When Langton Hyde was brought up before the magistrate next morning, the court was crowded to its utmost limits; and Viner, looking round him from his seat near the solicitors' table saw that most of the people interested in the case were present. Mr. Carless was whispering with Mr. Pawle; Lord Ellingham had a seat close by; in the front of the public gallery Miss Penkridge, grim and alert, was in charge of the timid and shrinking sisters of the unfortunate prisoner. There, too, were Mr. Armitstead and Mr. Isidore Rosenbaum, and Mr. Perkwite, all evidently very much alive to certain possibilities. But Viner looked in vain for either Methley or Woodlesford or their mysterious client; they were certainly not present when Hyde was put into the dock, and Viner began to wonder if the events of the previous day had warned Mr. Cave and those behind him to avoid publicity.
Instructed by Viner, who was determined to spare neither effort nor money to clear his old schoolmate, Felpham had engaged the services of one of the most brilliant criminal barristers of the day, Mr. Millington-Bywater, on behalf of his client; and he and Viner had sat up half the night with him, instructing him in the various mysteries and ramifications of the case. A big, heavy-faced, shrewd-eyed man, Mr. Millington-Bywater made no sign, and to all outward appearance showed no very great interest while the counsel who now appeared on behalf of the police, completed his case against the prisoner.
The only new evidence produced by the prosecution was that of the greengrocer on whose premises Hyde had admitted that he passed most of the night of the murder, and in whose shed the missing valuables had been found. The greengrocer's evidence as to his discovery was given in a plain and straightforward fashion—he was evidently a man who would just tell what he actually saw, and brought neither fancy nor imagination to bear on his observation. But when the prosecution had done with him, Mr. Millington-Bywater rose and quietly asked the police to produce the watch, chain and ring which the greengrocer had found, in their original wrappings. He held up the wrapping-papers to the witness and asked him if he could swear that this was what he had found the valuables in and had given to the police. The greengrocer was positive as to this; he was positive, too, that the other wrappings which Felpham had carefully preserved were those which had been on the outside of the parcel and had been thrown aside by himself on its discovery and afterwards picked up by Viner. Mr. Millington-Bywater handed all these papers up to the magistrate, directing his attention to the strong odour of drugs or chemicals which still pervaded them, and to the address of the manufacturing chemists which appeared on the outer wrapping. The magistrate seemed somewhat mystified.
"What is the object of this?" he asked, glancing at the defending counsel. "It is admitted that these are the wrappings in which the watch, and chain and ring were found in the witness's shed, but"—he paused, with another inquiring look—"you propose to—what?" he asked.
"I propose, Your Worship, to prove that these things were never put there by the prisoner at all!" answered Mr. Millington-Bywater, promptly and with an assurance which was not lost on the spectators. "I intend to show that they were purposely placed in that outhouse by the real murderer of John Ashton after the statement made by the prisoner at the inquest became public—placed there, of course, to divert any possible suspicion of himself.