Charles Peace, or The Adventures of a Notorious Burglar

by Anonymous

The darker side of his character was, of course, not known to those whom he counted as his friends.

Some people, gossiping and mischievously disposed persons, hinted that he was not the best of husbands; that he was a mercenary grasping man, but nobody was prepared to hear that he was a murderer.

His social position caused him to be treated with some degree of consideration, and bail was accepted pending the serious and weighty charge made against him. He had not much difficulty in obtaining the necessary sureties, after which he returned home. The offence with which he stood charged was committed in America, and the prosecution sought, by means of the extradition treaty, to take him over to that country for trial.

The doctor hoped, as other culprits have hoped both before and since, that the identification would fail to be established, and at the outset of the proceedings he buoyed himself up with this delusion. But Mr. Shearman had managed the case with a considerable amount of skill and tact, and he was not at all the sort of man to let the accused escape through any neglect or want of forethought.

When the first examination took place before the sitting magistrate, the counsel for the prosecution gave a brief but succinct recital of the leading events. He dwelt with much force upon the sudden and mysterious death of Clara Wagstaff, who appeared, so he averred, to be in sound and robust health but a few days before her decease.

Suddenly, and without any perceptible cause, she was stricken down with insupportable and violent pains in the viscera.

A doctor was called in, who declared her to be suffering from inflammation of the bowels. He prescribed and attended her with the greatest assiduity, but despite his remedies she gradually sank and expired in her husband’s arms, who was said to be overwhelmed with grief at the loss of his partner.

The body of the ill-fated woman was interred, and her husband, after a short period of mourning, plunged, so it was alleged, into a vortex of dissipation.

The theory that the young woman came by her death from natural causes, which were beyond the control of man, was very generally accepted. Some few, however, at the time of her decease, were a little mistrustful. One in particular, the black girl, Tilda, shook her head, and said she was not at all satisfied with the manner of her mistress’s death, which she declared to be strange and mysterious, and in every way suspicious. She spoke her mind pretty freely at the time, with no better result than being reviled for what people chose to call her scandalous and wicked aspersions. So the matter dropped, and, as years passed on, the death of Mrs. Wagstaff was forgotten by the inhabitants of the neighbourhood. And it was not until Mr. Silas Leaven instituted inquiries, that the real facts of the case were brought to light. The body was exhumed, and the presence of arsenic was detected in the stomach, intestines, and other organs of the body. A sufficient amount was recovered to prove beyond all question that the poor creature had been poisoned by that deleterious drug. Two doctors from America, who made the post mortem examination, gave their evidence at the police-court, and their testimony was unanswerable.

Up to this point the case was as clear as the sun at noonday. The next question was, how far Dr. Bourne was connected with the case. Was he the man who passed as Wagstaff, and who married the planter’s daughter?