"'Are you absolutely prepared to swear that no one went in or out of the smoking-room while you were making ready to serve dinner?7
"Then, as the young man seemed to hesitate, the magistrate added more emphatically:
"Think now! You were busy with your usual avocations; there would have been nothing extraordinary in one of the gentlemen going in or out of the smoking-room at that hour. Do you really believe and are you prepared to swear that such a very ordinary incident would have impressed itself indelibly upon your mind?'
"Thus pressed and admonished, Cambalt retrenched himself behind a vague: 'No, sir! I shouldn't like to swear one way or the other.'
"Whereat Miss Monica threw a defiant look at the accused, who, however, did not as much as wink an eyelid in response.
"Presently when that lady herself was called, no one could fail to notice that she, like the coroner's jury the previous day, had absolutely made up her mind that Morley Thrall was guilty, otherwise her attitude of open hostility toward him would have been quite inexplicable. She dwelt at full length on the fact that Mr. Thrall had paid her marked attention for months, and that he had asked her to marry him. She had given him her consent, and between them they had decided to keep their engagement a secret until after she, Monica, had attained her twenty-first birthday, when she would be free to marry whom she chose.
"'Unfortunately,' the witness went on, suddenly assuming a dry, pursed-up manner, 'Colonel Forburg got wind of this. He was always very much set against my marrying at all, and between tea and dinner on Christmas Eve he and I had some very sharp words together on the subject, at the end of which my stepfather said very determinedly: "Christmas or no Christmas, the fellow shall leave my house by the first available train to-morrow, and to-night I am going to give him a piece of my mind."'
"Just for a moment after Miss Glenluce had finished speaking, the accused seemed to depart from his attitude of dignity and reserve, and an indignant 'Oh!' quickly repressed, escaped his lips. The public by this time was dead against him. They are just like sheep, as you know, and the verdict of the coroner's jury had prejudiced them from the start, and the police, aided by Miss Glenluce, had certainly built up a formidable case against the unfortunate man. Every one felt that the motive for the crime was fully established already. 'Remount Forburg' had had a violent quarrel with Morley Thrall, then had turned him out of the house, and the latter, furious at being separated from the girl he loved, had killed the man who stood in his way.
"I should be talking until to-morrow morning were I to give you in detail all the evidence that was adduced in support of the prosecution. The accused listened to it all with perfect calm. He stood with arms folded, his eyes fixed on nothing. The 'Oh!' of indignation did not again cross his lips, nor did he look once at Miss Monica Glenluce. I can assure you that at one moment that day things were looking very black against him.
"Fortunately for him, however, he had a very clever lawyer to defend him in the person of his distinguished cousin, Sir Evelyn Thrall. The latter, by amazingly clever cross-examination of the servants and guests at Brudenell Court, had succeeded in establishing the fact that at no time, from the moment that the burglary alarm was given until after the two revolver shots had been heard, was the accused completely out of sight of some one or other of the witnesses. He was the last to leave the dining-room. Mrs. Rawstone and her daughter testified to that. He had stayed behind one moment after the other three gentlemen had gone out in order to say a few words to Monica Glenluce. Miss Rawstone was standing inside the dining-room door and she was quite positive that Mr. Thrall went straight out into the garden.