Volume Ii Part 10 (1/2)

_S_. I did notice that it looked very wet: but it was foul weather outside.

_L.C.J._ Did you feel of it, mistress?

_S._ No, my lord, I did not like to touch it.

_L.C.J._ Not like? Why that? Are you so nice that you scruple to feel of a wet dress?

_S._ Indeed, my lord, I cannot very well tell why: only it had a nasty ugly look about it.

_L.C.J._ Well, go on.

_S_. Then I called again to Thomas Snell, and bid him come to me and catch anyone that come out when I should open the cupboard door, 'for,'

says I, 'there is someone hiding within, and I would know what she wants.' And with that Squire Martin gave a sort of a cry or a shout and ran out of the house into the dark, and I felt the cupboard door pushed out against me while I held it, and Thomas Snell helped me: but for all we pressed to keep it shut as hard as we could, it was forced out against us, and we had to fall back.

_L.C.J._ And pray what came out--a mouse?

_S._ No, my lord, it was greater than a mouse, but I could not see what it was: it fleeted very swift over the floor and out at the door.

_L.C.J._ But come; what did it look like? Was it a person?

_S._ My lord, I cannot tell what it was, but it ran very low, and it was of a dark colour. We were both daunted by it, Thomas Snell and I, but we made all the haste we could after it to the door that stood open. And we looked out, but it was dark and we could see nothing.

_L.C.J._ Was there no tracks of it on the floor? What floor have you there?

_S._ It is a flagged floor and sanded, my lord, and there was an appearance of a wet track on the floor, but we could make nothing of it, neither Thomas Snell nor me, and besides, as I said, it was a foul night.

_L.C.J._ Well, for my part, I see not--though to be sure it is an odd tale she tells--what you would do with this evidence.

_Att._ My lord, we bring it to show the suspicious carriage of the prisoner immediately after the disappearance of the murdered person: and we ask the jury's consideration of that; and also to the matter of the voice heard without the house.

Then the prisoner asked some questions not very material, and Thomas Snell was next called, who gave evidence to the same effect as Mrs Arscott, and added the following:

_Att._ Did anything pa.s.s between you and the prisoner during the time Mrs Arscott was out of the room?

_Th._ I had a piece of twist in my pocket.

_Att._ Twist of what?

_Th._ Twist of tobacco, sir, and I felt a disposition to take a pipe of tobacco. So I found a pipe on the chimney-piece, and being it was twist, and in regard of me having by an oversight left my knife at my house, and me not having over many teeth to pluck at it, as your lords.h.i.+p or anyone else may have a view by their own eyesight--

_L.C.J._ What is the man talking about? Come to the matter, fellow! Do you think we sit here to look at your teeth?

_Th._ No, my lord, nor I would not you should do, G.o.d forbid! I know your honours have better employment, and better teeth, I would not wonder.

_L.C.J._ Good G.o.d, what a man is this! Yes, I _have_ better teeth, and that you shall find if you keep not to the purpose.

_Th._ I humbly ask pardon, my lord, but so it was. And I took upon me, thinking no harm, to ask Squire Martin to lend me his knife to cut my tobacco. And he felt first of one pocket and then of another and it was not there at all. And says I, 'What! have you lost your knife, Squire?'

And up he gets and feels again and he sat down, and such a groan as he gave. 'Good G.o.d!' he says, 'I must have left it there.' 'But,' says I, 'Squire, by all appearance it is _not_ there. Did you set a value on it,'

says I, 'you might have it cried.' But he sat there and put his head between his hands and seemed to take no notice to what I said. And then it was Mistress Arscott come tracking back out of the kitchen place.