back in
his chair. Mr. Pollard hastened to take off the edge of his lordship's
wrath by reprimanding the witness himself.

'You mustn't tell us that. You don't know it was the prisoner. What
was it you actually heard?'

The girl now felt and looked ready to resort to tears. She really did
not know what answer was safe, and prudently adopted a strictly
non-committal form.

'I heard a noise below.'

'What was the noise like?'

'Like someone going downstairs.'

'Well, why didn't you say that? You heard footsteps going down?'

'Yes.'

The judge took up his pen again and took down the answer.

'And did you notice the footsteps this time?'

'Yes; they were----'

'Stop! Not so fast. Answer my questions.'

Mr. Pollard was by this time little less nervous than the witness. He
was really utterly at a loss how to frame his next question without
incurring Tressamer's wrath or the rebuke of the Bench. At last he
blurted out:

'Was there anything different about the footsteps this time?'

Tressamer opened his mouth, but the judge was before him this time:

'Don't answer. Really, Mr. Pollard, you are as bad as the witness. You
know you ought not to put a question like that.' Then, seeing that the
poor young man was quite unequal to extracting the desired evidence,
his lordship quietly took over the examination himself:

'Did you notice the footsteps this time when they were going
downstairs?'

'Yes, sir--my lord.'

'Did anything strike you about them?'

'Yes, my lord.'

'What?'

'They were heavier, sir, and thumpy.'

'Had you ever heard anything like it before? I mean, did they or did
they not sound familiar in spite of this heaviness?'

'No, my lord; I don't remember.'

'Did you go downstairs again?'

'No, sir.'

The judge turned round to the jury with complacency, and smiled as if
to say, 'You see, gentlemen, how it can be done by one who knows how.'
Then he asked the counsel:

'Now, Mr. Pollard, do you want anything more from this witness?'

'No, my lord, thank you.'

He sat down, feeling considerably the worse for his experience, and
Tressamer got up.

He looked severely at the young woman for some seconds, and then
suddenly asked her:

'Why do you dislike Miss Owen?'

At once the court was all ears. It was one of those strokes of
brilliant advocacy which few men care to venture on. It was dangerous,
but in the present case it was completely successful. The witness lost
countenance, s