The magistrates conferred together for a few minutes, in an undertone.
"Mrs.Ellison," the senior of them said, addressing that lady, who was sitting on a chair placed at the upper end of the court, "we are sorry to trouble you, but we must ask you to go into the witness box.
"I wish to ask you," he went on, when she had taken her stand in the box, "how it was you at once connected the initials with the prisoner ?" "Because he had at one time lived in the village, and was employed assisting our gardener.

He was discharged on suspicion of having poisoned a watchdog which had bit him; and as the three dogs about the place had all been poisoned, on the night when the house was broken into, his name had been in my mind and, on seeing the initials, I naturally recognized them at once." There was a deep silence in the court, when Mrs.Ellison gave her evidence.

Hitherto the impression had been rather favourable to the prisoner.

His story, though strange, had been by no means impossible and, if true, would have completely accounted for the finding of the tools, which were the only evidence against him.

The evidence of Mrs.Ellison, however, entirely altered the complexion of the case.
Reuben had stood, quiet and composed, during the hearing.