The San Rosario Ranch
The preliminaries accomplished, all the participants adjourned to the
court-room, which was a bare apartment, very grimy, and sadly in need of
paint and soapsuds. At one end was a slightly raised table, behind
which the judge seated himself. He was a singular-looking man, and wore
his hair long, in greasy ringlets falling as far as the coat-collar.
His stout person was adorned with a large amount of rather flashy
jewelry, and a pink cravat was supplemented by a bunch of fuchsias worn
in the button-hole. The space in front of the bench was railed in by an
iron balustrade painted green. At the long tables sat groups of men
busily engaged in writing or in conversation. A policeman standing near
the judge's desk, when the clamor in the court-room became unusually
loud, pounded on the floor with his club, whereat the voices grew lower
for a brief space, and then the hubbub began again. Somebody seemed to
be addressing the court, though Millicent thought that no one paid much
attention to him. The entrance of the prosecuting council in the case
of manslaughter soon to be called, with two of the chief witnesses, made
some stir; and Millicent was conscious, as she took her place, that the
eyes of all present were fixed upon her. She looked wonderingly about
the dismal apartment, with its dirty wooden settles and bare floor, at
the judge on the bench, and at the crowd of poorly dressed people in the
seats behind her. Galbraith now entered the little pen, and, seating
himself at the table, proceeded to look through some papers which his
clerk handed to him, while the man who was haranguing the court
continued his discourse, in which nobody seemed to take any interest.
Millicent had never been in court before. Her only experience of the
abodes of justice had been the long afternoons passed in the court-rooms
of the Doge's palace, studying the frescoes and beautiful carvings of
those famous apartments. She had always invested the precincts of
justice with a vague majesty and splendor. A judge, in her imagination,
was a stately man clothed in crimson and ermine, with grave, reverend
features, majestic in mien, deliberate in speech. When Hal pointed out
Judge Croley, as one of the most distinguished of American jurists, she
was greatly astonished.
"Will he try the case in that dress?"
"Oh, yes; I heard Croley condemn a man to death in very much the same
costume as that which he wears to-day. The cravat was a little brighter
pink, I think; and I remember he wore carnations in his button-hole. He
said in a pleasant, nonchalant voice, very much the tone he would use in
ordering his farmer to kill a pair of chickens, 'You are condemned to be
taken to the San Bernardino prison, there to be hanged by the neck until
you are dead, on the third day of May at twelve o'clock; and may God
have mercy upon your soul!'"
Millicent shuddered as she heard the case called, and faltered for the
first time in her desire to see justice done to the murderer of Ah Lam.
It is such a terrible responsibility, the taking of life; can man's law
make it guiltless? The great question which all of modern thought has
not yet solved, troubled the mind of the young woman, who could accept
no judgment or creed on faith; she painfully and laboriously solved the
problems of life by the force of her own reasoning.
"There is Pierson, the counsel for the defence," whispered Hal, as a
little man strutted up the aisle between the benches full of people, and
entered the green-railed enclosure. He was perhaps the most
grotesque-looking person Millicent had ever seen. His height could not
have been above five feet; and this, with his small hands and feet, gave
him an exceedingly effeminate appearance. His small round head was like
a ball, on the surface of which little globular eyes and a beak-like
nose had been very casually placed. These features did not seem at all
a necessary part of the head, which resembled that of a parrot. Before
he spoke he put his head on one side, in a bird-like fashion; and he
occasionally shook himself, very much as a canary does when anything has
ruffled its composure. Millicent had learned from Galbraith that this
man was the most prominent criminal lawyer in California. As she looked
at his high, narrow forehead and mean, pinched smile she thought that
among all the malefactors in San Bernardino prison she had seen no face
as bad as that of Pierson, the great criminal lawyer. The prisoner was
now brought into the court. After stating his name, age, residence, and
occupation, he was asked the question,--
"Are you guilty or not guilty of the wilful murder of Ah Lam at Carey's
Bridge, on the afternoon of Wednesday, October 16?"
The noisy court-room had grown perfectly still; and the prisoner's
low-spoken answer was heard in the farthest corner with perfect
distinctness,--
"Not guilty."
The counsel for the defence now stated that the prisoner acknowledged
having been at Carey's Bridge on the day of the murder. He had there
seen and spoken to Miss Almsford, but had fled at the approach of some
gentlemen of the party. He admitted that he had assaulted Miss
Almsford, but pleaded that he had no intention of injuring her.
"What were you doing at the mill?"
"I come there to meet a man as I had 'gaged to."
"What man was it?"
The prisoner declined to answer this question, and finally declared that
he did not know the man's name.
"For what purpose did you meet this man?"
"To do a job as we was hired for."
"And what were you hired to do?"
"To carry off the young lady."
At this astonishing statement a moment's silence fell upon the
court-room, which was broken by Pierson's sharp voice: he asked his
client to name the person who had engaged him to kidnap the young girl.
With clasped hands and startled eyes, Millicent looked into the face of
the ruffian, waiting to hear the name of the man who had plotted against
her. John Graham, in the excitement of the moment, stood up in his
place to get a better view of Horton; while Maurice Galbraith sat with
an unmoved countenance, keenly watching the features of the prisoner at
the bar. The question was twice put to him,--"Who was the man?" but he
did not speak. A third time he was asked. Finally, he looked at his
lawyer, who nodded slightly; and then, with a defiant glance toward the
artist, at whom he pointed an unsteady finger, he said,--
"The man as hired me to do the job stands in this yer court-room. He
calls himself John Graham."
A moment of silence followed this astounding statement, succeeded by an
incredulous murmur which ran from mouth to mouth. From the confused
sounds rang out a deep, clear voice uttering these words:--
"It is a shameful lie!" Millicent it was who had spoken, rising to her
feet and stretching out her arms toward Graham with a gesture of womanly
protection, as if to shield him from the ruffian's slanderous breath.
Silence was at last enforced, and the examination of Horton proceeded.
He repeated his statement that he had not killed the Chinaman, and that
the abduction of Millicent had been attempted at the instigation of John
Graham. The artist, after the first moment of surprise, said nothing,
but remained perfectly silent, his eyes fixed intently on Daniel
Horton's face. The story told by the prisoner was one which bore some
semblance of truth. He had met his confederate on the morning of the
picnic as had been previously arranged, and had attempted to carry off
Miss Almsford; but hearing the voices of the gentlemen had fled. He had
undertaken the affair some time beforehand, and had twice visited
Graham's studio, where the artist had made a painting of him in order to
explain his presence there. A scrap of paper, soiled and tumbled, was
produced, on which were traced these words in Graham's handwriting:
"Come to the place I told you of, to-morrow at one; you shall be well
paid." One o'clock had been the hour of the picnic; and this note, it
was affirmed, had been sent to Horton on the previous day as per
agreement. On being further examined, the fellow showed a dogged
persistence in his story; and Maurice Galbraith's adroit
cross-questioning failed to make him contradict his original statement
in any particular. The day waned as the storm of words raged; and at
dusk the trial was adjourned until the following day. As the crowd
filed out of the court-room, Millicent found Graham at her side. He was
pale, and his dark eyes flashed angrily. He was about to speak to her;
and she turned toward him with smiling lips and eyes, when Henry Deering
stepped between them, and, bowing coolly to the artist, drew her arm
through his own, and, before she was well aware of his intention, led
her from the room. The eyes of a dozen curious outsiders were fixed
upon her, and she submitted to be placed in the wagon, which Hal drove
off at a sharp pace. The artist remained in the court-room, where he
was presently joined by Maurice Galbraith, who in a formal voice asked
him to accompany him to his apartment, in order that they might discuss
the new and unexpected feature in the case. The two men walked together
down the street, both too much excited to trust themselves to speak. As
soon as they found themselves alone in Galbraith's chamber at the inn,
Graham cried excitedly,--
"Galbraith, no one can for a moment believe that infamous lie,--you can
make the fellow eat his words to-morrow?"
The lawyer folded his arms across his breast, and looked into his
companion's face with a searching gaze, before he answered slowly and
ironically,--
"Am I to understand, Mr. Graham, that you deny all collusion in the
attempt to carry off Miss Almsford?"
"Great God! of course I do. Can you for a moment doubt me? _I to carry
off Millicent_? Are you mad to ask me such a question? Why, don't you
know, man, how much I have cared for that girl?"
"It is not difficult for the most indifferent observer to detect your
admiration for Miss Almsford."
"Well?"
"Well, what does that prove? It is a point against you that you are
supposed to be in love with the young lady, and gives color to Horton's
accusation."
Graham sank into a seat, and the lawyer continued,--
"Your great intimacy at the Ranch and your marked attentions to Miss
Almsford were apparently unaccountably discontinued by your removal to
San Francisco. This feature is against you. You must have seen that in
the eyes of Henry Deering, Horton's statement needed strong disproving."
"And you, Galbraith, can you for an instant suspect me of so base, so
vile an action? Is it possible that a man can be so misjudged?"
"All I have to say, Mr. Graham, is that it is my hope to prove you
innocent of the crime in which Horton has implicated you. As the friend
and counsel of Miss Almsford, I prefer to believe that she was menaced
by a vulgar ruffian and not by a man who might have aspired to the honor
and privilege of guarding her from every harm. If you will excuse me, I
will see you in the course of the evening."
With these words the lawyer left the apartment, his nervous face
suffused by a deep flush. John Graham stared after him for a moment, and
then passed down the corridor and out into the quiet night, to seek
counsel from the stars in this strange hour of doubt.
CHAPTER XVIII.
"... the passions of her mind,
As winds from all the compass shift and blow,
Made war upon each other for an hour."
"Millicent! Millicent! are you awake?"
It was the evening of the first day of the trial; and Miss Almsford,
sitting in her chamber warming her pretty feet before the fire,
recognized the voice and answered,--
"Yes, Bab, come in."