CHAPTER XCVIII.
IN WHICH CHARLES ARCHER PUTS HIMSELF UPON THE COUNTRY.
The excitement was high in Chapelizod when the news reached that a true bill was found against Charles Archer for the murder of Barnabas Sturk.
Everywhere, indeed, the case was watched with uncommon interest; and when the decisive day arrived, and the old judge, furrowed, yellow, and cross, mounted the bench, and the jury were called over, and the challenges began, and the grim, gentlemanlike person with the white hair, and his right arm in a black silk sling, whispering to his attorney and now and again pencilling, with his left hand, a line to his counsel with that indescribable air of confidence and almost defiance, pleaded to the indictment 'not guilty,' and the dreadful business of the day began, the court was crowded as it seldom had been before.
A short, clear, horrible statement unfolded the case for the crown.

Then the dying deposition of Sturk was put in evidence; then Irons the clerk was put up, and told his tale doggedly and distinctly, and was not to be shaken.

'No, it was not true that he had ever been confined in a mad house.' 'He had never had delirium tremens.' 'He had never heard that his wife thought him mad.' 'Yes, it was true he had pledged silver of his master's at the Pied Horse at Newmarket' 'He knew it was a felony, but it was the prisoner who put it into his head and encouraged him to do it.' 'Yes, he would swear to that.' 'He had several times spoken to Lord Dunoran, when passing under the name of Mervyn, on the subject of his father being wronged.' 'He never had any promise from my lord, in case he should fix the guilt of that murder on some other than his father.' Our friend, Captain Cluffe, was called, and delivered his evidence in a somewhat bluff and peremptory, but on the whole effective way.
Charles Nutter, after some whispered consultation, was also called, and related what we have heard.

'Yes, he had been arrested for the murder of Dr.Sturk, and now stood out on bail to answer that charge.' Then followed some circumstances, one of which, the discovery of a piece of what was presumed to be the weapon with which the murder was perpetrated, I have already mentioned.

Then came some evidence, curious but quite clear, to show that the Charles Archer who had died at Florence was _not_ the Charles Archer who had murdered Beauclerc, but a gentleman who had served in the army, and had afterwards been for two years in Italy, in the employment of a London firm who dealt in works of art, and was actually resident in _Italy_ at the time when the Newmarket murder occurred, and that the attempt to represent him as the person who had given evidence against the late Lord Dunoran was an elaborate and cunning contrivance of the prisoner at the bar.