The president, a florid, rather pompous man, who spoke with a faint lisp, cleared his throat and read the charge against the prisoner from the sheet with which he had been supplied—the charge of having violated the recent enactment against duelling made by the Commander-in-Chief of his Majesty’s forces in the Peninsula, in so far as he had fought: a duel with Count Jeronymo de Samoval, and of murder in so far as that duel, conducted in an irregular manner, and without any witnesses, had resulted in the death of the said Count Jeronymo de Samoval.
“How say you, then, Captain Tremayne?” the judge-advocate challenged him. “Are you guilty of these charges or not guilty?”
“Not guilty.”
The president sat back and observed the prisoner with an eye that was officially benign. Tremayne’s glance considered the court and met the concerned and grave regard of his colonel, of his friend Carruthers and of two other friends of his own regiment, the cold indifference of three officers of the Fourteenth—then stationed in Lisbon with whom he was unacquainted, and the utter inscrutability of O’Moy’s rather lowering glance, which profoundly intrigued him, and, lastly, the official hostility of Major Swan, who was on his feet setting forth the case against him. Of the remaining members of the court he took no heed.
From the opening address it did not seem to Captain Tremayne as if this case—which had been hurriedly prepared by Major Swan, chiefly that same morning would amount to very much. Briefly the major announced his intention of establishing to the satisfaction of the court how, on the night of the 28th of May, the prisoner, in flagrant violation of an enactment in a general order of the 26th of that same month, had engaged in a duel with Count Jeronymo de Samoval, a peer of the realm of Portugal.
Followed a short statement of the case from the point of view of the prosecution, an anticipation of the evidence to be called, upon which the major thought—rather sanguinely, opined Captain Tremayne—to convict the accused. He concluded with an assurance that the evidence of the prisoner’s guilt was as nearly direct as evidence could be in a case of murder.
The first witness called was the butler, Mullins. He was introduced by the sergeant-major stationed by the double doors at the end of the hall from the ante-room where the witnesses commanded to be present were in waiting.
Mullins, rather less venerable than usual, as a consequence of agitation and affliction on behalf of Captain Tremayne, to whom he was attached, stated nervously the facts within his knowledge. He was occupied with the silver in his pantry, having remained up in case Sir Terence, who was working late in his study, should require anything before going to bed. Sir Terence called him, and—
“At what time did Sir Terence call you?” asked the major.
“It was ten minutes past twelve, sir, by the clock in my pantry.”