“Convicted, Mr. Dunscomb—it is a distinction painful to make, but one that cannot now be avoided.”
“I beg pardon of the court—convicted.”
“Yes,” said Mary Monson, solemnly, “I am convicted, and of the revolting crime of murder. All my hopes of a triumphant acquittal are blasted; and, whatever may be the termination of this extraordinary affair, a dark spot will always rest on my name. Sir, I am as innocent of this crime as the youngest child in your county. I may have been wilful, perverse, ill-judging, unwise, and have a hundred other failings; but neither Peter nor Dorothy Goodwin did I ever harm. I had not been long in the house before I discovered that the old couple were not happy together. They quarrelled often, and bitterly. The wife was managing, dictatorial, and sordidly covetous, while he used every shilling he could obtain, for the purchase of liquors. His mind was affected by his debauches, and he drivelled. In this state, he came to me for sympathy and advice. There were passages in my own past life, short as it has been, which disposed me to feel for one who was not happy in the married state. It is no matter what my own experience has been; I had sympathy for that poor man. So far from wishing to do him harm, I desired to do him good. I advised him to quit the house, and live apart from his wife, for a time, at least; and this he consented to do, if I would furnish him with the means. Those means I promised; and, that he might not suffer, being of only feeble intellect, and in order to keep him from liquor, I had directed two of my agents to come to the house early in the morning of the very day that the fire happened, that they might convey Peter Goodwin to another residence, where he would be secret and safe, until his wife might repent of her treatment of him. It was fortunate for me that I had done this. Those two men, servants of my own, in the dress of countrymen, were the instruments of saving my life; without their aid, I should have perished in the flames. What they did, and how they did it, it would be premature now to say. Alas! alas! I have not been acquitted as I desired to be, and a dark shadow will for ever rest on my name!”
For the first time, a doubt of the sanity of the prisoner, crossed the mind of the judge. It was not so much the incoherence of her language, as her eye, the flushed cheek, and a certain air of stealthy cunning, that awakened this distrust. Nevertheless, Mary Monson’s manner was sincere, her language chosen and perfectly proper, and her explanations not without their force.[force.] There was something so strange, however, in a portion of her statements; so irreconcileable with a sound discretion, that, taken with the little which had come to light concerning this singular woman’s past life, the doubt arose.
“Perhaps it were better, Mr. District Attorney,” the judge observed, “if we delay the sentence.”
“As your honour may think fit. The state is not over-anxious for life.”
“What say you, Mr. Dunscomb—shall there be delay, or shall I sentence?”
“As the sentence must come, the sooner it is over, the better. We have no ground on which to carry up the case, the jury being judges of the facts. Our principal hope must be in the discretion of the governor.”
“Mary Monson,” continued the judge, evidently treating the affair as purely a matter of form, “you have been tried for feloniously depriving Peter Goodwin of his life—”
“I never did it,” interrupted the prisoner, in a voice so low as to be melodious, yet so clear as to be audible as the sound of a clarion. “These men have been influenced by the rumours they have heard, and were not fit to act as my judges. Men should have minds superior to mere reports, to sit in that box.”