-drawn breath of mingled dread and curiosity, was heard throughout the room. It was an ominous sign to me that every man of the jury avoided looking at the prisoner.

As the accused was ordered, according to the usual form, to stand up and look upon the jury, I glanced at the face of his wife. It was pale and red by turns. She seemed fainting. But the bearing of my client was as calm and collected as a Roman martyr’s. Save a slight flushing of the face, he betrayed no emotion. The audience, however, was lost in the most intense curiosity. Judge, officers, attorney general—all gazed anxiously at the foreman. Bending eagerly forward, they breathlessly awaited the verdict. The silence of the dead reigned in the room.

“How say you, gentlemen of the jury,” said the clerk, “is James Stanhope, the prisoner at the bar, guilty or not guilty, in manner and form as he stands indicted?”

There was a thrilling suspense of a moment, which seemed protracted into an age. Then came, in a low but fearfully distinct voice, the answer of the foreman, as, laying his hand upon his heart, he said,—

“Guilty of murder in the first degree!”

A half-suppressed cry shot wildly throughout the apartment, and then followed a heavy sob at my side. It was the prisoner’s wife who had fainted, and would have fallen, had I not caught her.

“And so say you all?” asked the clerk.

The jury nodded, and while the foreman handed in the verdict, prepared to take their seats, when suddenly, in one corner of the apartment, a commotion arose, as if some person was endeavoring to make way through the crowd, but was resisted. The opposition, however, was only momentary, for after a murmured altercation, cries arose of “pass her on—make way,” ending at length in a prolonged huzza, and before the astonished officers of the court could move toward the scene of the uproar, or be heard commanding silence in the din, the form of a woman was seen hurried through an opening in the crowd, and in an instant she stood within the bar. She was evidently highly excited.

“Stop!” she said, turning to the foreman, “in God’s name stop—don’t hand in your verdict—the prisoner is innocent—I can point out the murderer.”

If I could live, throughout an eternity, I should never forget that moment. Every man started to his feet. Without waiting for an explanation, the crowd caught at her assertion, with an eagerness which could not have been surpassed had their own fate depended on its truth. A universal frenzy seized on the spectators, which showed itself in long and reiterated shouts, lasting for several minutes. Even the officers caught the excitement. The judge himself was visibly agitated. The prisoner, for the first time, turned pale as death, and gasped convulsively, while his poor wife, recovered from her momentary shock, grasped my hand as if in a vice, and trembled violently.

“Mr. Clerk—don’t record the verdict yet!” said the judge, with an excited voice. “Let us hear the woman first. Swear her!”

As soon as silence could be procured, the woman was sworn. She proved to be the mistress of the real murderer, and had intended preserving silence, but her conscience, not yet altogether seared, would not suffer her to stand by, and see an innocent man convicted, when a word from her might save him. She was cognizant of both the robbery and murder, and now offered to turn state’s evidence. The murderer had confessed to her his meeting with Stanhope, and exulted in having given him the purse of the murdered man.