Robert Lorrie laid hold of the table and carried it to the other end of the room. The crippled gentleman flew into a furious rage with me for presuming to touch his chair. 'My chair is Me,' he said: 'how dare you lay hands on Me?' I first opened the door, and then, by way of accommodating him, gave the chair a good push behind with my stick instead of my hand, and so sent it and him safely and swiftly out of the room.
'Having locked the door, so as to prevent any further intrusion, I joined Robert Lorrie in examining the bedside table. It had one drawer in it, and that drawer we found secured.
'We asked the prisoner for the key.
'He flatly refused to give it to us, and said we had no right to unlock his drawers. He was so angry that he even declared it was lucky for us he was too weak to rise from his bed. I answered civilly that our duty obliged us to examine the drawer, and that if he still declined to produce the key, he would only oblige us to take the table away and have the lock opened by a smith.
'While we were still disputing there was a knock at the door of the room.
'I opened the door cautiously. Instead of the crippled gentleman, whom I had expected to see again, there was another stranger standing outside. The prisoner hailed him as a friend and neighbor, and eagerly called upon him for protection from us. We found this second gentleman pleasant enough to deal with. He informed us readily that he had been sent for by Mr. Dexter, and that he was himself a lawyer, and he asked to see our warrant. Having looked at it, he at once informed the prisoner (evidently very much to the prisoner's surprise) that he must submit to have the drawer examined, under protest. And then, without more ado, he got the key, and opened the table drawer for us himself.
'We found inside several letters, and a large book with a lock to it, having the words 'My Diary' inscribed on it in gilt letters. As a matter of course, we took possession of the letters and the Diary, and sealed them up, to be given to the Fiscal. At the same time the gentleman wrote out a protest on the prisoner's behalf, and handed us his card. The card informed us that he was Mr. Playmore, now one of the Agents for the prisoner. The card and the protest were deposited, with the other documents, in the care of the Fiscal. No other discoveries of any importance were made at Gleninch.
'Our next inquiries took us to Edinburgh—to the druggist whose label we had found on the crumpled morsel of paper, and to other druggists likewise whom we were instructed to question. On the twenty-eighth of October the Fiscal was in possession of all the information that we could collect, and our duties for the time being came to an end.'
This concluded the evidence of Schoolcraft and Lorrie. It was not shaken on cross-examination, and it was plainly unfavorable to the prisoner.
Matters grew worse still when the next witnesses were called. The druggist whose label had been found on the crumpled bit of paper now appeared on the stand, to make the position of my unhappy husband more critical than ever.
Andrew Kinlay, druggist, of Edinburgh, deposed as follows:
'I keep a special registry book of the poisons sold by me. I produce the book. On the date therein mentioned the prisoner at the bar, Mr. Eustace Macallan, came into my shop, and said that he wished to purchase some arsenic. I asked him what it was wanted for. He told me it was wanted by his gardener, to be used, in solution, for the killing of insects in the greenhouse. At the same time he mentioned his name—Mr. Macallan, of Gleninch. I at once directed my assistant to put up the arsenic (two ounces of it), and I made the necessary entry in my book. Mr. Macallan signed the entry, and I signed it afterward as witness. He paid for the arsenic, and took it away with him wrapped up in two papers, the outer wrapper being labeled with my name and address, and with the word 'Poison' in large letters—exactly like the label now produced on the piece of paper found at Gleninch.'
The next witness, Peter Stockdale (also a druggist of Edinburgh), followed, and said:
'The prisoner at the bar called at my shop on the date indicated on my register, some days later than the date indicated in the register of Mr. Kinlay. He wished to purchase sixpenny-worth of arsenic. My assistant, to whom he had addressed himself, called me. It is a rule in my shop that no one sells poisons but myself. I asked the prisoner what he wanted the arsenic for. He answered that he wanted it for killing rats at his house, called Gleninch. I said, 'Have I the honor of speaking to Mr. Macallan, of Gleninch?' He said that was his name. I sold him the arsenic— about an ounce and a half—and labeled the bottle in which I put it with the word 'Poison' in my own handwriting. He signed the register, and took the arsenic away with him, after paying for it.'
The cross-examination of the two men succeeded in asserting certain technical objections to their evidence. But the terrible fact that my husband himself had actually purchased the arsenic in both cases remained unshaken.
The next witnesses—the gardener and the cook at Gleninch—wound the chain of hostile evidence around the prisoner more mercilessly still.
On examination the gardener said, on his oath:
'I never received any arsenic from the prisoner, or from any one else, at the date to which you refer, of at any other date. I never used any such thing as a solution of arsenic, or ever allowed the men working under me to use it, in the conservatories or in the garden at Gleninch. I disapprove of arsenic as a means of destroying noxious insects infesting flowers and plants.'
The cook, being called next, spoke as positively as the gardener:
'Neither my master nor any other person gave me any arsenic to destroy rats at any time. No such thing was wanted. I declare, on my oath, that I never saw any rats in or about the house, or ever heard of any rats infesting it.'
Other household servants at Gleninch gave similar evidence. Nothing could be extracted from them on cross- examination except that there might have been rats in the house, though they were not aware of it. The possession of the poison was traced directly to my husband, and to no one else. That he had bought it was actually proved, and that he had kept it was the one conclusion that the evidence justified.
The witnesses who came next did their best to press the charge against the prisoner home to him. Having the arsenic in his possession, what had he done with it? The evidence led the jury to infer what he had done with it.
The prisoner's valet deposed that his master had rung for him at twenty minutes to ten on the morning of the day on which his mistress died, and had ordered a cup of tea for her. The man had received the order at the open door of Mrs. Macallan's room, and could positively swear that no other person but his master was there at the time.
