said. "I've an idea why you've come. But—there'll be no proceedings against Mrs. Perris. Her husband is in that room, and he's just told me the truth. She's innocent of everything—it was he who killed Webster! But why, only himself and God know I—I doubt if men ever will."
Chapter XXIII
Throughout the dreary and sordid weeks which elapsed between the making of his confession to the police and the holding of the ensuing Winter Assizes Perris maintained the attitude which he had shown to Wroxdale with a firmness and stolidity that nothing could break down. Having once made the confession nothing moved him from it or whatever purpose it was that had impelled him to make it. How and when he killed Pippany Webster he would and did tell; why he killed him he would not tell. It was nobody's affair but his, he said; repeated attempts on Wroxdale's part to get him to tell more, warnings as to his fate, only produced sullenness on his part and eventually silence. Once committed for trial and placed in prison on remand he fell into the prison routine with ready acceptance and a curious equanimity. They said of him that nothing affected his appetite nor his ability to sleep; he made no complaints and received Wroxdale's visits with indifference. And at last, when the Assizes were near at hand, he gave the solicitor a plain intimation that he wanted to see him no more.
"I can't see what's t' use o' your comin' here so oft, Mestur Wroxdale," he said, showing for the first time some signs of testiness. "It's only wastin' your time and it's doin' no good. I've telled t' truth about t' matter and theer's an end on it. At least, I know what t' end 'll be, and t' sooner it comes t' better."
"So you mean to let yourself be hanged without an effort to save your neck?" said Wroxdale, feeling it necessary to speak with brutal plainness. "Remember, you're not playing at this—you're in the hands of the Law."
"T' Law and t' lawyers can do wi' me what they like," answered Perris. "I've spokken. I've telled t' truth, and I'll tak' t' consequences. I thowt it all out when I were travillin' down i' t' train that day I come to see you, sir. I tell you I've spokken. An' nowt 'll alter what I've said."
Wroxdale shook his head.
"You've still a duty to yourself, Perris," he said. "You see, if you could only show me that there were extenuating circumstances—"
"I don't know what them words means, sir," replied Perris, with more signs of testiness. "I've telled what t' circumstances were, an'—"
"Wait a moment," said Wroxdale, "and try to remember that I'm doing my best for you. I don't want to see you go to the scaffold if I can save you. By extenuating circumstances I mean that perhaps you lost your temper—"
Perris made a gesture of impatient dissent.
"I lost nowt o' t' sort, then!" he exclaimed. "I werrn't likely to lose mi temper wi' t' like o' that theer. I killed him same as I'd ha' killed a weasel or a rat-ten. An' I've telled ye once for all, Mestur Wroxdale, I've said my say and I shall say no more. Ye mean well, sir, but it's no use comin' to this place agen on that business. What I've said, I'll stand to."
Then Wroxdale played his last card.
"There's somebody besides yourself to think of, Perris," he said. "There's your wife. You don't want her to go through the rest of her life branded as a murderer's widow?"
The look of sullen obstinacy which Wroxdale had begun to know so well came over Perris's face, and settled there as if it would never move.
"I've said my say, Mestur Wroxdale," he answered. "I've nowt no more to remark, sir."
And Wroxdale left him and troubled him no more. But he contrived, with the co-operation of the authorities, to have Perris examined, unknown to himself, by mental specialists, for he had doubts as to the man's sanity. And the mental specialists gave it as their convinced opinion that Perris was sane enough on all points, and then Wroxdale knew that things would have to take their course.
That course was short and sharp enough, once the weeks of weary waiting were over. In a crowded court, in which he himself seemed to be the most unconcerned person present, Perris, called upon to plead, reiterated his guilt as calmly and firmly as he had confessed it before the magistrates. Advised by the presiding judge to withdraw his plea and to take his trial, he answered that he should do no such thing.
He had already told the police and the magistrates all the circumstances of the crime he was charged with and in the telling he had spoken the truth. He was not going to take back what he had said to please anybody. And just as he had been deaf to all that Wroxdale had urged, so he was deaf to all that grave judicial advice could put before him. Forms of law were naught to him, and he shook his head impatiently at the mention of them and the advantage to himself and the public of a fair trial.
"I've answered that theer question you axed me," he said. "An' I'll answer it agen—Guilty!"
So there was no more to be done or said, the prisoner having been proved to be a perfectly sane man, and presently Perris heard himself sentenced to death. He stood for a moment after the last words had fallen on his ears, and he looked round the court, in which we many faces that he must have known, but if he was searching for any particular face he showed no sign. And with every eye fixed on him, he presently turned and walked steadily down the stairs behind him, and so disappeared.
There were many in the court who believed that Perris's last look round had been for his wife. But Rhoda had not been in court, though she was close at hand. At the time of Perris's sudden reappearance she had broken down, and it had been necessary to remove her from Wroxdale's house to an adjacent nursing home where she had ever since remained. Only the best medical skill and the closest attention had restored her sufficiently to be in a condition to face the prospect of entering the witness-box, and the doctor who had accompanied her to the Assizes was thankful for his patient's sake when he heard that there would be no call upon her.
"All the same," he said to Wroxdale, who with Taffendale had come across from the courts to the hotel in which Rhoda and a nurse were waiting in a private room, "somebody's got to break the news to her. She'll be better when she hears it."
Wroxdale looked at Taffendale.
"That's your duty, Mark," he said quietly.
Taffendale's face showed signs of agitation, and he turned away from the other two. But they suddenly saw him draw himself up and square his shoulders and he turned to them with a firmly-set jaw.
"If you think so, and the doctor thinks so," he said.
The doctor nodded.
"Yes, I think so," he said. "Tell her quietly and briefly. I'll call the nurse out and we'll stay near the door in case we're wanted. Come away as soon as you've told her, and then we'll get her away again. Come at once—the sooner she knows the better."
When Taffendale walked through the door which the doctor held open for him he felt that he was dealing with the most critical episode in his life. He knew what would result from the carrying out of the sentence which had just been passed on Abel Perris. Rhoda would be free, and she was already cleared of the suspicions which had gathered about her. And yet he felt a strange certainty that at this moment she was further away from him than ever; that there was a vast gulf between them which nothing could bridge. And as he crossed the room all thoughts of himself and of her went out of his mind and he only saw her as a trembling and agitated woman waiting to know the worst.
She
