This produced so much laughter that the bailiffs had to enforce order in the hall.
Lady Hawkshaw then, with great ingenuity, referred to Sir Thomas Vernon, “who, in those days, forty years ago, was not called ‘Wicked Sir Thomas,’ but plain ‘Lying Tom Vernon’!”
This produced a regular uproar, during which Lady Hawkshaw, with great complacency, fanned herself. After a warning from the presiding justice to keep to the matter in hand, she curtsied deeply to him, and immediately resumed her account of Sir Thomas Vernon, in which she told of a certain occasion, in the time of the American war, when, as the royal family was passing to chapel at Windsor, hisses were heard, which were directly traced to Sir Thomas Vernon, the king having declined to receive him at the levee on account of his notoriously bad character. And Sir Thomas, being thrust out, was taken by some of the inhabitants of Windsor, and ducked in a neighboring horse-pond. At this point, the judge himself courteously but firmly interrupted Lady Hawkshaw, and informed her that she could not be permitted to go on in that strain.
“I shall observe your lordship’s caution,” she replied politely, and straightway launched into a description of Sir Thomas’ appearance when he emerged from the horse-pond, which brought a smile to every face in court—including even the judge’s—except the victim himself, who bit his lip, and scowled in fury.
The judges afterward said that Lady Hawkshaw proved to be the most unmanageable witness any and all of them had ever encountered; for in spite of them, she gave a circumstantial account of every misdeed Sir Thomas Vernon had ever been guilty of in his life, as far as she knew.
The crown lawyers, very wisely, declined to cross-examine this witness. When she stepped down out of the witness-box and took Sir Peter’s arm, she passed close to the presiding justice, who happened to have his snuff-box open in his hand. My lady deliberately stopped and took a pinch out of the judge’s box, remarking suavely,—
“Your lordship shows excellent taste in preferring the Spanish!”
I thought his lordship would drop out of his chair.
The evidence being all in, and the arguments made, a recess was taken. We were not the only ones who paid our respects immediately to Giles Vernon. Many persons went forward and shook his hand, while I think Sir Thomas did not receive a cordial greeting from a single man or woman in the hall, although he was known to every one present.
We got a hurried dinner at the tavern, and returned at once to the hall. It was about half-past four in the winter afternoon, and the day being dark and lowering, candles were required. The lord justice’s instructions to the jury were then read, and my heart sank, as, in a dreadful monotone, he expounded the law to them. Alas! As long as the statute against the abduction of an heiress remained, Giles Vernon was guilty of a capital crime; and not one word uttered by any one of us who testified in his behalf did aught but prove the more strongly that he had carried Lady Arabella off against her will.