no time more than the present--at this
point Mr. Walters bowed to the presiding judge--the embodiment of legal
knowledge, legal experience, and legal wisdom.

After this tribute to the murdered man and the presiding judge, Mr.
Walters proceeded to lay the facts of the crime before the jury, who had
read all about them in the newspapers.

With methodical care he built up the case against the accused man,
classifying the points of evidence against him in categorical order for
the benefit of the jury. The most important witness for the prosecution
was a man known as James Hill, who had been in Sir Horace Fewbanks's
employ as a butler. Hill's connection with the prisoner was in some
aspects unfortunate, for himself, and no doubt counsel for the defense
would endeavour to discredit his evidence on that account, but the jury,
when they heard the butler tell his story in the witness box, would have
little difficulty in coming to the conclusion that the man Hill was the
victim of circumstances and his own weakness of temperament. However much
they might be disposed to blame him for the course he had pursued, he was
innocent of all complicity in his master's death, and had done his best
to help the ends of justice by coming forward with a voluntary confession
to the police.

Mr. Walters made no attempt to conceal or extenuate the black page in
Hill's past, but he asked the jury to believe that Hill had bitterly
repented of his former crime, and would have continued to lead an honest
life as Sir Horace Fewbanks's butler, if ill fate had not forged a cruel
chain of circumstances to link him to his past life and drag him down by
bringing him in contact with the accused man Birchill, whom he had met in
prison. Sir Horace Fewbanks was the self-appointed guardian of a young
woman named Doris Fanning, the daughter of a former employee on his
country estate, who had died leaving her penniless. Sir Horace had deemed
it his duty to bring up the girl and give her a start in life. After
educating her in a style suitable to her station, he sent her to London
and paid for music lessons for her in order to fit her for a musical
career, for which she showed some aptitude. Unfortunately the young woman
had a self-willed and unbalanced temperament, and she gave her benefactor
much trouble. Sir Horace bore patiently with her until she made the
chance acquaintance of Birchill, and became instantly fascinated by him.
The acquaintance speedily drif