The House of the White Shadows

by B. L. Farjeon

"Picture to yourselves this struggle already so vividly painted, so graphically portrayed. The unhappy girl clung to her destroyer, she clutched his dress, his hands, his body in her wild despair--a despair which inspired her with strength beyond her ordinary capacity. And of still greater weight is the fact that there was not to be found on any part of Gautran's body a scratch, a wound, or a bruise of any description.

"What, then, becomes of the evidence of a terrible life and death struggle in which it is said he was engaged? Upon this point alone the entire theory of the prosecution breaks down. The absence from Gautran's clothes and person of any mark or identification of a physical contest is the strongest testimony of his innocence of this ruthless, diabolical crime; and, wretched and degraded as is the spectacle he presents, justice demands from you his acquittal.

"Still one other proof of his innocence remains to be spoken of; I will touch upon it lightly, but it bears a very strange aspect, as though the prosecution were fearful that its introduction would fatally injure their case.

"When Gautran was searched a knife was found upon him--the knife, without doubt, with which he inflicted upon the face of a comrade a wound which he will bear to the grave. Throughout the whole of the evidence for the prosecution I waited and looked for the production of that knife; I expected to see upon it a blood proof of guilt. But it was not produced; no mention has been made of it. Why? Because there is upon its blade no mark of blood.

"Do you believe that a ruffian like Gautran would have refrained from using his knife upon the body of his victim, to shorten the terrible struggle? Even in light quarrels men in his condition of life threaten freely with their knives, and use them recklessly. To suppose that with so swift and sure a means at hand to put an end to the horrible affair, Gautran, in the heat and fury of the time, refrained from availing himself of it, is to suppose a thing contrary and opposed to reason.

"Remember the answer given by one of the witnesses who knows the nature of the man well, when I asked him whether in his passionate moods Gautran would be likely to show coolness or cunning. 'He would have no time to think; he would be carried away by his passion.' His is the nature of a brute, governed by brute laws. You are here to try, not the prisoner's general character, not his repulsive appearance, not his brutish nature, but a charge of murder of which he is accused, and of which, in the clear light of human motive and action, it is impossible he can be guilty."

The Advocate's speech, of which this is but a brief and imperfect summary, occupied seven hours, and was delivered throughout with a cold impressive earnestness and with an absence of passion which gradually and effectually turned the current which had set so fatally against the prisoner. The disgust and abhorrence he inspired were in no wise modified, but the Advocate had instilled into the minds of his auditors the strongest doubts of Gautran's guilt.

Two witnesses were called, one a surgeon of eminence, the other a nurse in an hospital. They deposed that there were no marks of an encounter upon the prisoner's person, that upon his skin was no abrasion, that his clothes exhibited no traces of recent tear or repair, and that it was scarcely possible he could have been engaged in a violent personal struggle.

Upon the conclusion of this evidence, which cross-examination did not shake, the jury asked that Gautran should be examined by independent experts. This was done by thoroughly qualified men, whose evidence strengthened that of the witnesses for the defence. The jury asked, also, that the knife found upon Gautran should be produced. It was brought into court, and carefully examined, and it was found that its blade was entirely free from blood-stain.

The jury, astounded at the turn the affair had taken, listened attentively to the speech of the judge, who dwelt with great care upon every feature in the case. The court sat late to give its decision, and when the verdict was pronounced, Gautran was a free man.