"Evening, my lord," said Mr. Flappertrap, standing up and whispering his lordship audibly.
"Evening is it?" said his lordship—"ay, so it is—evening—no matter—he swears to the time at which he saw the fire break out—and hence will naturally arise in your minds a chain of circumstances which it will be my duty to endeavour to unravel. In the first place——"
Hereabouts one of the servants of the court put his head in at one of the doors at the back of the bench, and whispered the lord mayor much after the same manner in which Mr. Flappertrap had just before whispered the judge. His lordship immediately pulled out his watch—then looked at the clock—and then wrote a few words upon a slip of paper, and laid that slip of paper upon his lordship's notes. The judge took up the memorandum, and tore it in pieces—as I thought indignantly.
"You know what that means?" said my friend, the sheriff.
"No," said I.
"Dinner's waiting," replied my friend—an announcement which startled me, as it seemed impossible but that it would be kept waiting for some time. This little scene, however, was followed by the arrival of the recorder, who, after bowing to the lord mayor, took his seat on the bench.
"I told you so," said the sheriff; "Mr. Recorder is come to try the remaining cases——" A cry of "Silence—pray, silence," indicated that Mr. Sheriff Bucklesbury and I were speaking somewhat too loudly.
"The circumstances to which I allude," continued his lordship, after he had torn up the note, "are in fact so clearly detailed in the evidence you have heard, that to men of intelligence and experience, like those I am now addressing, any attempt at explanation on my part would be superfluous. The case appears a very clear one—you have to decide upon the value of the evidence, and return your verdict accordingly, giving the prisoner the benefit of any doubts you may entertain on the question."
Never was I more surprised than at finding the promised explanations and comparisons of fact and testimony so suddenly cut short, after the manner of "the story of the Bear and Fiddle," and I could not help, while the clerk of the arraigns was putting his accustomed question to the jury, noticing the circumstance to my worshipful friend.
"To be sure," said the sheriff, "don't you see—the time is up—he smells the marrow puddings."