Harding listened to every word with scrupulous attention; and it was observed that, at several of the counts in the indictment, which described the act that he had committed with much greater precision than he had expected, he set his teeth hard. On the question being put to each of the prisoners--"How say you, guilty or not guilty?"--the three first pleaded "not guilty," and what is termed put themselves upon their country, or in fact appealed to a jury. Walter Harrison, however, in a bold, firm voice, replied at once--"Guilty of the robbery, but not guilty of the murder;" and consequently it was found necessary to proceed on his trial also, upon several of the counts in the indictment.
The trial then went on; and as the reader is already aware of the greater part of the evidence that could be brought forward, it shall be but briefly recapitulated here. The footprints on the floor of the room where the murder had been committed, and the mark of the hand on the wall, were proved to correspond exactly with the feet of Harding and Smithson, and with the hand of the latter. The marks in the passage were also proved to have been caused by the feet of the young sailor; and evidence was given that Harding had paid the master of a cutter, hired to carry them to France, with one of the notes which could be traced to the possession of the miser of Ryebury a few days before his death. The ci-devant smuggler, Billy Small, swore positively to the persons of Harding, Smithson, Harrison, and the woman, and detailed fully the particulars of their arrival at his house, with a gentleman whose ancle was dislocated, and who had evidently received a severe contusion on the forehead. The Bow Street officers proved the state of the prisoners' apartments in Paris, the considerable sums of money there found, and a variety of minor facts, which all aggravated the suspicions against them; and as the principal witness, Henry Beauchamp, was at length called, in order to establish the fact of the prisoners having been on the very night of the murder at the house of Mr. Tims, and having thence proceeded direct to the cottage of the smuggler. As he entered the witness-box, the cheek of Harding turned a shade paler, but at the same time his eye flashed with an expression rather of rage, than fear. As his former master went on, however, he recovered his composure, and listened calmly, while Beauchamp clearly and distinctly detailed all the events, from his second visit to Mr. Tims's house, on the night of the murder, till he was delivered over to the care of the old smuggler and his family.
Throughout the trial, Harding had acted as his own counsel, and now he proceeded with an air of cool determined effrontery to cross-examine his former master, mingling skilfully those questions which might tend to exculpate himself with those which he thought would annoy the witness.
"Allow me to ask you, Mr. Beauchamp," he said, "whether, while I was in your service, you ever detected me in any act of dishonesty."
"To speak but candidly," replied Beauchamp, "I never did."
"Did I not on more than one occasion," proceeded Harding, "when your tradesmen endeavoured to cheat or overcharge you, point out to you the fact."
"You certainly did," replied his former master.
"So far, then, your evidence is favourable to me," continued the culprit. "Now, pray tell me, Mr. Beauchamp, what was your own errand at the house of Mr. Tims on the night in question--or rather, what became of you between the first and second calls which you made at his dwelling during that evening?" and he fixed his eye upon the witness's countenance with a degree of sneering triumph at the pain he imagined the question would cause him. But Beauchamp answered with the utmost coolness.
"I do not know," he said, "that any law would oblige me to reply to a demand which does not seem to bear upon the case; but, nevertheless, I have not the slightest objection to do so. I had, on the first visit I paid to the unhappy man who was afterwards murdered, received from him the sum of twenty-five thousand pounds, which I had promised to advance on mortgage on the estate of my cousin. Sir Sidney Delaware. From the house of Mr. Tims I went straight to Emberton Park; and, having discovered that Captain Delaware was absent from home, I took the liberty, as a relation and intimate friend, of entering his room, and leaving the money enveloped in a packet upon his dressing-table, proposing to give him intimation of the fact next morning."
"Was not that rather a hazardous action, sir?" demanded Harding with cool insolence--"especially when there were so many thieves abroad?"