They Hanged My Saintly Billy (32 page)

'What
have
you
been
drinking?'
she
asks
me.

'Some
brandy
and
water
along
with
Dr
Palmer,'
I
says.

'The
more
fool
you,'
she
says.
'Never
heard
what
happened
to poor
Abley,
down
at
The
Lamb
and
Flag,
eleven
years
ago
?
You're poisoned,
Tom,
that's
what
you
are.
Who's
your
doctor?'

'Dr
Palmer,'
says
I.

'Don't
talk
foolish,
Tom,'
says
she;
so
I
go
and
lay
me
down
in one
of
the
stalls,
for
I
couldn't
mount
the
ladder
to
the
loft, nohow
I
couldn't.
My
legs,
they
wouldn't
support
me,
like.
Well, I
lived,
as
you
see,
Sir,
and
that's
more
than
poor
Abley
did,
nor poor
Watty
Palmer.
But
I
felt
mighty
queer
for
three
or
four days
after.
I
remember
very
little
about
when
I
woke
up,
or
how long
I
lay
there.

I'm
told
the
ostl
er
came
and
covered
me
with
a
horse-rug.
I
was as
black
as
soot
in
the
face,
he
says,
which
it
wasn't
only
the
horse dung
on
which
I'd
laid—that
I'll
swear—and
he
couldn't
hear
me breathe,
nohow,
nor
nothing.
He
th
ought
I
was
dead,
like,
and left
me
there,
saying
nothing
to
Mr
Lloyd,
nor
the
missus,
for fear
he'd
be
blamed.
A
narrow
shave
it
was,
you
may
be
bound, in
all
honesty!

No,
Sir,
I
never
named
it
to
Dr
Palmer
afterward.
I
couldn't positively
swear
that
he
nobbled
me,
you
see?
And
he
was
always a
generous
gentleman
when
I
ran
him
his
errands.

It
is,
however,
not
impossible
that
these
two
stories
may,
after all,
have
been
substantially
true—if
Dr
Palmer's
motive
was
not, in
either
case,
to
kill
but
merely
to
prostrate
his
victims
and cloud
their
judgement
by
the
use
of
'knocking-out
drops':
as these
are
termed
in
the
taverns
and
brothels
of
seaport
towns, where
sailors
are
forcibly
enlisted
for
long
voyages.
If
Doubt
had lost,
the
Doctor
would
have
been
able
to
tear
a
page
or
two
from Swindell's
betting-book,
and
empty
his
money-belt
of
whatever cash
it
contained.
In
Tom's
case,
he
stood
to
gain
nothing
but
a petty
revenge;
yet
it
will
be
noted
that
the
drug
supposedly
used on
Swindell
was
a
laxative,
whereas
the
one
supposedly
used
on Boots
was
an
emetic.
The
latter
may
have
been
tried
experimentally,
with
more
important
victims
in
view.

We
can
find
no
confirmation
of
a
rumour,
now
widely
current, that
Dr
Palmer
also
attempted
to
drug
Lord
George
Bentinck, the
racehorse
owner.
This
is
said
to
have
taken
place
while
he
was still
a
student
at
Bart's,
three
years
before
Lord
George's
death
in
1848;
but
the
exact
circumstances
are
never
given.

Chapter XIV

FINANCIAL
STRAITS

T
HE
Attorney-General's
speech
on
the
opening
day
of
the trial
has
given
a
very
fair
account
of
Dr
Palmer's
financial troubles;
save
that,
in
our
opinion,
he
misrepresented
Jeremiah Smith's
humorous
pro
posals
for
an
insurance
on
George
Bate's life
as
serious
ones
prompted
by
the
Doctor
and
designed
to improve
his
own
situation.
This
situation
was,
indeed,
desperate. Yet,
after
careful
thought,
we
accept
his
plea
of
'Not
Guilty'
to the
charge
of
taking
Cook's
life,
by
strychnine
poisoning,
with the
object
of
pecuniary
gain.
The
gain
would
have
been
utterly inadequate
to
re-establish
his
credit;
and
imprisonment
is
always a
better
fate
than
the
gallows.
Nor
do
we
believe
that
strychnia was
the
cause
of
Cook's
death.

THE
ATTORNEY-GENERAL

Gentl
emen,
it
seems
that
as
early
as
the
year
1853,
Palmer
had
got into
pecuniary
difficulties—he
began
to
raise
money
on
bills.
In the
year
1854,
his
circumstances
became
worse,
and
he
was
at
that time
indebted
to
different
persons
in
a
large
sum
of
money.
He then
had
recourse
to
an
expedient
which
I
shall
have
to
bring before
you,
because
it
has
an
important
bearing
on
this
case. Gentlemen,
let
me
make
a
preli
minary
observation.
I
must
detail to
you
transactions
involving
fraud
and,
what
is
graver,
forgery— circumstances
and
transactions
reflecting
th
e
greatest
discredit
on those
connected
with
them.
Yet
while
I
feel
it
absolutely
necessary to
bring
these
circumstances
to
your
notice
for
the
elucidation of
the
truth,
I
am
anxious
that
they
should
not
have
more
th
an their
fair
and
legitimate
effect.
You
must
not
allo
w
them
to
prejudice
your
minds
against
the
prisoner
as
regards
the
real
matter
of inquiry
here
today.
A
man
may
be
guilty
of
fraud,
he
may
be guilty
of
forgery;
it
does
not
follow
that
he
should
be
guilty
of murder.