he excitement was high in Chapelizod when the news reached that a true bill was found against Charles Archer for the murder of Barnabas Sturk. Everywhere, indeed, the case was watched with uncommon interest; and when the decisive day arrived, and the old judge, furrowed, yellow, and cross, mounted the bench, and the jury were called over, and the challenges began, and the grim, gentlemanlike person with the white hair, and his right arm in a black silk sling, whispering to his attorney and now and again pencilling, with his left hand, a line to his counsel with that indescribable air of confidence and almost defiance, pleaded to the indictment 'not guilty,' and the dreadful business of the day began, the court was crowded as it seldom had been before.
A short, clear, horrible statement unfolded the case for the crown. Then the dying deposition of Sturk was put in evidence; then Irons the clerk was put up, and told his tale doggedly and distinctly, and was not to be shaken. 'No, it was not true that he had ever been confined in a mad house.' 'He had never had delirium tremens.' 'He had never heard that his wife thought him mad.' 'Yes, it was true he had pledged silver of his master's at the Pied Horse at Newmarket' 'He knew it was a felony, but it was the prisoner who put it into his head and encouraged him to do it.' 'Yes, he would swear to that.' 'He had several times spoken to Lord Dunoran, when passing under the name of Mervyn, on the subject of his father being wronged.' 'He never had any promise from my lord, in case he should fix the guilt of that murder on some other than his father.' Our friend, Captain Cluffe, was called, and delivered his evidence in a somewhat bluff and peremptory, but on the whole effective way.
Charles Nutter, after some whispered consultation, was also called, and related what we have heard. 'Yes, he had been arrested for the murder of Dr. Sturk, and now stood out on bail to answer that charge.' Then followed some circumstances, one of which, the discovery of a piece of what was presumed to be the weapon with which the murder was perpetrated, I have already mentioned. Then came some evidence, curious but quite clear, to show that the Charles Archer who had died at Florence was not the Charles Archer who had murdered Beauclerc, but a gentleman who had served in the army, and had afterwards been for two years in Italy, in the employment of a London firm who dealt in works of art, and was actually resident in Italy at the time when the Newmarket murder occurred, and that the attempt to represent him as the person who had given evidence against the late Lord Dunoran was an elaborate and cunning contrivance of the prisoner at the bar. Then came the medical evidence.
Pell was examined, and delivered only half a dozen learned sentences; Toole, more at length, made a damaging comparison of the fragment of iron already mentioned, and the outline of the fractures in the deceased man's head; and Dillon was questioned generally, and was not cross-examined. Then came the defence.
The points were, that Sturk was restored to speech by the determined interposition of the prisoner at the bar, an unlikely thing if he was ruining himself thereby! That Sturk's brain had been shattered, and not cleared from hallucinations before he died; that having uttered the monstrous dream, in all its parts incredible, which was the sole foundation of the indictment against that every way respectable and eminent gentleman who stood there, the clerk, Irons, having heard something of it, had conceived the plan of swearing to the same story, for the manifest purpose of securing thereby the favour of the young Lord Dunoran, with whom he had been in conference upon this very subject without ever once having hinted a syllable against Mr. Paul Dangerfield until after Doctor Sturk's dream had been divulged; and the idea of fixing the guilt of Beauclerc's murder upon that gentleman of wealth, family, and station, occurred to his intriguing and unscrupulous mind.
Mr. Dangerfield, in the dock nodded sometimes, or sneered or smirked with hollow cheeks, or shook his head in unison with the passing sentiment of the speaker, directing, through that hot atmosphere, now darkening into twilight, a quick glance from time to time upon the aspect of the jury, the weather-gauge of his fate, but altogether with a manly, sarcastic, and at times a somewhat offended air, as though he should say, ''Tis somewhat too good a jest that I, Paul Dangerfield, Esq., a man of fashion, with my known character, and worth nigh two hundred thousand pounds sterling, should stand here, charged with murdering a miserable Chapelizod doctor!' The minutes had stolen away; the judge read his notes by candle-light, and charged, with dry and cranky emphasis, dead against that man of integrity, fashion, and guineas; and did not appear a bit disturbed at the idea of hanging him.
When the jury went in he had some soup upon the bench, and sipped it with great noise. Mr. Dangerfield shook hands with his counsel, and smirked and whispered. Many people there felt queer, and grew pale in the suspense, and the general gaze was fixed upon the prisoner with a coarse curiosity, of which he seemed resolutely unconscious; and five minutes passed by and a minute or two more—it seemed a very long time—the minute-hands of the watches hardly got on at all—and then the door of the jury-room opened, and the gentlemen came stumbling in, taking off their hats, and silence was called. There was no need; and the foreman, with a very pale and frightened face, handed down the paper.
And the simple message sounded through the court—
'Guilty!'