‘Can you swear to the rest as your father’s writing and your own?’
The evidence of the banker’s clerk as to the cashing of the cheque had been already taken, and the magistrate said, ‘Thank you. Miss Mohun, I think the case is complete, and we need not trouble you any more.’
But the prisoner’s voice made Dolores start and shudder again, as he said,
‘I beg your pardon, sir, but you have not asked the young lady’—there was a sort of sneer in his voice—‘how she sent this draft.’
‘Did not you send it direct by the post?’ demanded the magistrate.
‘No; I gave it to—’ Again she paused, and the words ‘Gave it to—?’ were authoritatively repeated, so that she had no choice.
‘I gave it to Miss Constance Hacket to send.’
‘You will observe, sir,’ said Flinders, in a somewhat insolent tone, ‘that the evidence which the witness has been so ready to adduce is incomplete. There is another link between her hands and mine.’
‘You may reserve that point for your defence on your trial,’ rejoined the magistrate. ‘There is quite sufficient evidence for your committal.’
There was already a movement to let Dolores be taken away by her uncle and aunt, so as to spare her from any reproach or impertinence that Flinders might launch at her. She was like some one moving in a dream, glad that her aunt should hold her hand as if she were a little child, saying, as they came out into the street, ‘Very clearly and steadily done, Dolly! Wasn’t it, Uncle Regie?’