about 9.30 p.m. on Wednesday, December the 10th, in a cab, with a
quantity of luggage; and this closed the case for the prosecution.

"Everybody in that court already _saw_ Smethurst mounting the gallows.
It was uninterested curiosity which caused the elegant audience to wait
and hear what Sir Arthur Inglewood had to say. He, of course, is the
most fashionable man in the law at the present moment. His lolling
attitudes, his drawling speech, are quite the rage, and imitated by the
gilded youth of society.

"Even at this moment, when the Siberian millionaire's neck literally and
metaphorically hung in the balance, an expectant titter went round the
fair spectators as Sir Arthur stretched out his long loose limbs and
lounged across the table. He waited to make his effect--Sir Arthur is a
born actor--and there is no doubt that he made it, when in his slowest,
most drawly tones he said quietly;

"'With regard to this alleged murder of one William Kershaw, on
Wednesday, December the 10th, between 6.15 and 8.45 p.m., your Honour, I
now propose to call two witnesses, who saw this same William Kershaw
alive on Tuesday afternoon, December the 16th, that is to say, six days
after the supposed murder.'

"It was as if a bombshell had exploded in the court. Even his Honour was
aghast, and I am sure the lady next to me only recovered from the shock
of the surprise in order to wonder whether she need put off her dinner
party after all.

"As for me," added the man in the corner, with that strange mixture of
nervousness and self-complacency which had set Miss Polly Burton