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Show THE STORY J'JONmiAN MILLER i mill tfc pj ,ended 'in the' gasp of death. and he entered, and going up to the "W 1 mlid "Pn hearing this terrible con-bed, con-bed, flashed his light upon the bloody uM'Wk fession. Was not Miller's death spectacle of the murdered man's ffWWwk upon my soul as well? Was I not body. So great was his horror and . M'mM:&. UJ equally culpable for not having a surprise 'that he dropped the knife Ml&Wmfm. ' R keener insight into character that I upon the bloody, sheets, and had only MfMwnmtm! Q Wi might have read his innocence in just picked it up again when the two ClMfiMlMHhiiii l his steadfast attitude? Many a long traveling men entered. JrWiffM (S3 night as I walked the floor of my "His trembling and fear at their VMmlmm U arrival he attributed to the natural -WmffMu fv fTl 1 Wffli IH. horror of the situation and the ter- 5. f&zfctysmP Sl llV ror of the instant thought that guilt 'g jfj I If 1 i "With such a degree of sincerity ZJPf L jf l) M Hi 1 21 tfflk was his story told, and so firm was WW--SK III eLfi i ffl I Will I w the landlord's bearing before the pre- BilBPjpSM IS jJahfiaiBm j I ' liminary court that he attracted many M 3&fKNj rttsf TmlSBm W ill' '!i t ''ffa sympathizers who believed his story " j , ; I.. 4-v fUw gaPHlfcl!4' - -'vl and looked upon him as the unfon.i- W&3 "fa Rxw WmmMStf jftti&Sl nate victim of a most -peculiar coin- ( JfeSiggfes- Ei5l'51sj l885jSffliM bination of circumstances. -1. rtjfyKr irSkiSiirfWl "But these circumstances were too lffi'hauVi --illllt patent to be ignored and Miller was cent, and this I will declare to the MVrfSLj!j j ' U bound over to await the action of enu-' vLmfff M illllfl the grand jury, indicted and in due "How any men when facing death Ijl'MmmMx&MW I I course of time brought to trial be- on the gallows have said the same. fore me. I wonder how many men have said "In the time .intervening between J truly- " is trlie' as pPe savs. 8 iffl !$ Ill !! his arrest and his trial the landlord's that hope sPriflSS eternal in the hu- TwWM attitude was a mixture of terror and ' breast, but I often wonder if we l WMmTf'l I I bravado which did not tend to in- do not makie a Snevous error in not 1 mXWki'MMm crease the belief of the general pub- glV;ng gl'eat5r "edence to the dying llUE iWWl lie in his innocence. I myself, al- statement of a condemned man. M MPml Wllf though I have always endeavored to , ?na'han. Miller paid the penalty W IMH WM-. enter a trial free from prejudice, f the deatht of f obert Co wlth X WmJB7 had I been a venireman, should have e. Sam flc& resignation which NiTlW , . , . . . i v, had marked the end of many a man s-sSJii been forced to admit that I had , tl, . " , . s, , r i , : . J? ' m the same extremity. With his formed an opinion concerning the r,tI, tUn v , , guilt or innocence of the accused. S? Case seemed. at an end and p3CCOOCOQCOSOQiSOC0060QOOQ( 1 AUTHOR'S NOTE. S i The material facts in this o 1 story of circumstantial evidence K are drawn from an actual re- V corded case, only such change Q 1 of names and local color being Jc i i made as to remove them from N ' the classification of legal re- x i i ports to that of fiction. All the Q j essential points of evidence, 8 i however, are retained. O ine raemners of the Call-Skin Call-Skin club dropped into J their accustomed places Judge Dennett entered "'J&'.lX with a stranser of distill-'MGgmi distill-'MGgmi guished mein, and dignified fi?B;r '"-arin-. H: wliite hair sjiy andwhite mutton-chop whis-jtsrttv- Ll'''s betokened the coun-fp.W coun-fp.W I'if ' '- J !" "'' lor.s .xj.tri- U.1'. Xi.'.f- n-V ! !!!- for HatHBuB-the English bench caused him unwittingly to assume the personal person-al appearance of a wearer of the wig and ermine of Blackstonian days. Judge Dennett introduced him as Judge Tanner and assured the club that his guest was primed with many a reminiscence of his long career and would gladly furnish the story of the evening. After the pipes of good fellowship fel-lowship had been burned for a space Judge Tanner arose and began his story of circumstantial evidence. "I often wonder," he said, "if there is a trial judge of any considerable experience who has not carried some one case as a load on his mind and conscience for years after the verdict of the jury is in and the condemned led away to execution. It is a wise provision of the law that makes the jury the judge both of the law and the evidence, and the judge but the medium through which the law reaches the twelve; and I cannot conceive con-ceive the condition of mind of those early English judges, before whom, when they had arrived at a conviction of guilt, even the jury was powerless. power-less. It was from their arbitrary and unreasonable rulings, now happily not held within the power of the judge, that most of our records of miscarried justice have resulted. "Within my own experience there has come one case which I believe is as strange as any of record and which for years, as I looked back upon it, caused me to doubt the ability of man ever infallibly to pass judgment upon a fellow creature. The parties now are all dead and I tell it for the first time. But to the story. "In a little city on the circuit in which I have held court for more years than I care to think of there was at one time a hotel kept by a very respectable man named Jonathan Jona-than Miller. It was the favorite stopping stop-ping place for commercial travellers and thus the most prominent and best paying hotel in the city. "One evening a jewelry salesman by the name of Robert Conway arrived at the hotel just before supper. He instructed Miller to send his grips up to his room and remarked in the hearing hear-ing of several at the desk that he did not care to have them left in the' general gen-eral baggage room as he was carrying a far more expensive line of samples than usual. He also asked that the door be carefully locked and the key brought to him. "Supper over, he fell in withtl a salesman for a shoe house and one I never could understand why he didn't see me. When they put it on him I hadn't the nerve to speak up. My God, I've got Miller on my soul, too! There they both stand. Take 'em away,' and he went into unintelligible ravings which finally endpfl in the saso of death. "You can imagine my state of mind upon hearing this terrible confession. con-fession. Was not Miller's death upon my soul as well? Was I not equally culpable for not having a. keener insight into character that I might have read his innocence in ' his steadfast attitude? Many a long night as I walked the floor of my and he entered, and going up to the bed, flashed his light upon the bloodv spectacle of the murdered man's body. So great was his horror and surprise 'that he dropped the knife upon the bloody sheets, and had only just picked it up again when the two traveling men entered. "His trembling and fear at their arrival he attributed to the natural horror of the situation and the terror ter-ror of the instant thought that guilt might point to him. "With such a degree of sincerity was his story told, and so firm was the landlord's bearing before the preliminary pre-liminary court that he attracted many sympathizers who believed his story and looked upon him as the unfortunate unfortu-nate victim of a most -peculiar combination com-bination of circumstances. "But these circumstances were too patent to be ignored and Miller was bound over to await the action of the grand jury, indicted and in due course of time brought to trial before be-fore me. "In the time intervening between his arrest and his trial the landlord's attitude was a mixture of terror and bravado which did not tend to increase in-crease the belief of the general public pub-lic in his innocence. I myself, although al-though I have always endeavored to enter a trial free from prejudice, had I been a venireman, should have been forced to admit that I had formed an opinion concerning the guilt or innocence of the accused. cent, and this I will declare to the end.' "How many men when facing death on the gallows have said the same. I wonder how many men have said it truly. It is true, as Pope says, that hope springs eternal in the human hu-man breast, but I often wonder if we do not make a grievous error in not giving greater credence to the dying statement of a condemned man. "Jonathan Miller paid the penalty of the death of Robert Conway with the same stoical resignation which had marked the end of many a man in the same extremity. With his death the case seemed at an end and it passed from my mind along with chamber I turned these questions ovr ing my mind, never finding an answer an-swer that was satisfactory to my conscience. I seriously considered resigning re-signing from the bench. My faith in man's justice had received a crushing crush-ing blow. For five years I carried that weight of self accusing guilt, and only .the sympathy of my friends and the loyalty and trust of my townsmen sustained me. 'One night I was seated in the study of Rev Charles Poindexter, the rector rec-tor of the Episcopalian church. Before Be-fore a cheery grate fire we talked into the night and to him I unburdened my soul. " 'My heavens, judge' he said to ma, laying his hand on my shoulder. 'Why haven't you told me all this before? be-fore? I might have saved you these years of troubling. Never before have I disclosed that which has been imparted im-parted to me in the confessional, bnt in this case I believe my duty to the dead is outweighted by my duty to the living. When you sentenced Jonathan Miller you condemned a guilty man. You remember that I attended at-tended him as a spiritual adviser in his last hours. To me alone he told the true story of that fatal night He was guilty of Conway's death although his hand did not strike the blow. He went to Conway's room with the intent to murder him and rob him ol his wealth. It was for that fell purpose pur-pose that he took the knife and lantern. lan-tern. When he reached the room, he found the deed already done, and even as the two traveling men entered en-tered the room he was meditating upon how he might secure the contents con-tents of the satchels and hide them. Let your mind rest, judge; his hand was as guilty as the hand that struck the blow! "Thus was the weight of years Btb ed from my mind, and this, gentle-men, gentle-men, is my story." Amid the congratulations and thanks of the members of the Call Skin club Judge Grower from the chair announced that Judge Sturgia had a story for the next meeting. (Copyright, 1909. by W. G. Chapman.), j tor a clothing firm and they repaired to the bar where they played cards and drank until 11 o'clock, when they all retired. It happened that the hotel was well filled and the clothing man and the shoe man had been forced. to take a double room together. This room was directly across the hall from the one occupied by the jewelry salesman. "About two o'clock in the morning the two roommates were awakened by groans which seemed to come from the room of their companion of the evening across the hall. "They arose and without stopping to dress hurried out to see what the trouble trou-ble was. You can imagine their horror hor-ror to find Conway, the jewelry man, dead, the bed blood-soaked, and standing stand-ing over him, a dark lantern in one hand and a bloody knife in the other, Jonathan Miller, the landlord, who trembled violently and gasped incoherently inco-herently when they burst into the chamber of death. "The case seemed black enough against him. There was not a suspicion sus-picion in the mind of anyone in the city that he could be otherwise than guilty. Yet when taken before a justice jus-tice for a preliminary hearing he most stoutly maintained his innocence and told a story which had it not paled into improbability by the side of damning circumstances against him would have been plausible in the extreme. ex-treme. "He said he had just reached his room after, as was his custom, sitting sit-ting up until a train due at half past one, came in. He had not had time to remove his clothing when he, too, heard groans coming from the neighborhood neigh-borhood of Conway's room. Like the two salesmen, he had hurried to investigate, in-vestigate, and as a weapon of defense de-fense he had taken the knife. He also picked up the dark lantern which he always used in making his last rounds of the hotel and which was still lighted- "When he reached the jeweler's door he was surprised to find it standing stand-ing open. The groans had ceased j. lie audit: ua.Luia.uy xesieu uyuu the testimony of the two salesmen who swore to the events of the fatal evening and to entering the room just in time to find the landlord bending bend-ing over the body. They were both firm in the conclusion that his terror upon seeing them was the terror of discovered guilt. I admit that defendant's de-fendant's counsel should not have allowed al-lowed this portion of their testimony to go to the jury, but no objection was made to it. "Also further damaging evidence against him was produced to the effect ef-fect that he had a short time before become liable through indorsing a note for a large sum of money and that his ownership of the hotel was threatened in case he was not able to raise the amount. This seemed to furnish a powerful motive for the crime. That he had alwa'ys borne a good reputation, that his record for honesty was such that he might easily eas-ily have raised the sum of money he required on a loan, and his own story of going to Conway's room and finding find-ing the body were all that the unfortunate unfor-tunate landlord had to offer in his own defense. "There could have been but one conclusion as to what the verdict of the jury would be, although I am sure that 1 gave them the law without partiality. par-tiality. Miller took his sentence with resignation and when I asked him if he had anything to say, he arose and addressed the court as follows: " 'Your honor, it comes to every man once to die. For the sake of my dear wife who stood by me so nobly through this terrible ordeal I should have chosen for myself a different end from that which is to be my lot I have no fault to find with the view the jury and this court have taken of their duty, but you are making a terrible mistake. You have convicted an innocent man. I am not guilty of the death of Robert Conway. I had nothing whatever to do with his death. Some day the truth will come out, but I fear it will be long after I have done with this world. I have no more to say but that I am inno- many other cases which have arisen in a long and busy career. I probably never again would have recalled it except incidentally had it not been for a strange occurrence. "I was just retiring for the night one evening about two years after the execution of Miller when I was startled by the sound of a horse dashing dash-ing madly up to my gate. There was a loud rapping on the door and upon opening it the panting horseman cried: " 'Buck Everett's 'just been shot down in Kiley's saloon. He's dying and wants to see you right away. Says he's got an important confession to make.' "I hurried out, and mounting the messenger's horse, spurred full speed for Kiley's place, which was a disreputable disrep-utable roadhouse about a mile distant. dis-tant. On the way I tried to recall who Buck Everett might be, and at last remembered him as the porter in Miller's hotel at the time of the Conway murder. When I arrived at the place he was almost gone, but with the aid of a stiff drink of whisky he revived sufficiently to make the following confession: " 'I'm a goner, judge, but before I cash in Pve got to get something off my mind. It's Conway. I've seen him day and night. My God, judge, there he is. now pointing his bony finger at me I Take him away. For God's sake take him away.' He gasped in terror and the froth upon his pallid lips was bloody. We thought he was going before his weighty secret was told. " 'Come, Buck, have it out and you'll go easier,' I said as I held his head. " 'Yes, judge, I've got to tell it,' he whispered. 'It was me that killed Conway. Con-way. Miller never done it. The thing took hold on me when I took his grips upstairs and he said they was full of jewelry. I slipped in and knifed him as he slept and got what there was in his pockets. I was just turnin' to the grips when I heard the landlord comin' down the hall. I i slipped out and got past him, and |