+ ~ -
 
Please report pronunciation problems here. Select and sample other voices. Options Pause Play
 
Report an Error
Go!
 
Go!
 
TOC
 

I was chosen Foreman of the Jury. On the
second morning of the trial, after evidence had
been taken for two hours (I heard the church
clocks strike), happening to cast my eyes over
my brother-jurymen, I found an inexplicable
difficulty in counting them. I counted them several
times, yet always with the same difficulty. In
short, I made them one too many.

I touched the brother-juryman whose place
was next me, and I whispered to him, "Oblige
me by counting us." He looked surprised by
the request, but turned his head and counted.
"Why," says he, suddenly, "we are Thirt——;
but no, it's not possible. No. We are twelve."

According to my counting that day, we were
always right in detail, but in the gross we were
always one too many. There was no appearance
no figureto account for it; but I had
now an inward foreshadowing of the figure that
was surely coming.

The Jury were housed at the London Tavern.
We all slept in one large room on separate
tables, and we were constantly in the charge
and under the eye of the officer sworn to hold us
in safe-keeping. I see no reason for suppressing
the real name of that officer. He was intelligent,
highly polite, and obliging, and (I was glad
to hear) much respected in the City. He had
an agreeable presence, good eyes, enviable black
whiskers, and a fine sonorous voice. His name
was Mr. Harker.

When we turned into our twelve beds at
night, Mr. Harker's bed was drawn across the
door. On the night of the second day, not being
disposed to lie down, and seeing Mr. Harker
sitting on his bed, I went and sat beside him,
and offered him a pinch of snuff. As Mr.
Harker's hand touched mine in taking it from
my box, a peculiar shiver crossed him, and he
said: "Who is this!"

Following Mr. Harker's eyes and looking
along the room, I saw again the figure I
expectedthe second of the two men who had
gone down Piccadilly. I rose, and advanced a
few steps; then stopped, and looked round at
Mr. Harker. He was quite unconcerned,
laughed, and said in a pleasant way, "I thought
for a moment we had a thirteenth juryman, without
a bed. But I see it is the moonlight."

Making no revelation to Mr. Harker, but
inviting him to take a walk with me to the end of
the room, I watched what the figure did. It
stood for a few moments by the bedside of each
of my eleven brother-jurymen, close to the
pillow. It always went to the right-hand side
of the bed, and always passed out crossing the
foot of the next bed. It seemed from the action
of the head, merely to look down pensively at
each recumbent figure. It took no notice of me,
or of my bed, which was that nearest to Mr.
Harker's. It seemed to go out where the moonlight
came in, through a high window, as by an
aërial flight of stairs.

Next morning at breakfast, it appeared that
everybody present had dreamed of the murdered
man last night, except myself and Mr. Harker.

I now felt as convinced that the second man
who had gone down Piccadilly was the murdered
man (so to speak), as if it had been borne into
my comprehension by his immediate testimony.
But even this took place, and in a manner for
which I was not at all prepared.

On the fifth day of the trial, when the case for
the prosecution was drawing to a close, a
miniature of the murdered man, missing from
his bedroom upon the discovery of the deed, and
afterwards found in a hiding-place where the
Murderer had been seen digging, was put in
evidence. Having been identified by the witness
under examination, it was handed up to the
Bench, and thence handed down to be inspected
by the Jury. As an officer in a black gown was
making his way with it across to me, the figure
of the second man who had gone down Piccadilly,
impetuously started from the crowd, caught the
miniature from the officer, and gave it to me
with its own hands, at the same time saying in a
low and hollow tonebefore I saw the miniature,
which was in a locket—"I was younger then,
and my face was not then drained of blood." It
also came between me and the brother juryman
to whom I would have given the miniature, and
between him and the brother juryman to whom
he would have given it, and so passed it on
through the whole of our number, and back
into my possession. Not one of them, however,
detected this.

At table, and generally when we were shut
up together in Mr. Harker's custody, we had
from the first naturally discussed the day's
proceedings a good deal. On that fifth day,
the case for the prosecution being closed, and
we having that side of the question in a
completed shape before us, our discussion was more
animated and serious. Among our number was
a vestrymanthe densest idiot I have ever seen
at largewho met the plainest evidence with
the most preposterous objections, and who was
sided with by two flabby parochial parasites;
all the three empanelled from a district so
delivered over to Fever that they ought to have
been upon their own trial, for five hundred
Murders. When these mischievous blockheads
were at their loudest, which was towards
midnight while some of us were already preparing
for bed, I again saw the murdered man. He
stood grimly behind them, beckoning to me.
On my going towards them and striking into
the conversation, he immediately retired. This
was the beginning of a separate series of
appearances, confined to that long room in which
we were confined. Whenever a knot of my
brother jurymen laid their heads together, I
saw the head of the murdered man among
theirs. Whenever their comparison of notes
was going against him, he would solemnly and
irresistibly beckon to me.

It will be borne in mind that down to the
production of the miniature on the fifth day of
the trial, I had never seen the Appearance in
Court. Three changes occurred, now that we
entered on the case for the defence. Two of
them I will mention together, first. The figure
was now in Court continually, and it never there