“Mr. Cumberland, the only two bottles known to contain this especial brand of wine were in the clubhouse at ten o’clock that night. How came one of them to get into the barrel outside your stable before your return the next day?”
“I cannot say.”
“This barrel stood where?”
“In the passage behind the stable.”
“The passage you pass through on your way to the door leading into your neighbour’s grounds?”
“Yes.”
The dreaded moment had come. This “Yes” had no sooner left Arthur’s lips than I saw Ella throw out her innocent arms, and leap impetuously to her feet, with a loud “No, no, I can tell—”
She did not say what, for at the hubbub roused by this outbreak in open court, she fainted dead away and was carried out in her dismayed father’s arms.
This necessarily caused a break in the proceedings. Mr. Fox suspended his cross-examination and in a few minutes more, the judge adjourned the court. As the prisoner rose and turned to pass out, I cast him a hurried glance to see what effect had been made upon him by this ingenuous outburst from one he had possibly just a little depreciated. A great one, evidently. His features were transformed, and he seemed almost as oblivious of the countless eyes upon him as she had been when she rose to testify for him in her self-forgetful enthusiasm. As I observed this and the satisfaction with which Mr. Moffat scented this new witness,—a satisfaction which promised little consideration for her if she ever came upon the stand—I surrendered to fate.
Inwardly committing Carmel’s future to the God who made her and who knew better than we the story of her life and what her fiery temper had cost her, I drew a piece of paper from my pocket, and, while the courtroom was slowly emptying, hastily addressed the following lines to Mr. Moffat who had lingered to have a few words with his colleague: