The old man made this trivial remark, thinking it better not to respond at all to Adam’s agitation: he would gather, in an indirect way, that there was nothing decisive to communicate at present.
“And now,” he said, rising again, “I must see to your having a bit of the loaf, and some of that wine Mr. Irwine sent this morning. He’ll be angry with me if you don’t have it. Come, now,” he went on, bringing forward the bottle and the loaf and pouring some wine into a cup, “I must have a bit and a sup myself. Drink a drop with me, my lad—drink with me.”
Adam pushed the cup gently away and said, entreatingly, “Tell me about it, Mr. Massey—tell me all about it. Was she there? Have they begun?”
“Yes, my boy, yes—it’s taken all the time since I first went; but they’re slow, they’re slow; and there’s the counsel they’ve got for her puts a spoke in the wheel whenever he can, and makes a deal to do with cross-examining the witnesses and quarrelling with the other lawyers. That’s all he can do for the money they give him; and it’s a big sum—it’s a big sum. But he’s a ’cute fellow, with an eye that ’ud pick the needles out of the hay in no time. If a man had got no feelings, it ’ud be as good as a demonstration to listen to what goes on in court; but a tender heart makes one stupid. I’d have given up figures for ever only to have had some good news to bring to you, my poor lad.”
“But does it seem to be going against her?” said Adam. “Tell me what they’ve said. I must know it now—I must know what they have to bring against her.”
“Why, the chief evidence yet has been the doctors; all but Martin Poyser—poor Martin. Everybody in court felt for him—it was like one sob, the sound they made when he came down again. The worst was when they told him to look at the prisoner at the bar. It was hard work, poor fellow—it was hard work. Adam, my boy, the blow falls heavily on him as well as you; you must help poor Martin; you must show courage. Drink some wine now, and show me you mean to bear it like a man.”
Bartle had made the right sort of appeal. Adam, with an air of quiet obedience, took up the cup and drank a little.
“Tell me how she looked,” he said presently.
“Frightened, very frightened, when they first brought her in; it was the first sight of the crowd and the judge, poor creatur. And there’s a lot o’ foolish women in fine clothes, with gewgaws all up their arms and feathers on their heads, sitting near the judge: they’ve dressed themselves out in that way, one ’ud think, to be scarecrows and warnings against any man ever meddling with a woman again. They put up their glasses, and stared and whispered. But after that she stood like a white image, staring down at her hands and seeming neither to hear nor see anything. And she’s as white as a sheet. She didn’t speak when they asked her if she’d plead ‘guilty’ or ‘not guilty,’ and they pleaded ‘not guilty’ for her. But when she heard her uncle’s name, there seemed to go a shiver right through her; and when they told him to look at her, she hung her head down, and cowered, and hid her face in her hands. He’d much ado to speak poor man, his voice trembled so. And the counsellors—who look as hard as nails mostly—I saw, spared him as much as they could. Mr. Irwine put himself near him and went with him out o’ court. Ah, it’s a great thing in a man’s life to be able to stand by a neighbour and uphold him in such trouble as that.”
“God bless him, and you too, Mr. Massey,” said Adam, in a low voice, laying his hand on Bartle’s arm.
“Aye, aye, he’s good metal; he gives the right ring when you try him, our parson does. A man o’ sense—says no more than’s needful. He’s not one of those that think they can comfort you with chattering, as if folks who stand by and look on knew a deal better what the trouble was than those who have to bear it. I’ve had to do with such folks in my time—in the south, when I was in trouble myself. Mr. Irwine is to be a witness himself, by and by, on her side, you know, to speak to her character and bringing up.”
“But the other evidence … does it go hard against her!” said Adam. “What do you think, Mr. Massey? Tell me the truth.”
“Yes, my lad, yes. The truth is the best thing to tell. It must come at last. The doctors’ evidence is heavy on her—is heavy. But she’s gone on denying she’s had a child from first to last. These poor silly women-things—they’ve not the sense to know it’s no use denying what’s proved. It’ll make against her with the jury, I doubt, her being so obstinate: they may be less for recommending her to mercy, if the verdict’s against her. But Mr. Irwine ’ull leave no stone unturned with the judge—you may rely upon that, Adam.”
“Is there nobody to stand by her and seem to care for her in the court?” said Adam.
“There’s the chaplain o’ the jail sits near her, but he’s a sharp ferrety-faced man—another sort o’ flesh and blood to Mr. Irwine. They say the jail chaplains are mostly the fag-end o’ the clergy.”
“There’s one man as ought to be there,” said Adam bitterly. Presently he drew himself up and looked fixedly out of the window, apparently turning over some new idea in his mind.
“Mr. Massey,” he said at last, pushing the hair off his forehead, “I’ll go back with you. I’ll go into court. It’s cowardly of me to keep away. I’ll stand by her—I’ll own her—for all she’s been deceitful. They oughtn’t to cast her off—her own flesh and blood. We hand folks over to God’s mercy, and show none ourselves. I used to be hard sometimes: I’ll never be hard again. I’ll go, Mr. Massey—I’ll go with you.”
There was a decision in Adam’s manner which would have prevented Bartle from opposing him, even if he had wished to do so. He only said, “Take a bit, then, and another sup, Adam, for the love of me. See, I must stop and eat a morsel. Now, you take some.”
Nerved by an active resolution, Adam took a morsel of bread and drank some wine. He was haggard and unshaven, as he had been yesterday, but he stood upright again, and looked more like the Adam Bede of former days.
Chapter VIII.
The Verdict.
The place fitted up that day as a court of justice was a grand old hall, now destroyed by fire. The midday light that fell on the close pavement of human heads was shed through a line of high pointed windows, variegated with the mellow tints of old painted glass. Grim dusty armour hung in high relief in front of the dark oaken gallery at the farther end, and under the broad arch of the great mullioned window opposite was spread a curtain of old tapestry, covered with dim melancholy figures, like a dozing indistinct dream of the past. It was a place that through the rest of the year was haunted with the shadowy memories of old kings and queens, unhappy, discrowned, imprisoned; but to-day all those shadows had fled, and not a soul in the vast hall felt the presence of any but a living sorrow, which was quivering in warm hearts.
But that sorrow seemed to have made it itself feebly felt hitherto, now when Adam Bede’s tall figure was suddenly seen being ushered to the side of the prisoner’s dock. In the broad sunlight of the great hall, among the sleek shaven faces of other men, the marks of suffering in his face were startling even to Mr. Irwine, who had last seen him in the dim light of his small room; and the neighbours from Hayslope who were present, and who told Hetty Sorrel’s story by their firesides in their old age, never forgot to say how it moved them when Adam Bede, poor fellow, taller by the head than most of the people round him, came into court and took his place by her side.
But Hetty did not see him. She was standing in the same position Bartle Massey had described, her hands crossed over each other and her eyes fixed on them. Adam had not dared to look at her in the first moments, but at last, when the attention of the court was withdrawn by the proceedings he turned his face towards her with a resolution not