The steamer arrived on the Atlantic coast May 19, just one month after the almost fatal boat-ride.
On the other side of the ocean there was sorrow and suspense. Louise’s home was desolate for its lost one. Public opinion was still bitter against the author of her misfortune. With innocent heart, but blanched face, Mr. Farneaux was brought from jail to the crowded court-room for his trial on the charge of homicide. Every day and hour he had hoped for some word that would show him to be guiltless, but days grew into weeks, and neither the boat nor Louise Arnot was found. He supposed her dead, but hoped some vessel would report the empty boat, or have picked up at sea the missing one.
The prosecution made out a strong case.
“If Mr. Farneaux’s story were true,” said the attorney, “that he was unable to reach her, and therefore saved his life by swimming ashore, her body would have been found on the beach long before this. She was last seen in his company. It was an easy matter to sink the oars and then swim to shore after the deed was done. Thirty days have gone by, long enough for any vessel to have picked her up and restored her to her heart-broken family, if she were alive.”
And then for hours the enormity of the deed, the coaxing her to go upon the ocean that Sabbath evening, the cold-bloodedness of the whole affair, were gone over by able lawyers.
Mr. Farneaux’s face grew white, and his body trembled at the accusations. And then he told in straightforward language the story of his losing the oars, of the increasing wind so that he could scarcely gain the shore, of the impossibility of reaching her with his heavy oars in hands, and of the certainty of death for both if he attempted it.
“He talks like an innocent fellow,” said one.
“Yes, I have known him for years, and he’s a well-brought-up young man, but I’ve known well-brought-up people turn out to be fiends,” said another.
“Not often if they have Christian parents,” said a third. “That young man has a good mother, and it’s rare that the son of such a mother goes wrong. I believe in the man. I’d be willing to wager a good deal that his story is true.”