The ways of the hour

by James Fenimore Cooper

Unhappy life, and taint me if they can.”

The Orphan.

It is to be presumed that Timms found the means to communicate to Williams the rejection of the latter’s offer, before the court met next morning. It is certain that the counsel associated with the Attorney-General manifested unusual zeal in the performance of duties that most men would have found unpleasant, if not painful, and that he was captious, short, and ill-natured. Just as Mary Monson came within the bar, a letter was put into the hands of Dunscomb, who quietly broke the seal, and read it twice, as the observant Timms fancied; then put it in his pocket, with a mien so undisturbed that no mere looker-on would have suspected its importance. The letter was from Millington, and it announced a general want of success in his mission. The whereabouts of M. de Larocheforte could not be ascertained; and those who knew anything about his movements, were of opinion that he was travelling in the West, accompanied by his fair, accomplished, and affluent young consort. None of those who would naturally have heard of such an event, had it occurred, could say there had ever been a separation between the French husband and the American wife. Millington, himself, had never seen his kinswoman, there being a coolness of long standing between the two branches of the family, and could give little or no information on the subject. In a word, he could discover nothing to enable him to carry out the clue obtained in the rumour; while, on the other hand, he found a certain set, who occupied themselves a good deal with intelligence of that sort, were greatly disposed to believe the report, set on foot by herself, that Mary Monson was a stool-pigeon of a gang of marauders, and doubtless guilty of everything of which she had been accused. Millington would remain in town, however, another day, and endeavour to push his inquiries to some useful result. Cool, clear-headed, and totally without romance, Dunscomb knew that a better agent than his young friend could not be employed, and was fain to wait patiently for the discoveries he might eventually succeed in making. In the mean time the trial proceeded.

“Mr. Clerk,” said his honour, “let the jury be called.”

This was done, and Mary Monson’s lips moved, while a lurking smile lighted her countenance, as her eyes met the sympathy that was expressed in the countenances of several of the grave men who had been drawn as arbiters, in her case, between life and death. To her it was apparent that her sex, her youth, perhaps her air and beauty, stood her friends, and that she might largely count on the compassion of that small but important body of men. One of her calculations had succeeded to the letter. The tale of her being a stool-pigeon had been very actively circulated, with certain additions and embellishments that it was very easy to disprove; and another set of agents had been hard at work, all the morning, in brushing away such of the collateral circumstances as had, at first, been produced to confirm the main story, and which, in now being pulled to pieces as of no account, did not fail to cast a shade of the darkest doubt over the whole rumour. All this Mary Monson probably understood, and understanding, enjoyed; a vein of wild wilfulness certainly running through her character, leading in more directions than one.

“I hope there will be no delay on account of witnesses,” observed the judge. “Time is very precious.”

“We are armed at all points, your honour, and intend to bring the matter to an early conclusion,” answered Williams, casting one of those glances at the prisoner which had obtained for him the merited sobriquet of “saucy.” “Crier, call Samuel Burton.”

Timms fairly started. This was breaking ground in a new spot, and was producing testimony from a source that he much dreaded. The Burtons had been the nearest neighbours of the Goodwins, and were so nearly on a social level with them, as to live in close and constant communication. These Burtons consisted of the man, his wife, and three maiden sisters. At one time, the last had conversed much on the subject of the murders; but, to Timms’ great discontent, they had been quite dumb of late. This had prevented his putting in practice a method of anticipating testimony, that is much in vogue, and which he had deliberately attempted with these sometime voluble females. As the reader may not be fully initiated in the mysteries of that sacred and all-important master of the social relations, the law, we shall set forth the manner in which justice is often bolstered, when its interests are cared for by practitioners of the Timms’ and Williams’ school.

No sooner is it ascertained that a particular individual has a knowledge of an awkward fact, than these worthies of the bar set to work to extract the dangerous information from him. This is commonly attempted, and often effected, by inducing the witness to relate what he knows, and by leading him on to make statements that, on being sworn to in court, will either altogether invalidate his testimony, or throw so much doubt on it as to leave it of very little value. As the agents employed to attain this end are not very scrupulous, there is great danger that their imaginations may supply the defects in the statements, and substitute words and thoughts that the party never uttered. It is so easy to mistake another’s meaning, with even the best intentions, that we are not to be surprised if this should seriously happen when the disposition is to mislead. With the parties to suits, this artifice is often quite successful, admissions being obtained, or supposed to be obtained, that they never, for an instant, intended to make. In the states where speculation has cornered men, and left them loaded with debt, these devices of the eaves-droppers and suckers are so common, as to render their testimony no immaterial feature in nearly every cause of magnitude that is tried. In such a state of society it is, indeed, unsafe for a suitor to open his lips on his affairs, lest some one near him be employed to catch up his words, and carry them into court with shades of meaning gathered from his own imagination.

At first, Timms was under the impression that the Burtons were going to sustain the defence, and he was placing himself on the most amiable footing with the females, three of whom might very reasonably be placed within the category of matrimony with this rising lawyer; but, it was not long ere he ascertained that Williams was getting to be intimate, and had proved to be a successful rival. Davis, the nephew and heir of the Goodwins, was a single man, too, and it is probable that his frequent visits to the dwelling of the Burtons had a beneficial influence on his own interests. Let the cause be what it might, the effect was clearly to seal the lips of the whole family, not a member of which could be induced, by any art practised by the agents of Timms, to utter a syllable on a subject that now really seemed to be forbidden. When, therefore, Burton appeared on the stand, and was sworn, the two counsel for the defence waited for him to open his lips, with a profound and common interest.