The House of the Whispering Pines (38 page)

"Oh, yes—every moment."

"Her hands as well as her face?"

"I don't know about her hands. I should have observed it if she had done
anything strange with them."

"Can you say she did not clutch or grip her throat during any of
this time?"

"Yes, yes. I couldn't have forgotten it, if she had done that. I remember
every move she made so well. She didn't do that."

Mr. Fox's eye stole towards the jury. To a man, they were alert, anxious
for the next question, and serious, as the arbitrators of a man's life
ought to be.

Satisfied, he put the question: "When, after telephoning, you returned to
the room where your sister lay, you glanced at the lounge?"

"Yes, I could not help it."

"Was it in the same condition as when you left—the pillows, I mean?"

"I—I think so. I cannot say; I only half looked; I was terrified by it."

"Can you say they had not been disturbed?"

"No. I can say nothing. But what does—"

"Only the answer, Miss Cumberland. Can you tell us how those pillows were
arranged?"

"I'm afraid not. I threw them down quickly, madly, just as I collected
them. I only know that I put the window cushion down first. The rest fell
anyhow; but they quite covered her—quite."

"Hands and face?"

"Her whole body."

"And did they cover her quite when you came back?"

"They must have—Wait—wait! I know I have no right to say that, but I
cannot swear that I saw any change."

"Can you swear that there was no change—that the pillows and the window
cushion lay just as they did when you left the room?"

She did not answer. Horror seemed to have seized hold of her. Her eyes,
fixed on the attorney's face, wavered and, had they followed their
natural impulse, would have turned towards her brother, but her
fear—possibly her love—was her counsellor and she brought them back to
Mr. Fox. Resolutely, but with a shuddering insight of the importance of
her reply, she answered with that one weighty monosyllable which can
crush so many hopes, and even wreck a life:

"No."

At the next moment she was in Dr. Carpenter's arms. Her strength had
given way for the time, and the court was hastily adjourned, to give her
opportunity for rest and recuperation.

Threescore and ten I can remember well:
Within the volume of which time, I have seen
Hours dreadful, and things strange; but this sore night
Hath trifled former knowledge.

Macbeth
.

I shall say nothing about myself at this juncture. That will come later.
I have something of quite different purport to relate.

When I left the court-room with the other witnesses, I noticed a man
standing near the district attorney. He was a very plain man—with no
especial claims to attention, that I could see, yet I looked at him
longer than I did at any one else, and turned and looked at him again as
I passed through the doorway.

Afterward I heard that he was Sweetwater, the detective from New York who
had had so much to do in unearthing the testimony against
Arthur,—testimony which in the light of this morning's revelations, had
taken on quite a new aspect, as he was doubtless the first to
acknowledge. It was the curious blending of professional disappointment
and a personal and characteristic appreciation of the surprising
situation, which made me observe him, I suppose. Certainly my heart and
mind were full enough not to waste looks on a commonplace stranger
unless there had been some such overpowering reason.

I left him still talking to Mr. Fox, and later received this account of
the interview which followed between them and Dr. Perry.

"Is this girl telling the truth?" asked District Attorney Fox, as soon as
the three were closeted and each could speak his own mind. "Doctor, what
do you think?"

"I do not question her veracity in the least. A woman who for purely
moral reasons could defy pain and risk the loss of a beauty universally
acknowledged as transcendent, would never stoop to falsehood even in her
desire to save a brother's life. I have every confidence in her. Fox, and
I think you may safely have the same."

"You believe that she burnt herself—intentionally?"

"I wouldn't disbelieve it—you may think me sentimental; I knew and loved
her father—for any fortune you might name."

"Say that you never knew her father; say that you had no more interest in
the girl or the case, than the jurors have? What then—?

"I should believe her for humanity's sake; for the sake of the happiness
it gives one to find something true and strong in this sordid work-a-day
world—a jewel in a dust-heap. Oh, I'm a sentimentalist, I acknowledge."

Mr. Fox turned to Sweetwater. "And you?"

"Mr. Fox, have you those tongs?"

"Yes, I forgot; they were brought to my office, with the other exhibits.
I attached no importance to them, and you will probably find them just
where I thrust them into the box marked 'Cumb.'"

They were in the district attorney's office, and Sweetwater at once rose
and brought forward the tongs.

"There is my answer," he said pointing significantly at one of the legs.

The district attorney turned pale, and motioned Sweetwater to carry them
back. He sat silent for a moment, and then showed that he was a man.

"Miss Cumberland has my respect," said he.

Sweetwater came back to his place.

Dr. Perry waited.

Finally Mr. Fox turned to him and put the anticipated question:

"You are satisfied with your autopsy? Miss Cumberland's death was due to
strangulation and not to the poison she took?"

"That was what I swore to, and what I should have to swear to again if
you placed me back on the stand. The poison, taken with her great
excitement, robbed her of consciousness, but there was too little of it,
or it was too old and weakened to cause death. She would probably have
revived, in time; possibly did revive. But the clutch of those fingers
was fatal; she could not survive it. It costs me more than you can ever
understand to say this, but questions like yours must be answered. I
should not be an honest man otherwise."

Sweetwater made a movement. Mr. Fox turned and looked at him critically.

"Speak out," said he.

But Sweetwater had nothing to say.

Neither had Dr. Perry. The oppression of an unsolved problem, involving
lives of whose value each formed a different estimate, was upon them all;
possibly heaviest upon the district attorney, the most serious portion of
whose work lay still before him.

To the relief of all, Carmel was physically stronger than we expected
when she came to retake the stand in the afternoon. But she had lost a
little of her courage. Her expectation of clearing her brother at a word
had left her, and with it the excitation of hope. Yet she made a noble
picture as she sat there, meeting, without a blush, but with an air of
sweet humility impossible to describe, the curious, all-devouring glances
of the multitude, some of them anxious to repeat the experience of the
morning; some of them new to the court, to her, and the cause for which
she stood.

Mr. Fox kept nobody waiting. With a gentleness such as he seldom showed
to any witness for the defence, he resumed his cross-examination by
propounding the following question:

"Miss Cumberland, in your account of the final interview you had with
your sister, you alluded to a story you had once read together. Will you
tell us the name of this story?"

"It was called 'A Legend of Francis the First.' It was not a novel, but a
little tale she found in some old magazine. It had a great effect upon
us; I have never forgotten it."

"Can you relate this tale to us in a few words?"

"I will try. It was very simple; it merely told how a young girl marred
her beauty to escape the attentions of the great king, and what respect
he always showed her after that, even calling her sister."

Was the thrill in her voice or in my own heart, or in the
story—emphasised as it was by her undeniable attempt upon her own
beauty? As that last word fell so softly, yet with such tender
suggestion, a sensation of sympathy passed between us for the first time;
and I knew, from the purity of her look and the fearlessness of this
covert appeal to one she could not address openly, that the doubts I had
cherished of her up to this very moment were an outrage and that were it
possible or seemly, I should be bowed down in the dust at her feet—in
reality, as I was in spirit.

Others may have shared my feeling; for the glances which flew from her
face to mine were laden with an appreciation of the situation, which for
the moment drove the prisoner from the minds of all, and centred
attention on this tragedy of souls, bared in so cruel a way to the
curiosity of the crowd. I could not bear it. The triumph of my heart
battled with the shame of my fault, and I might have been tempted into
some act of manifest imprudence, if Mr. Fox had not cut my misery short
by recalling attention to the witness, with a question of the most vital
importance.

"While you were holding your sister's hands in what you supposed to be
her final moments, did you observe whether or not she still wore on her
finger the curious ring given her by Mr. Ranelagh, and known as her
engagement ring?"

"Yes—I not only saw it, but felt it. It was the only one she wore on her
left hand."

The district attorney paused. This was an admission unexpected, perhaps,
by himself, which it was desirable to have sink into the minds of the
jury. The ring had not been removed by Adelaide herself; it was still on
her finger as the last hour drew nigh. An awful fact, if
established—telling seriously against Arthur. Involuntarily I glanced
his way. He was looking at me. The mutual glance struck fire. What I
thought, he thought—but possibly with a difference. The moment was
surcharged with emotion for all but the witness herself. She was calm;
perhaps she did not understand the significance of the occasion.

Mr. Fox pressed his advantage.

"And when you rose from the lounge and crossed your sister's hands?"

"It was still there; I put that hand uppermost."

"And left the ring on?"

"Oh, yes—oh, yes." Her whole attitude and face were full of protest.

"So that, to the best of your belief, it was still on your sister's
finger when you left the room?"

"Certainly, sir, certainly."

There was alarm in her tone now, she was beginning to see that her
testimony was not as entirely helpful to Arthur as she had been led to
expect. In her helplessness, she cast a glance of entreaty at her
brother's counsel. But he was busily occupied with pencil and paper, and
she received no encouragement unless it was from his studiously composed
manner and general air of unconcern. She did not know—nor did I know
then—what uneasiness such an air may cover.

Mr. Fox had followed her glances, and perhaps understood his adversary
better than she did; for he drew himself up with an appearance of
satisfaction as he asked very quietly:

"What material did you use in lighting the fire on the club-house
hearth?"

"Wood from the box, and a little kindling I found there."

"How large was this kindling?"

"Not very large; some few stray pieces of finer wood I picked out from
she rest."

"And how did you light these?"

"With some scraps of paper I brought in my bag?"

"Oh—you brought scraps?"

"Yes. I had seen the box, seen the wood, but knew the wood would not
kindle without paper. So I brought some."

"Did the fire light quickly?"

"Not very quickly."

"You had trouble with it?"

"Yes, sir. But I made it burn at last."

"Are you in the habit of kindling fires in your own home?"

"Yes, on the hearth."

"You understand them?"

"I have always found it a very simple matter, if you have paper and
enough kindling."

"And the draught is good."

"Yes, sir."

"Wasn't the draught good at the club-house?"

"Not at first."

"Oh—not at first. When did you see a change?"

"When the note I was trying to burn flew up the chimney."

"I see. Was that after or before the door opened?"

"After."

"Did the opening of this door alter the temperature of the room?"

"I cannot say; I felt neither heat nor cold at any time."

"Didn't you feel the icy cold when you opened the dressing-closet window
to throw out the phial?"

"I don't remember."

"Wouldn't you remember if you had?"

"I cannot say."

Can you say whether you noticed any especial chill in the hall when you
went out to telephone?"

"My teeth were chattering but—"

"Had they chattered before?"

"They may have. I only noticed it then; but—"

"The facts, Miss Cumberland. Your teeth chattered while you were passing
through the hall. Did this keep up after you entered the room where you
found the telephone?"

"I don't remember; I was almost insensible."

"You don't remember that they did?"

"No, sir."

"But you do remember having shut the door behind you?"

"Yes."

An open window in the hall! That was what he was trying to prove—open at
this time. From the expression of such faces of the jury as I could see,
I think he had proved it. The next point he made was in the same line.
Had she, in all the time she was in the building, heard any noises she
could not account for?

"Yes, many times."

"Can you describe these noises?"

"No; they were of all kinds. The pines sighed continually; I knew it was
the pines, but I had to listen. Once I heard a rushing sound—it was when
the pines stopped swaying for an instant—but I don't know what it was.
It was all very dreadful."