A Butterfly on the Wheel Part 22

"That's settled, then," Adams replied, as the two men strolled into the big smoke-room, where the brown-cased Cocoa Tree is put with all its old a.s.sociations of the past. They fidgeted about a little, smoked a cigarette, while they looked down into the busy St. James's Street from the great Georgian windows, looked at their watches, and then hailed a taxi-cab and were driven to the Law Courts.

Court II. in the Probate, Divorce, and Admiralty Division of the High Court of Justice was crowded almost to suffocation as the two men entered and found, with some difficulty, the seats which had been allotted to them. They settled themselves quietly in their places in the well of the court.

The President was writing something in the book before him, and seated below the judge was the a.s.sociate, while the usher stood a few yards away.

Lots of people--and these the most fortunate--have never had occasion to visit a law court. It was so with Colonel Adams. This was the first time he had ever entered the great building at the junction of Fleet Street and the Strand, and he gazed round him with great interest.

He saw many faces that he knew. Immediately around him were the privileged of society sitting behind the solicitors; Admaston, Roderick Collingwood, the maid Pauline, and Lord Ellerdine.

In the second row the leading counsel sat.

Mr. Menzies, hawk-faced and saturnine of aspect, the horse-hair wig which framed his face only accentuating the hatchet-like alertness of his countenance. Sir Robert Fyffe, huge-framed, and with a face like the risen moon. Mr. M'Arthur, a youthful-looking man, handsome and _debonnaire_, but with something rather dangerous and threatening in his face.

Behind the leaders sat a row of junior counsel; and then Lady Attwill, other members of society, and the two friends who had driven from the Cocoa Tree Club.

The gallery at the back of the court was packed with people, and there was a curious hush and stillness over everything.

All eyes were directed to one point--to the witness-box, where Mrs.

Admaston was standing.

At the moment when the two men entered both Mr. M'Arthur and Sir Robert Fyffe were standing up.

"I have noted your question, Mr. M'Arthur, and do not think it is admissible at this stage," the President was saying. "No doubt, if Sir Robert's cross-examination follows a certain line, you can return to the matter when you re-examine your witness."

Sir Robert Fyffe sat down.

"If your lords.h.i.+p pleases," he said

Mr. M'Arthur turned over the leaves of a notebook. He was Mrs.

Admaston's leading counsel, and his examination continued:

"Now, Mrs. Admaston, let me be quite sure that you clearly understand the charges you have to meet. It is alleged that you arranged to miss the train at Boulogne in order to spend the evening in Paris with the co-respondent."

"That is not true," pierced through the dull, blanket-like silence of the court.

Few people enough have any experience of a court. They read long and large accounts of what goes on in the daily papers. Well-known descriptive writers endeavour to present a true picture of what they themselves have witnessed. And in the result almost every one whose experience of trials is taken almost entirely from the newspapers imagines that the scene of justice is some vast hall. It is all magnified and splendid in their thoughts. The reality is quite different.

A quite small room, panelled, badly lighted, thronged with people--this is the real theatre where the dramas of society are played in London town....

"It is alleged," Mr. M'Arthur, Peggy's own counsel, continued, "that, having reached Paris, you permitted Mr. Collingwood to engage rooms--connected the one with the other."

"I did not know that Mr. Collingwood's room opened out of mine," Mrs.

Admaston said. "It seems the hotel was full."

Everyone in the court--one person only excepted--was looking at the slim young woman in the witness-box. She was very simply dressed. Her face was perfectly pale, but her self-possession was marvellous.

From their seats behind the junior counsel, Colonel Adams and Henry Pa.s.she looked on with sympathetic interest.

Pa.s.she--who was somewhat of a psychologist--remarked upon the extreme simplicity of Mrs. Admaston's dress to his friend. "I call it ostentatious," he said, "or something of a trick. When a woman has an income of eighty thousand pounds a year quite apart from her husband, it seems to me exaggerated humility to appear in the clothes that any little milliner might wear."

Colonel Adams shrugged his shoulders. He didn't in the least understand his friend's point of view....

"After you went to bed"--the handsome young-elderly Mr. M'Arthur continued,--"it is said that you permitted Mr. Collingwood to enter your room--you being at the time undressed--and to stay there a considerable time."

Peggy's little white-gloved hands rested upon the rail of the witness-box.

"I don't know about permitting," she said in a clear voice. "He came in because he heard the telephone. I think he thought that I had gone to bed, and that the call might be from our friends."

"At anyrate, he came in, and you permitted him to stay?"

"Yes, I suppose I did. I asked him to go, but we were great friends, and--well--I let him stay and smoke a cigarette."

The court was dead silent now; the keen face of the President regarded counsel and witness with an intent scrutiny.

The society people who were there looked at each other and held their breath. The junior counsel leant forward from their benches, keenly attentive to the efforts of the respondent's friend.

"It is alleged," Mr. M'Arthur continued, "that while you were alone together you were unfaithful to your husband."

"That is a lie." The voice was so poignant, so ringing, so instinct with indignation, that even the President looked up and watched the witness keenly. Mr. M'Arthur nodded to himself as if very pleased with the response he had elicited. He put his hands together and made a motion as though he was congratulating himself.

When he looked up again his face was perfectly bright and cheerful.

"I will put this generally," he said. "Have you ever, Mrs.

Admaston--ever, on any occasion or in any place--been unfaithful to your husband?"

"Never--never--never!" Peggy replied....

She seemed no more the young and frivolous person she had been. Tense and strung up, her personality had become arresting and real--her voice seemed to carry conviction.

Mr. M'Arthur looked round the court--with a half glance at the President--and sat down.

As a matter of fact, he had the very gravest doubt as to the possible success of his case. That sleuth-hound, Sir Robert Fyffe, was against him, and the case itself was a thoroughly weak one. He, accomplished barrister, actor, and man of the world as he was, sat down with a quietly suggested air of triumph that impressed every one.

Sir Robert Fyffe rose.

Sir Robert Fyffe was the absolute leader in his own particular line.

There was something so red-faced and jolly about him--such a suggestion of friendliness even when he was most deadly,--that the eminence he enjoyed was very well deserved. His voice was mellow; indeed, it was more than that, and had a suggestion of treacle.

He looked at Mrs. Admaston with a bland smile.

"You will, I am sure, admit, Mrs. Admaston, that the events of the 23rd March give ground for very grave suspicion."

Peggy Admaston did not seem at all distressed by this question. Her voice showed the pain that she was enduring, but all her answers to counsel were delivered clearly and openly. They had either a frank innocence about them, or else she was certainly one of the most accomplished actresses and liars of her time.

"Some persons are more suspicious than others," Peggy answered.