Mr. Grey looked perplexed and vexed, and asked Mr. Beanchamp if he could suggest any other person able to identify Maddox. He frowned, said there must have been workmen at the factory, but knew not where they were, looked at Colin Keith, asked Alison if she or her sister had ever seen Maddox, then declared he could lay his hands on no one but Dr. Long at Belfast.
Mauleverer vehemently exclaimed against the injustice of detaining him till a witness could be summoned from that distance. Mr. Grey evidently had his doubts, and began to think of calling in some fresh opinion whether he had sufficient grounds for committal, and Alison's hopes were only unstained by Colin's undaunted looks, when there came a knock at the door, and, as much to the surprise of Alison as of every one else, there entered an elderly maid-servant, leading a little girl by the hand, and Colonel Keith going to meet the latter, said, "Do not be frightened, my dear, you have only to answer a few questions as plainly and clearly as you can."
Awed, silent, and dazzled by the sudden gas-light, she clung to his hand, but evidently distinguished no one else; and he placed her close to the magistrate saying, "This is Mr. Grey, Rose, tell him your name."
And Mr. Grey taking her hand and repeating the question, the clear little silvery voice answered,
"I am Rose Ermine Williams."
"And how old are you, my dear?"
"I was eight on the last of June."
"She knows the nature of an oath?" asked Mr. Grey of the Colonel.
"Certainly, yon can soon satisfy yourself of that."
"My dear," then said Mr. Grey, taking her by the hand again, and looking into the brown intelligent eyes, "I am sure you have been well taught. Can you tell me what is meant by taking an oath before a magistrate?"
"Yes," said Rose, colour flushing into her face, "it is calling upon Almighty God to hear one speak the truth." She spoke so low that she could hardly be heard, and she looked full of startled fear and distress, turning her face up to Colonel Keith with a terrified exclamation,
"Oh please, why am I here, what am I to say?"
He was sorry for her; but her manifest want of preparation was all in favour of the cause, and he soothed her by saying, "Only answer just what you are asked as clearly as you can, and Mr. Grey will soon let you go. He knows you would try any way to speak the truth, but as he is going to examine you as a magistrate, he must ask you to take the oath first."
Rose repeated the oath in her innocent tones, and perhaps their solemnity or the fatherly gentleness of Mr. Grey reassured her, for her voice trembled much less when she answered his next inquiry, who her parents were.
"My mother is dead," she said; "my father is Mr Williams, he is away at Ekaterinburg."
"Do you remember any time before he was at Ekaterinburg?"
"Oh yes; when we lived at Kensington, and he had the patent glass works."
"Now, turn round and say if there is any one here whom you know?"
Rose, who had hitherto stood facing Mr. Grey, with her back to the rest of the room, obeyed, and at once exclaimed, "Aunt Alison," then suddenly recoiled, and grasped at the Colonel.
"What is it, my dear?"
"It is--it is Mr. Maddox," and with another gasp of fright, "and Maria! Oh, let me go."
But Mr. Grey put his arm round her, and assured her that no one could harm her, Colonel Keith let his fingers be very hard pinched, and her aunt came nearer, all telling her that she had only to make her answers distinctly; and though still shrinking, she could reply to Mr. Grey's question whom she meant by Mr. Maddox.
"The agent for the glass--my father's agent."
"And who is Maria?"
"She was my nurse."
"When did you last see the person you call Mr. Maddox?"
"Last time, I was sure of it, was when I was walking on the esplanade at Avoncester with Colonel Keith," said Rose, very anxious to turn aside and render her words inaudible.
"I suppose you can hardly tell when that was?"
"Yes, it was the day before you went away to Lord Keith's wedding," said Rose, looking to the Colonel.
"Had you seen him before?"
"Twice when I was out by myself, but it frightened me so that I never looked again."
"Can you give me any guide to the time?"
She was clear that it had been after Colonel Keith's first stay at Avonmouth, but that was all, and being asked if she had ever mentioned these meetings, "Only when Colonel Keith saw how frightened I was, and asked me."
"Why were you frightened?" asked Mr. Grey, on a hint from the Colonel.
"Because I could not quite leave off believing the dreadful things Mr. Maddox and Maria said they would do to me if I told."
"Told what?"
"About Mr. Maddox coming and walking with Maria when she was out with me," gasped Rose, trying to avert her head, and not comforted by hearing Mr. Grey repeat her words to those tormentors of her infancy.
A little encouragement, however, brought out the story of the phosphoric letters, the lions, and the vision of Maddox growling in the dressing-room. The date of the apparition could hardly be hoped for, but fortunately Rose remembered that it was two days before her mamma's birthday, because she had felt it so bard to be eaten up before the fete, and this date tallied with that given by Maria of her admitting her treacherous admirer into the private rooms.
"The young lady may be precocious, no doubt, sir," here said the accused, "but I hardly see why she has been brought here. You can attach no weight to the confused recollections of so young a child, of matters that took place so long ago."
"The question will be what weight the jury will attach to them at the assizes," said Mr. Grey.
"You will permit me to make one inquiry of the young lady, sir. Who told her whom she might expect to see here?"
Mr. Grey repeated the query, and Rose answered, "Nobody; I knew my aunt and the Colonel and Lady Temple were gone in to Avoncester, and Aunt Ermine got a note from the Colonel to say that I was to come in to him with Tibbie in a fly."
"Did you know what you were wanted for?"
"No, I could not think. I only knew they came to get the woman punished for being so cruel to the poor little girls."
"Do you know who that person was?"
"Mrs. Rawlins," was the ready answer.
"I think," said Mr. Grey to the accused, "that you must perceive that, with such coincidence of testimony as I have here, I have no alternative but to commit you for the summer assizes."
Mauleverer murmured something about an action for false imprisonment, but he did not make it clear, and he was evidently greatly crestfallen. He had no doubt hoped to brazen out his assumed character sufficiently to disconcert Mr. Beauchamp's faith in his own memory, and though he had carried on the same game after being confronted with Maria, it was already becoming desperate. He had not reckoned upon her deserting his cause even for her own sake, and the last chance of employing her antecedents to discredit her testimony, had been overthrown by Rose's innocent witness to their mutual relations, a remembrance which had been burnt in on her childish memory by the very means taken to secure her silence. When the depositions were read over, their remarkable and independent accordance was most striking; Mrs. Dench had already been led away by the minister, in time to catch her train, just when her sobs of indignation at the deception were growing too demonstrative, and the policeman resumed the charge of Maria Hatherton.
Little Rose looked up to her, saying, "Please, Aunt Ailie, may I speak to her?"
Alison had been sitting restless and perplexed between impulses of pity and repulsion, and doubts about the etiquette of the justice room; but her heart yearned over the girl she had cherished, and she signed permission to Rose, whose timidity had given way amid excitement and encouragement.
"Please, Maria," she said, "don't be angry with me for telling; I never did till Colonel Keith asked me, and I could not help it. Will you kiss me and forgive me as you used?"