“I didn’t know what to answer, I was so surprised, and he went on to say that that was all he happened to have with him, and that it was lucky he had that much. He said he wouldn’t tell me who he was, but he told me how to have something printed in the Herald if I ever needed money, and he would send me some. He said I’d have to take his word for that. I decided to do it when I saw him count out the thousand dollars on the table. I promised to leave right away, in ten minutes, without stopping to take anything but my clothes.”
Mr. Leg interrupted:
“Didn’t you suspect that a crime had been committed?”
“Yes, sir; of course I knew something had happened, but all that money was too much for me. After he had gone—”
“Didn’t he wait to see you go?”
“No, sir; he went right away. I guess he knew that I’d certainly beat it with the money. I let him out at the basement door, and in less than no time I had my clothes packed and was all ready. I went out by the basement door, too, but I couldn’t make myself go. I stood there on the sidewalk maybe two minutes calling myself a fool, but I couldn’t help it. I wanted to see what had happened in that flat upstairs.
“I went up to the ground floor by the front steps, leaving the outer door open as I entered, dropped my suitcase in the front hall, and went up two more flights to the door of Miss Reeves’s flat. It was locked. I ran down to the basement for my duplicate key, came back up and unlocked the door. The flat was dark. I switched on the lights, and there on the floor I saw Miss Reeves. The hilt of a knife was sticking from her breast, and there was blood on her dress, and her face looked awful. It scared me so I didn’t know what I was doing. I ran out without turning off the lights, and I think I forgot to lock the door.
“I ran back to the ground floor as fast as I could and picked up my suitcase. I started for the outside door, and then I suddenly saw a man coming up the stoop. I was so scared I didn’t know what to do. I stepped back into the corner of the hall as the man entered the door, and, scared as I was, I was surprised to see that it wasn’t one of the tenants, or anyone I had ever seen before. He came in and started upstairs without saying anything, just glancing at me. I picked up—”
“Just a minute, Cummings,” Mr. Leg interrupted. He turned and pointed at William Mount. “Is that the man you saw enter and go upstairs, after you had seen Miss Reeves’s dead body on the floor?”
The witness examined the prisoner a moment.
“Yes, sir, I think so. The light in the hall was dim, so I couldn’t be sure, but it looks like him.”
“All right. Go on.”
“That’s all, sir. I picked up the suitcase and ran. I took the subway to the end of the line, and there I got on a trolley for Yonkers. The next day I went on to Albany, and I’ve been hiding there ever since.”
“And don’t you know that you have made yourself an accessory to this murder and are liable to punishment?” asked the lawyer.
“Yes, sir, I know that. I didn’t care at first, until I saw in the papers that some man that I knew was innocent had been arrested for it. Then I wanted to come and tell all I knew — I really did, sir — but I was afraid, and I couldn’t ever make myself start. When that young man came after me this morning” — he pointed to Dan — “I was only too glad to come, sir. Ask him. I hope I won’t be punished, sir.”
At this point Judge Manton interrupted the examination. He leaned forward in his chair as he spoke, while the fingers of his right hand were toying with the edge of the glass which had remained on his desk, half full of water.
“I think we had better adjourn for luncheon, Mr. Leg,” he observed. “It’s one o’clock. You may continue with the witness after the recess.”
Dan sprang up to murmur something in Mr. Leg’s ear. The lawyer looked astonished and bewildered, but finally nodded in acquiescence.
“Very well, your honor,” he said to the court. “But I would like to ask the witness just two more questions before adjournment, if your honor please.”
“Let them be short,” the judge said curtly.
Mr. Leg turned to the witness.
“Cummings, I want to ask you if this man whom you called the colonel, whom you saw and heard quarreling with Alice Reeves, and who gave you a thousand dollars to flee from the scene of the murder — I want to ask you if that man is now in this courtroom?”
Cummings hesitated a moment and glanced from side to side, then suddenly straightened up and said in a loud and distinct tone:
“Yes, sir, he is here.”
A gasp of amazement came from every side.
“Will you point him out to the judge and jury?”
For reply, Cummings turned and leveled his finger straight at the face of Judge Manton.
But the wave of astonishment and incredulity that swept over the courtroom was swiftly drowned in a great cry of alarm. Judge Manton, looking over the accusing finger straight into Cummings’s face, had lifted the glass of water to his lips; and Dan, springing up and knocking Mr. Leg out of his way, had leaped like a panther over the rail to the dais and with one sweep of his arm dashed the glass from the judge’s hand to the floor.
Court attendants ran forward, shouting; the jury stood up in their box; several of them leaped over the partition and rushed onto the platform of justice; the spectators tumbled over the rail by scores, trampling one another; screams were heard from a hundred throats. Dan was hanging desperately on to Judge Manton’s gown, calling at the top of his voice:
“The water was poisoned! Quick! Hold him! You fools! He’ll kill himself! Help!”
But the officers and attendants shrank back before the look of mad rage and passion on Judge Manton’s face. With a violent movement he threw Dan off; the boy fell on his knees on the platform, still calling out for help. Judge Manton seized the heavy wooden gavel from his desk and raised it high.
“Damn you!” he snarled in a voice of savage fury, and brought the gavel down on Dan’s head. The boy toppled over with a moan.
The next moment a dozen men had sprung forward and borne Judge Manton to the floor.
The following morning Mr. Leg and Dan sat talking in the lawyer’s office. Nearby was Miss Venner, listening to them; her eyes never left Dan’s face. The blow from Judge Manton’s gavel had, luckily, not seriously injured him; he had been unconscious for more than an hour, but when he finally came to, was none the worse for it.
“Yes, I let Mount have two thousand dollars,” Mr. Leg was saying. “He’s going to buy a little cigar store or something somewhere and try to forget things. Poor devil! I hope he succeeds.”
“Yes, sir,” Dan agreed. “But he really hasn’t anything left to live for.” And quite unconsciously the boy’s eyes turned to meet those of Miss Venner, who flushed and looked the other way.
“And so you saw Manton take something from his pocket and put it in that glass of water,” Mr. Leg observed in a voice filled with undisguised admiration.
“Yes, sir. Of course, I was watching him all the time.”
“And you think it was with him that Mount’s wife left home. But why wouldn’t some of his friends have known about her?”
“Perhaps they did,” was the reply. “But it’s evident that the judge was pretty cagey; he doesn’t seem ever to have taken anybody up there. He probably met her in a cabaret, or somewhere, and simply fell in love with her.
As for his willingness to sacrifice Mount, well, some men are made that way. He probably said to himself, ‘What does this broken-down creature amount to compared with a man like me — wealthy, intellectual, cultured, of high position?’ You must remember that he murdered her in a fit of passion, just as when he hit me with that gavel.”