"You have simply been telling the court a tissue of lies from beginning to end," thundered the lawyer. "You have contradicted yourself so many times that you can't remember what you have said. Now let me tell you this, my man: unless you are prepared to confess the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, you will find yourself in the dock on a charge of perjury and with the moral certainty of being sentenced to a long term of imprisonment with hard labour. Now, answer me; did you receive that note before or after the departure of the _Hawk_?"
"Do you know why Mr. Solomon gave you that note?"
"But he told you to swear that you found it in his office on the day in question?"
"You knew that it was he who provided the vessel with guns and ammunition, and also caused the name _Hawk_ to be substituted for that of _Arrow_?"
Sumbowa hesitated for the fraction of a minute.
The witness tottered back to his seat and almost collapsed in it. Never had he passed through such an ordeal before, and, for the time being, he was a nervous wreck.
"I shall not waste your time, gentlemen," he said, "by calling witnesses for the defence--as, for instance, my client's chief officer, who was with him when he visited the prosecutor on the night of sailing--or by arguing a matter which I regard as proven. All I shall do is to draw from the evidence conclusions which, beyond a doubt, prove my client's innocence of the charge brought against him. After having treated us to a series of palpable falsehoods at the instigation of his employer, the witness Sumbowa has admitted that Solomon did not give him the note saying that he would be out of town until a fortnight after the _Arrow's_ departure and the inference is that Solomon _did_ see my client on that particular night. Had he not done so, why should he have tried to establish an alibi; why should he have taken such pains to try and prove that he was not in Singapore that night?
"Further, I contend that these deductions are confirmed by the fact that Solomon, on his own admission, did not make known the alleged offence until three weeks after the steamer had left. I put it to you, gentlemen, as men of the world, that this was an extraordinary procedure, and can only be accounted for by the assumption that the prosecutor did not want his victim to be arrested before the latter had secured what, for want of a better term, I shall call a generous profit on the initial outlay.