The Curse of Carne's Hold: A Tale of Adventure

by G. A. Henty

"I noticed that they were on the table and in about the same place where they were standing the night before, but I could not say exactly."

"I want you to go out, Ruth," Dr. Arrowsmith said, when he reached her after the jury had retired. "They may be an hour or more before they make up their minds. You are as white as death, child. Let me lead you out."

Ruth shook her head, and murmured, "I must stay." The doctor shrugged his shoulders and returned to his seat. It was an hour and a half before the door opened and the foreman of the jury entered. As he was unaccompanied, it was evident he wanted to ask a question.

"My lord," he said, "we are unanimous as to one part of the verdict, but we can't agree about the other."

"How do you mean, sir?" the judge asked. "I don't want to know what you are unanimous about, but I don't understand what you mean about being unanimous about one part of the verdict and not unanimous on the other."

The foreman hesitated. Then, to the astonishment of the court, the prisoner broke in in a clear steady voice:

"I will not accept acquittal, sir, on the ground of insanity. I am not mad; if I had been the events of the last two months would have driven me so. I demand that your verdict be guilty or not guilty."

The judge was too surprised to attempt to check the prisoner when he first began to speak, and although he attempted to do so before he had finished, the interruption was ineffectual.

"Go back, sir," the judge then said to the foreman. "You must be unanimous as to the whole of your verdict."

The interruption of the prisoner had enlightened those in court as to the nature of the foreman's question. Undoubtedly he had divined rightly. The jury were in favour of the verdict not guilty, but some of them would have added on the ground of insanity. The interruption, although irregular, if not unprecedented, had a favourable effect upon his hearers. The quickness with which the accused had seized the point, and the steady, resolute voice in which he had spoken, told in his favour, and many who before, had they been in the jury-box, would have returned the verdict of not guilty on the ground of insanity, now doubted whether they would add the concluding words.