The Greatest Murder Mysteries of Mary Elizabeth Braddon. Mary Elizabeth Braddon

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СКАЧАТЬ days before the murder, when, one morning, at a little before twelve o’clock—that being the time at which my pupils are dismissed from their studies for an hour’s recreation—I said to him, ‘Mr. North, I should like you to call upon this Indian gentleman, who is staying with Mrs. Marwood, and whose wealth is so much talked of——”

      “Pardon me. You said, ‘whose wealth is so much talked of.’ Can you swear to having made that remark?”

      “I can.”

      “Pray continue,” said the counsel.

      “ ‘I should like you,’ I said, ‘to call upon this Mr. Harding, and solicit his aid for the Orphan Asylum; we are sadly in want of funds. I know, North, your heart is in the work, and you will plead the cause of the orphans successfully. You have an hour before dinner; it is some distance to the Black Mill, but you can walk fast there and back.’ He went accordingly, and on his return brought a five-pound note, which Mr. Harding had given him.”

      Dr. Tappenden proceeded to describe the circumstance of the death of the little boy in the usher’s apartment, on the very night of the murder. One of the servants was examined, who slept on the same floor as North, and who said she had heard strange noises in his room that night, but had attributed the noises to the fact of the usher sitting up to attend upon the invalid. She was asked what were the noises she had heard.

      “I heard some one open the window, and shut it a long while after.”

      “How long do you imagine the interval to have been between the opening and shutting of the window?” asked the counsel.

      “About two hours,” she replied, “as far as I could guess.”

      The next witness for the prosecution was the old servant, Martha.

      “Can you remember ever having seen the prisoner at the bar?”

      The old woman put on her spectacles, and steadfastly regarded the elegant Monsieur de Marolles, or Jabez North, as his enemies insisted on calling him. After a very deliberate inspection of that gentleman’s personal advantages, rather trying to the feelings of the spectators, Mrs. Martha Jones said, rather obscurely—

      “He had light hair then.”

      “ ‘He had light hair then.’ You mean, I conclude,” said the counsel, “that at the time of your first seeing the prisoner, his hair was of a different colour from what it is now. Supposing that he had dyed his hair, as is not an uncommon practice, can you swear that you have seen him before to-day?”

      “I can.”

      “On what occasion?” asked the counsel.

      “Three days before the murder of my mistress’s poor brother. I opened the gate for him. He was very civil-spoken, and admired the garden very much, and asked me if he might look about it a little.”

      “He asked you to allow him to look about the garden? Pray was this as he went in, or as he went out?”

      “It was when I let him out.”

      “And how long did he stay with Mr. Harding?”

      “Not more than ten minutes. Mr. Harding was in his bedroom; he had a cabinet in his bedroom in which he kept papers and money, and he used to transact all his business there, and sometimes would be there till dinner-time.”

      “Did the prisoner see him in his bedroom?”

      “He did. I showed him upstairs myself.”

      “Was anybody in the bedroom with Mr. Harding when he saw the prisoner?”

      “Only his coloured servant: he was always with him.”

      “And when you showed the prisoner out, he asked to be allowed to look at the garden? Was he long looking about?”

      “Not more than five minutes. He looked more at the house than the garden. I noticed him looking at Mr. Harding’s window, which is on the first floor; he took particular notice of a very fine creeper that grows under the window.”

      “Was the window, on the night of the murder, fastened, or not?”

      “It never was fastened. Mr. Harding always slept with his window a little way open.”

      After Martha had been dismissed from the witness-box, the old servant of Mr. Harding, the Lascar, who had been found living with a gentleman in London, was duly sworn, prior to being examined.

      He remembered the prisoner at the bar, but made the same remark as Martha had done, about the change in colour of his hair.

      “You were in the room with your late master when the prisoner called upon him?” asked the counsel.

      “I was.”

      “Will you state what passed between the prisoner and your master?”

      “It is scarcely in my power to do so. At that time I understood no English. My master was seated at his cabinet, looking over papers and accounts. I fancy the prisoner asked him for money. He showed him papers both printed and written. My master opened a pocket-book filled with notes, the pocket-book afterwards found on his nephew, and gave the prisoner a bank note. The prisoner appeared to make a good impression on my late master, who talked to him in a very cordial manner. As he was leaving the room, the prisoner made some remark about me, and I thought from the tone of his voice, he was asking a question.”

      “You thought he was asking a question?”

      “Yes. In the Hindostanee language we have no interrogative form of speech, we depend entirely on the inflexion of the voice; our ears are therefore more acute than an Englishman’s. I am certain he asked my master some questions about me.”

      “And your master——?”

      “After replying to him, turned to me, and said, ‘I am telling this gentleman what a faithful fellow you are, Mujeebez, and how you always sleep in my dressing-room.’ ”

      “You remember nothing more?”

      “Nothing more.”

      The Indian’s deposition, taken in the hospital at the time of the trial of Richard Marwood, was then read over to him. He certified to the truth of this deposition, and left the witness-box.

      The landlord of the Bargeman’s Delight, Mr. Darley, and Mr. Peters (the latter by an interpreter), were examined, and the story of the quarrel and the lost Indian coin was elicited, making considerable impression on the jury.

      There was only one more witness for the crown, and this was a young man, a chemist, who had been an apprentice at the time of the supposed death of Jabez North, and who had sold to him a few days before that supposed suicide the materials for a hair-dye.

      The counsel for the prosecution then summed up.

      It is not for us to follow him through the twistings and windings of a very complicated mass of evidence; he had to prove the identity of Jabez North with the prisoner at the bar, and he had to prove that Jabez North was the murderer of Mr. Montague Harding. To the mind of every spectator in that crowded court he succeeded in proving СКАЧАТЬ