CHAPTER X

Dinner at Framley Court

Lord Lufton, as he drove home to Framley after the meeting of
the magistrates at Silverbridge, discussed the matter with his
brother-in-law, Mark Robarts, the clergyman. Lord Lufton was driving
a dog-cart, and went along the road at the rate of twelve miles
an hour. "I'll tell you what it is, Mark," he said, "that man is
innocent; but if he won't employ lawyers at his trial, the jury will
find him guilty."

"I don't know what to think about it," said the clergyman.

"Were you in the room when he protested so vehemently that he did not
know where he got the money?"

"I was in the room all the time."

"And did you not believe him when he said that?"

"Yes, I think I did."

"Anybody must have believed him,--except old Tempest, who never
believes anybody, and Fothergill, who always suspects everybody.
The truth is, that he found the cheque and put it by, and did not
remember anything about it."

"But, Lufton, surely that would amount to stealing it."

"Yes, if it wasn't that he is such a poor, cracked, crazy creature,
with his mind all abroad. I think Soames did drop his book in
his house. I'm sure Soames would not say so unless he was quite
confident. Somebody has picked it up, and in some way the cheque has
got into Crawley's hand. Then he has locked it up and forgotten all
about it; and when that butcher threatened him, he has put his hand
upon it, and he thought, or believed, that it had come from Soames or
the dean or from heaven, if you will. When a man is so crazy as that,
you can't judge of him as you do of others."

"But a jury must judge of him as it would of others."

"And therefore there should be a lawyer to tell the jury what to do.
They should have somebody up out of the parish to show that he is
beside himself half his time. His wife would be the best person, only
it would be hard lines on her."

"Very hard. And after all he would only escape by being shown to be
mad."

"And he is mad."

"Mrs. Proudie would come upon him in such a case as that, and
sequester his living."

"And what will Mrs. Proudie do when he's a convicted thief? Simply
unfrock him, and take away his living altogether. Nothing on earth
should induce me to find him guilty if I were on a jury."

"But you have committed him."

"Yes,--I've been one, at least, in doing so. I simply did that which
Walker told us we must do. A magistrate is not left to himself as a
juryman is. I'd ea