nce, shortly after
midnight. Evidence will be called to show that Birchill, or a man
answering his description, boarded a tramcar at Euston Road at 9.30 p.m.,
and journeyed in it to Hampstead. He was observed both at Euston Road and
the Hampstead terminus by the conductor, because of his obvious desire to
avoid attention. There were only two other passengers on the top of the
car when it left Euston Road. The conductor directed the attention of the
driver to his movements, and they both watched him till he disappeared in
the direction of the Heath. In fairness to the prisoner, it was necessary
to point out, however, that neither the conductor nor the driver can
identify him positively as the man they had seen on their car that night,
but both will swear that to the best of their belief Birchill is the man.
Assuming that it was the prisoner who travelled to Hampstead by the
Euston Road tram--a route he would probably prefer because it took him to
Hampstead by the most unfrequented way--he would have a distance of
nearly a mile to walk across Hampstead Heath to Tanton Gardens, where
Sir Horace Fewbanks's house was situated. The evidence of the tram-men is
that he set off across the Heath at a very rapid rate. The tram reached
Hampstead at four minutes past ten, so that, by walking fast, it would be
possible for a young energetic man to reach Riversbrook before a quarter
to eleven. Another five minutes would see an experienced housebreaker
like Birchill inside the house. At twenty minutes past eleven a young man
named Ryder, who had wandered into Tanton Gardens while endeavouring to
take a short cut home, heard the sound of a report, which at the time he
took to be the noise of a door violently slammed, coming from the
direction of Riversbrook. A few moments afterwards he saw a man climb
over the front fence of Riversbrook to the street. He drew back
cautiously into the shade of one of the chestnut trees of the street
avenue, and saw the man plainly as he ran past him. Ryder will swear that
the man he saw was Birchill."

"It's a lie! It's a lie! You're trying to hang him, you wicked man. Oh,
Fred, Fred!"

The cry proceeded from the girl Doris Fanning. Her unbalanced temperament
had been unable to bear the strain of sitting there and listening to Mr.
Walters' cold inexorable construction of a legal chain of evidence
against her lover. She rose to her feet, shrieking wildly, and
gesticulating menacingly at Mr. Walters. The