CHAPTER XX

THE TRIAL BEGINS

Although he had been up most of the night at work on his speech, Maître Raymond Floriot was among the early arrivals at court the next morning. His unlined, youthful face wore an expression of grave responsibility as incongruous as his black advocate's gown when he took his seat at his desk.

The more he had hammered at his appeal to the jury the more he realized that in the strength of his speech lay his one hope of victory. All the evidence would be against him. He did not expect to profit much by cross-examination. The affair was too simple. He must move the jury to pity. There was not even a chance to instil a doubt into the minds of the men who would judge his case. That is usually the chief aim of a defending lawyer in a bad murder trial. He does not have to convince twelve men of conscience that his client is innocent If he can work one drop of the poison of uncertainty into their minds he is usually safe. For the man of average imagination would rather violate his duty to the state a dozen times and let a dozen murderers go free than send one to the gallows and risk the punishment of remorse. "Certainty beyond reasonable doubt," which is the formula of the law, is a farce with most jurors. If there exists, to them, any doubt at all, nothing can convince them that that doubt is unreasonable.

With this powerful weapon taken from him, the young advocate had but one left--an appeal to the emotions. Had he had to face a jury of cold, law-worshipping Anglo-Saxons or stolid, virtue-loving Teutons his best move would have been a plea of guilty and an invocation to Mercy. On these a lawyer might wear out an oratorical rod of Moses without producing a drop of moisture in the way of a tear. But here were volatile, easily moved Latins, and Louis Floriot knew his people when he told his son to "shake them up." So the young man decided to ignore the evidence and build his whole speech on the statement that the woman made to the sergeant of gendarmes on her way to the prison after the shooting--that she had killed Laroque to prevent him from "doing an abominable act."

He was very nervous when he took his seat at the table reserved for counsel for the defense, just in front of the dock. He felt himself growing more uneasy when the judges in their robes of red and black marched in from their room at the rear and the clerk solemnly proclaimed that court was in session.

The great hall was crowded to the doors with men and women from every plane of the social scale. Dozens of lawyers came to watch their new brother break his first spear. A number of seats were reserved for municipal officers. Veiled society women sat among them. Banker, butcher and baker rubbed elbows and craned necks in the general throng, and women of all descriptions squeezed and jostled their way through them.

Raymond ran his eye hurriedly over the first rows and caught a smile of pride on Helene's lovely face, gazing at him over the railing that cut off the spectators from the attorneys and court officials. M. Noel and Dr. Chennel gave him reassuring nods as they met his glance and Rose waved her hand. He turned hastily away and began busying himself with his papers as the prisoner was led in between two gendarmes. She was crying and held her handkerchief to her eyes as she took her seat in the dock. Raymond watched her nervously and tried to say a few encouraging words but he could only stammer. M. Valmorin, from his desk on the opposite side of the "bank," smiled at his future son-in-law's symptoms of panic and gave him a friendly nod.

Raymond had watched court proceedings in criminal cases so often that he was as familiar with the routine as a practised lawyer but now that he was for the first time an actor it all seemed strange and overwhelming. He was conscious only that Helene and his father never took their eyes off him but he never looked their way again. The voice of the clerk reading the charge sounded far away and seemed to be no part of the present scene.

"--In consequence of which the woman, Laraque, is accused of having, on April 3rd, 19--, at half-past five in the afternoon, committed an act of voluntary homicide in Room 24 of the Hotel of the Three Crowns in Bordeaux, on the person of her lover, Frederick Laroque, a crime punishable by Articles 295 and 304 of the Penal Code."

The voice stopped amid absolute silence, and then Raymond heard the grave, gentle tones of the kindly old President of the Court.

"Woman Laroque, you have heard the charge against you. You are accused of having committed an act of voluntary homicide on the person of your lover, Frederick Laroque. What have you to say in your defense? Do you admit that you are guilty of this crime?"

He paused and Raymond, turning in his chair, locked up at his client. Every eye in the room was on her. She was dressed entirely in black and wore a black cloth shawl over her head that almost entirely concealed her face, excepting from those directly in front of her. Her profile was toward the judges. The black background made her pallor almost ghastly. Her features were set and hard--a hopeless mask of chalk. She gave no sign that she had heard the President's words.

"You refuse to reply?" he went on. "You persist in keeping silent as you kept silent under examination? Let me beg of you, in your own interests, to speak. Your silence can only be harmful to your case. You refuse to speak?"--He paused again.

"The matter is in the hands of the jury. You shall hear the evidence against you. Clerk of the court, call the first witness!"

A stir and a murmur ran through the court as the President settled back in his chair and the clerk called, "Victor Chouquet! Victor Chouquet!"

Perissard and Merivel had managed to secure seats well forward and watched the proceedings with the interest of experts.

"What did I tell you, my dear Merivel!" whispered the senior partner.

"It has all been arranged!"

"Of course it has!"

While they were awaiting the appearance of the boots of the Three Crowns, Raymond gazed curiously at his client. It was the first time he had ever seen her, and he was wondering what tragic story was masked behind her stony, inscrutable face. She did not seem to be aware that he was alive, and turning her head, glanced over the row of judges. Suddenly Raymond saw her eyes widen with horror and amazement Her bosom heaved and her lips worked as if she were trying to speaks He rose hastily and leaned over the dock.

"What is the matter, madame? Are you ill?" he asked in quick undertone.

She turned to him with the jerky, uncertain movements of an automaton, but kept her eyes fastened on the bench.

"What--who--who is that gentleman--talking to the judges?" she whispered. The words could barely be heard.

"President Floriot, from Toulouse," answered Raymond. He supposed that she had asked this apparently idle question to conceal the real thought that had caused her agitation, and so went on earnestly:

"Believe me, madame, your silence may lose your case for you. I beg you to speak!"

She drew the cloth more closely about her face and stared out over his head with wild eyes. With a shrug of his shoulders Raymond dropped back into his chair and turned to listen to the examination of Chouquet. He was beginning to feel more master of himself and more certain that his case was hopeless.

"State your name, age, and profession!" commanded the President as Victor took his stand behind the witness railing.

"Victor Emmanuel Chouquet, twenty-nine years of age, boots of the Hotel of the Three Crowns," replied Victor in his high-pitched drawl.

"Where do you live?"

"At the hotel, M. the President."

"You are no relation of the prisoner, are you, or in any way connected with her service?"

"No, M. the President."

"Raise your right hand!--Do you swear to speak without hatred or fear, to tell the whole truth? Say, 'I swear it.'"

"I swear it!" repeated the witness.

"Put down your hand. Give your evidence!"

Victor shuffled uneasily up against the railing and turned to the jury.

"On April 3d," he began, "a man and woman came to the hotel----"

"What time was it?" interrupted the President.

"It was a short time after lunch."

"Go on!"

"They had a trunk and a bag. I took them up to Room 24 on the top floor, and the man said, as he went into the room, 'Not a palace, is it?' And the woman said, 'Oh, what does it matter--this room or another one!' to which the man replied, 'Well, I don't suppose we will be here long.' Then they asked me for absinthe and cigarettes which I got for them, and the man asked me to leave the bottle."

"Did they drink much?" interrupted the President.

"I didn't notice."

"What was the attitude of the woman?"

"She didn't have any," replied Victor, and a titter ran over the benches. The court usher frowned and rapped on his desk.

"Did she look happy, sad, calm or nervous?" explained the President, irritably. Victor considered for several moments.

"She looked very tired," he replied.

"Go on!"

"Some time afterward my wife went up to their room for the police form and took down their names--M. and Mme. Laroque, from Buenos Ayres on their way to Paris."

"Your wife was at the hotel?"

"Yes, she was chambermaid there."

"Why has she not been called as a witness?" the judge demanded with a frown. Victor rubbed his hand across his eyes and snuffled.

"Because she's not there any longer. On the evening after the murder she left me and I haven't seen her since. A few days after she had gone she wrote me a note, saying, 'Don't worry about me. I am very happy. Take care of the child.'"

There was a quick shuffling of feet and exclamations of pity and sympathy swept across the court. The usher frowned and pounded his desk again. The President's face softened as he watched Victor wiping away his tears, and he gave him time to recover before requesting him to go on.

"At about half-past five, as I was taking water to a room on the same floor," said Victor at last, "I heard a shot fired and a shriek in Room 24. I rushed in and found M. Laroque lying on the floor in front of his wife, who held a smoking revolver in her hand. I took the revolver away from her and held her tight."

"Did she say anything?"

"She said, 'There's no hurry. I shan't try to get away.' Then the police came and took her off."

"That's all you know?"

"Yes, M. the President."

"The prisoner is the woman you call Madame Laroque, is she?"

Victor gazed at the white face above Raymond's head.

"Yes, M. the President," he said. The President looked in the same direction.

"Prisoner, you have heard the evidence of this witness? Have you anything to say?" he asked, solemnly.

Jacqueline had not heard the evidence. From the moment she recognized her husband a thousand mad thoughts had stormed through her mind in a bewildering phantasmagoria. Her fierce hatred had given birth to a hundred fantastic schemes of vengeance that the situation made possible. Should she wait until her character and her shame had been painted their blackest and then tell the crowded court that he was her husband? Should she go to the place of execution and denounce him from the scaffold? No! She could not do that because of her boy. She had killed Laroque to hide her shame from her son. How could she proclaim it now and make that terrible crime useless? But couldn't she tell just enough to show _him_--God! how she hated him! who she was and to what he had driven her? She could picture his face as he recognized her and listened to the horrible story of her degradation. She was glad that there was no vice so low that it had not soiled her; for thus the greater would be his anguish when she proclaimed it....

"You insist on remaining silent?" the President was saying.

"Wait a little! Wait a little while!" she murmured, but so low that even Raymond could not catch the words.

"Gentlemen of the Jury, have you any questions to ask the jury?" He paused and turned to M. Valmorin.

"Thank you, no, M. the President," bowed the Prosecutor.

"Has the counsel for the defense anything to ask the witness?"

The instinct of the cross-examiner triumphed over the nervousness of youth.

"The witness has mentioned that my client had been drinking absinthe," said Raymond, rising. His voice was sure and steady. "I should like to know whether he thinks she was intoxicated."

The President nodded and turned to Victor.

"You hear the question? Was the prisoner drunk or sober when you ran into the room and found her with the revolver in her hand?"

Victor shifted uneasily and appeared to hesitate.

"Well, she was very much excited," he said. "There's no doubt about that, M. the President Her eyes were like a crazy woman's and her face was red and she didn't seem to know what she was doing."

A stir and murmur from the benches told Raymond that the audience credited him with a point scored.

"Would you say she was drunk?" he insisted.

"Well, some would say she was and some would say she wasn't," replied the witness, falling back on his never-failing formula.

A titter ran through the court at this conservative answer, and the president frowned.

"What would _you_ say?" demanded Raymond. Victor's confusion was complete.

"I--I wouldn't say!" he stammered. Raymond turned back to his desk with a shrug of his shoulders.

"Counsel for the defense, have you any more questions to ask the witness?" demanded the court.

"No, M. the President," was the reply.

"Stand down!" commanded the President "Clerk of the court, call the next witness!"

The next witness was Sergeant Fontaine, the gendarme who had arrested Jacqueline. He talked in jerky, military tones, and gave his evidence as if he were dictating an official report He told of arresting her in the hotel and taking her to the prison.

"Did she say anything while you were taking her off?" asked the court.

"I did most of the talking," he replied. "I asked her why she had killed Laroque and she said she had done it to prevent him doing a disgraceful thing which would have brought unhappiness and despair to some one she loved. I tried to make her say more, but she wouldn't. She said that she wouldn't say another word to anybody, and she didn't."

No one had any questions to ask the witness, though it was plain from the manner in which some of the jurors gazed at the prisoner that the policeman's testimony had made an impression. They were the usual run of jurors--plain middle-class tradesmen with a rather better than average intelligence; and, as Raymond looked them over, he felt that there was grim work ahead if he would upset their judgment and make them follow the impulse of emotion. He did not think he could do it.

Victor and the sergeant were the only two witnesses, and the President turned to Jacqueline when the gendarme had taken a seat beside Victor on the bench reserved for witnesses.

"Before calling on the Public Prosecutor," he said solemnly, "I ask you for the last time, prisoner, in your own interest, to tell the jury why you committed this crime. You told the policeman who arrested you, and who has just given his evidence, that you killed Laroque to prevent him from committing an infamous and abominable act which would have caused trouble to some one you loved. To what act did you allude? To whom would it have brought trouble? Knowledge of the reasons which caused you to commit the murder may have an important influence on the jury in reaching a verdict. You refuse, to speak? You have made up your mind to say nothing----"

He paused; and then:

"M. the Prosecutor!" he announced.

M. Valmorin rose slowly and bowed to the President, and then to the jury. It was an old story with him--the murder of a degenerate man by a fallen woman. He had only to go over an old formula.

"There you are!" whispered M. Perissard to his colleague. "It is practically over!"

"Gentlemen of the jury, I shall not keep you long," began M. Valmorin, in a gentle, pleasant voice. "The crime on which you have to give your verdict is simple and baneful. The woman has killed her lover--but who is this woman? What is her real name? Where does she come from? Who is she? We do not know! Since her arrest the prisoner has refused to answer all questions that have been put to her. She has not spoken a syllable in reply to the Examining Magistrate, and you have seen for yourselves that here in court she has insisted on remaining obstinately silent, although her silence cannot but harm her case--if she has the slightest shred of defense!

"There is sometimes an explanation of a murder--if not an excuse for it--to be found in the motives that inspired it. Murders are committed for reasons of money, for reasons of love, for reasons of jealousy, or to quench a thirst for vengeance. And the passion which arms the criminal's hand, which disturbs her power of reasoning and which makes her act without thinking--this, to some extent, diminishes her responsibility and the horror which the act of murder makes every man feel."

The jurors were leaning forward, their eyes fastened on his face and their reasons hypnotized by the musical, confident voice.

"When one or other of these reasons is brought forward, justice may be tempered with mercy. But how can you be asked to find excuses for an act, the motive of which the prisoner refuses to disclose? By this very refusal we may be forgiven for believing--nay, we are almost forced to believe that they are the worst possible motives. I distrust, for my part, the impenetrable mystery in which the prisoner has robed herself, and I can feel no pity for a guilty woman whose lips have not uttered a word of repentance!"

A loud, clear voice rang suddenly and sharply through the court.

"_I will speak presently_!"

A burst of laughter would not have been more disconcerting! M. Valmorin stopped, and every eye in the court was on the prisoner. Half of the men in the great room had started to their feet. The attitude and the look of suffering and the dark, hunted eyes were not visibly changed, but it was undoubtedly the woman who had spoken. The prosecutor bit his lip. Ten seconds before he had read in every eye in the jury-box, and in nearly every face in the courtroom, a placid acquiescence. Now there was pity in the glance of more than one of the twelve who would judge his case, and he would have to win them away from it. This would be harder than gaining their confidence at the outset had been.

The usher hammered the top of his desk until the excitement died away and there was order in court once more. Then M. Valmorin began the work of repairing the damage.

"As I was saying, gentlemen of the jury, we know nothing about the woman Laroque," he continued, calmly, as if he considered of little importance the sensation that accompanied the dramatic interruption. "We have found no proof that she was ever a resident of France.

"In Buenos Ayres it is not known where she came from. During her stay in South America she did not, so far as we can learn, offend any of the laws of the country. In the month of March she took passage on board the Amazon for Bordeaux. Nothing particular was remarked about her during the trip, excepting that she told the fortunes of the passengers with a deck of cards--that she said she was certain she would die before long, and that she was in a great hurry to get back to France. This is all we know about her past.

"On the afternoon of April 3d she arrived at the Hotel of the Three Crowns, and at half-past five she killed her lover--a man whose past will not bear scrutiny, and who had been sentenced for theft on two occasions. You have heard the evidence of the servant with reference to the overexcitement of the prisoner. I will draw no conclusion from this evidence, nor is it necessary to go into the question of the prisoner's moral responsibility, which overexcitement--caused by drink--may have affected. I will leave this phase of the case to my friend, the counsel for the defense--Maître Raymond Floriot----"

A frightful, unearthly shriek drowned the soothing voice of the prosecutor and brought every man and woman in the courtroom, pale-faced and startled, to their feet. Several women screamed, and the others stared, frightened at the prisoner. She was standing, rigid and swaying, head raised and eyes closed, her stiffened arms held close to her sides, her hands opening and closing convulsively. Two gendarmes seized her and tried to force her back into her chair.

"My God! My God!" she shrieked again and again. Raymond was beside her in a moment, his hand on her arm, begging her to be calm.

"For God's sake! Stop torturing that woman!" roared a man's voice from the audience.

It was the signal for a pandemonium! The usher pounded on his desk until the boards cracked, but the crowd lurched forward against the railing in a terrific uproar.

"Let her alone!"

"She's dying!"

"Great God! It's Jacqueline! It's Floriot's wife!" shouted Noel in Dr. Chennel's ear. And the next moment that elderly physician was over the railing like a boy. He burst through the gendarmes and rushed over to the dock. But Jacqueline was again in her seat and waved him back. He and Raymond bent over her.

"Are you ill? Shall I ask for an adjournment?" they asked breathlessly.

"No! No! No!" she panted, "I'm all right--all right!"

Her eyes were still closed and her lips worked as if she were trying to speak. Dr. Chennel's fingers closed over her left wrist. He leaned over and whispered reassuring words in her ear and gently patted her shoulder. The subtle magnetism cf the physician seemed to have its effect at last and she slowly opened her eyes and sat up.

The din in the courtroom died as suddenly as it had begun, and the spectators shamefacedly sought their seats under the blazing eyes of the President.

He was livid with anger.

"This is the most disgraceful scene that ever stained a French court!" he cried in a voice that trembled with suppressed rage. "If there is another sound from the benches during these proceedings I will order the gendarmes to clear the hall!"

Noel glanced quickly at his friend in his seat behind the judges to see if he, too, had recognized "the woman, Laroque."

Floriot's face was buried in his hands. He pressed a handkerchief so tightly to his eyes that Noel fancied he could see the whiteness of the nails. Any great blow--mental or physical--is immediately followed by a practically complete cessation of all activity of the senses. The mind --if it works at all--revolves around singular and ridiculous trifles, utterly foreign to the disaster or its effect. It was this condition that the recognition of Jacqueline left her husband. He was conscious that quiet had been restored and that Valmorin was continuing his speech, but the scene and its actors seemed remote from his life.

"As for the reason of the crime," the prosecutor was saying, "I repeat that we do not know it. Now that the prisoner has promised to speak, we may learn what it was."

Speak!--would she speak!--Raymond was standing half facing the prosecutor, his profile toward the woman. His right hand rested on the top of the railing in front of the dock. Jacqueline's eyes were on his handsome head, and in them there was unutterable love and unutterable dread. His delicate nostrils were quivering, and a touch of color came and went in his cheeks. He was watching Valmorin with eager, anxious eyes. Timidly, as a child, her hand crept out and closed softly over his fingers. He glanced up at her quickly, with what was meant to be a reassuring smile, but the early stage fright was returning. The prosecutor was nearing the end of his speech and in a few moments he must rise to reply. She drew her hand away, and he looked from it to the woman for a moment as if something remarkable had happened.

... An invisible band that has never been measured by our mortal standards binds mother and child together. It, alone of earthly ties, takes no count of Time or Space, and joy and degradation and wealth and want and woe alike are powerless to loosen. It has been called the only unselfish love, but it is not that. For, "damned in body and soul," the boy clings to his mother as to a promise of salvation; and a mother, dying in shame and despair, yet sees in her child--Immortality!...

As if it had needed but that touch of the fingers to draw the cord tightly around his heart, Raymond felt for a moment that his soul was going out to the wretched woman that he had never seen until that day. Emotions that he had never known before were stirred to life. A desire to take her in his arms almost overpowered him. And what it meant to the mother only a mother may know. "Speak!" She would commit a thousand murders and go a thousand times to execution rather than utter a syllable now!...

"You, gentlemen of the jury, will weigh in the balance her sincerity and repentance with her guilt, and let your conscience be the judge of what punishment is proportionate to the crime she has committed."

There was a rustle and low murmur of whispered conversation as M. Valmorin resumed his seat.

"I don't think much of M. the Public Prosecutor," muttered M. Perissard. M. Merivel nodded his acquiescence without taking his eyes off the scene beyond the railing. The prisoner was huddled over the front of the dock, sobbing violently The President gazed at her with pity in his eyes.

"Woman Laroque, will you answer my questions now?" he asked, kindly. She did not seem to hear.

"You said a few minutes ago that you would speak."

Jacqueline raised her wet, anguish-stricken face and held out both hands, as if warding off a blow.

"No! Never! Never!" she cried, wildly, and sank down again.

"Take time for reflection, and let me, for the last time, advise you not to remain obstinate!" persisted the judge.

There was no reply save a storm of weeping that shook the dock. Murmurs of pity rose again and the usher rapped sharply on his desk for attention.

"Counsel for the defense!" called the President,