Volume I Part 15 (2/2)
”He's but this moment gone down _there_. Bring him in custody before me, within ten minutes' time, or I'll strip your gown from your shoulders and fine the sheriff!” he thundered, while his eyes flashed round the court in search of the functionary.
Attorneys, counsellors, idle spectators, gazed in the direction in which Mr. Justice Harbottle had shaken his gnarled old hand. They compared notes. Not one had seen any one making a disturbance. They asked one another if the Judge was losing his head.
Nothing came of the search. His lords.h.i.+p concluded his charge a great deal more tamely; and when the jury retired, he stared round the court with a wandering mind, and looked as if he would not have given sixpence to see the prisoner hanged.
CHAPTER V.
CALEB SEARCHER.
The Judge had received the letter; had he known from whom it came, he would no doubt have read it instantaneously. As it was he simply read the direction:
_To the Honourable_ _The Lord Justice_ _Elijah Harbottle,_
_One of his Majesty's Justices of_ _the Honourable Court of Common Pleas._
It remained forgotten in his pocket till he reached home.
When he pulled out that and others from the capacious pocket of his coat, it had its turn, as he sat in his library in his thick silk dressing-gown; and then he found its contents to be a closely-written letter, in a clerk's hand, and an enclosure in 'secretary hand,' as I believe the angular scrivinary of law-writings in those days was termed, engrossed on a bit of parchment about the size of this page. The letter said:
”Mr. Justice Harbottle,--My Lord,
”I am ordered by the High Court of Appeal to acquaint your lords.h.i.+p, in order to your better preparing yourself for your trial, that a true bill hath been sent down, and the indictment lieth against your lords.h.i.+p for the murder of one Lewis Pyneweck of Shrewsbury, citizen, wrongfully executed for the forgery of a bill of exchange, on the--the day of ---- last, by reason of the wilful perversion of the evidence, and the undue pressure put upon the jury, together with the illegal admission of evidence by your lords.h.i.+p, well knowing the same to be illegal, by all which the promoter of the prosecution of the said indictment, before the High Court of Appeal, hath lost his life.
”And the trial of the said indictment, I am farther ordered to acquaint your lords.h.i.+p is fixed for the 10th day of ---- next ensuing, by the right honourable the Lord Chief-Justice Twofold, of the court aforesaid, to wit, the High Court of Appeal, on which day it will most certainly take place. And I am farther to acquaint your lords.h.i.+p, to prevent any surprise or miscarriage, that your case stands first for the said day, and that the said High Court of Appeal sits day and night, and never rises; and herewith, by order of the said court, I furnish your lords.h.i.+p with a copy (extract) of the record in this case, except of the indictment, whereof, notwithstanding, the substance and effect is supplied to your lords.h.i.+p in this Notice. And farther I am to inform you, that in case the jury then to try your lords.h.i.+p should find you guilty, the right honourable the Lord Chief-Justice will, in pa.s.sing sentence of death upon you, fix the day of execution for the 10th day of ----, being one calendar month from the day of your trial.”
It was signed by ”CALEB SEARCHER,
”Officer of the Crown Solicitor in the ”Kingdom of Life and Death.”
The Judge glanced through the parchment.
”'Sblood! Do they think a man like me is to be bamboozled by their buffoonery?”
The Judge's coa.r.s.e features were wrung into one of his sneers; but he was pale. Possibly, after all, there was a conspiracy on foot. It was queer. Did they mean to pistol him in his carriage? or did they only aim at frightening him?
Judge Harbottle had more than enough of animal courage. He was not afraid of highwaymen, and he had fought more than his share of duels, being a foul-mouthed advocate while he held briefs at the bar. No one questioned his fighting qualities. But with respect to this particular case of Pyneweck, he lived in a house of gla.s.s. Was there not his pretty, dark-eyed, over-dressed housekeeper, Mrs. Flora Carwell? Very easy for people who knew Shrewsbury to identify Mrs. Pyneweck, if once put upon the scent; and had he not stormed and worked hard in that case?
Had he not made it hard sailing for the prisoner? Did he not know very well what the bar thought of it? It would be the worst scandal that ever blasted judge.
So much there was intimidating in the matter, but nothing more. The Judge was a little bit gloomy for a day or two after, and more testy with every one than usual.
He locked up the papers; and about a week after he asked his housekeeper, one day, in the library:
”Had your husband never a brother?”
Mrs. Carwell squalled on this sudden introduction of the funereal topic, and cried exemplary ”piggins full,” as the Judge used pleasantly to say.
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