‘Si-lence!’ cried the usher. The judge was returning.
‘I have decided,’ said he, ‘to allow the questions to be put as Mr Bentley proposes. Let them be written out and submitted to me for my approval.’
I sat down and wrote my questions, and they were passed up to the judge. As he read them, he looked more surprised than ever. But all he said, as he handed them down, was, ‘Put the questions.’
I walked up to the dock and gave them into the prisoner’s hands, together with my pencil. He read them carefully through, and wrote his answers slowly and with consideration. With the paper in my hand, I got into the witness-box and was sworn.
My evidence was to the effect already stated. As I described the man I had seen under the lamp, with my face averted from the prisoner and turned to the jury, I saw that they were making a careful comparison, and that, allowing for the change wrought by twelve years, they found that the description tallied closely with the man’s appearance.
‘I produce this paper, on which I just now wrote certain questions, to which the prisoner wrote the answers under my eyes. These are the questions and answers:
‘Question. Were you smoking when you came up to the corner of Hauraki Street?—Answer. No.
‘Question. Did you afterwards smoke?—Answer. I had no lights.
‘Question. Did you try to get a light?—Answer. Yes, by climbing a lamp at the corner; but I was not steady enough, and I remember I broke my hat against the crossbar.
‘Question. Where did you carry your pipe and tobacco?—Answer. In my hat.