The Classic Mystery Collection - Arthur Conan Doyle [5863]
"No"
"Then I must insist on an answer. However, I will not do so now, but at the proper time. I will now ask you one other question, and I think you willanswer that. Did you resume friendly relations with Mr. Carwell after your quarrel with him that day?" and Mr. Stryker fairly hurled the question at Harry Bartlett.
If this was a trap it was a most skillfully set one. For there must be an answer, and either no or yes would involve explanations.
"Answer me!" exclaimed the prosecutor. "Did you make up after the quarrel?"
There was a tense silence as Bartlett, whose face showed pale under his tan, said:
"I did not."
"Then you admit that you had a quarrel with Mr. Carwell?"
"Yes, but - "
Just at this moment Viola Carwell fainted in the arms of her aunt, the resultant commotion being such that an adjournment was taken while she was carried to an anteroom, where Dr. Lambert attended her.
"We will resume where we left off," said the prosecutor, when Bartlett again took the stand, and it might have been noticed that during the temporary recess one of the regular court constables from the county building at Loch Harbor remained close at his side. "Will you now state the nature of your quarrel with Mr. Carwell?" asked Mr. Stryker.
"I do not feel that I can."
"Very well," was the calm rejoinder. "Then, your honor," and again Billy Teller seemed to swell with importance at the title, "I ask that this witness be held without bail to await a further session of this court, and I ask for an adjournment to summon other witnesses."
"Granted," replied Teller, who had been coached what to answer.
"Held!" exclaimed Bartlett, as he rose to his feet in indignation. "You are going to hold me! On what grounds?"
"On suspicion," answered the prosecutor.
"Suspicion of what?"
"Of knowing something concerning the death of Mr. Carwell."
An exclamation broke from the crowd, and Bartlett reeled slightly. He was quickly approached by the same constable who had remained at his side during the recess, and a moment later Coroner Billy Teller adjourned court.
CHAPTER IX
58 C. H.- I6I*
There was considerable excitement when it became known to the crowd, as it speedily did, that Harry Bartlett, almost universally accepted as the fiance of Viola Carwell, had been held as having vital knowledge of her father's death. Indeed there were not a few wild rumors which insisted that he had been held on a charge of murder.
"Oh, I can't believe it! I can't believe it!" exclaimed Viola, when they told her. "It can't be possible that they can hold him on such a charge. It's unfair!"
"Perhaps," gently admitted Dr. Lambert. "The law is not always fair; but it seeks to know the truth."
Viola and her aunt were again in the room where Viola had been revived from her indisposition caused by the shock of Bartlett's testimony. Colonel Ashley, who, truth to tell, had been expecting some such summons, went with Dr. Lambert.
"Oh, isn't it terrible, Colonel?" began Viola. "Have they a right to - to lock him up on this charge?"
"It isn't exactly a charge, Viola, my dear, and they have, I am sorry to say, a right to lock him up. But it will not be in a cell."
"Not in a - a cell ?"
"No, as a witness, merely, he has a right to better quarters; and I understand that he will be given them on the order of the prosecutor."
"He'll be in jail, though, won't he?"
"Yes; but in very decent quarters. The witness rooms are not at all like cells, though they have barred windows."
"But why can't he get out on bail?" asked Viola, rather petulantly. "I'm sure the charge, absurd as it is, is not such as would make them keep him locked up without being allowed to get bail. I thought only murder cases were not bailable."
"That is usually the case," said Colonel Ashley. "But if this is not a suicide case it is a murder case, and though Harry is not accused of murder, in law the distinction is so fine that the prosecutor, doubtless, feels justified in refusing bail."
"But we could give it - I could - I have money!" cried Viola. "Aunt Mary