“You refuse absolutely to give up the papers. You decline to comply with the order of the Court. Then, sir, I shall commit you for contempt. In prison you will have leisure in which to reflect on the enormity of your conduct.”

“But, my lord—”

“Not another word, sir. Your duty is to respect the Court, not to argue with it. Officer, remove your prisoner!”

And William Sadd was hurried away, placed in a fly, driven off to Marston Castle, and handed over to the safe custody of the governor of that establishment. The gates of Marston Castle never closed on a prisoner more innocent of offence.

William Sadd was an inventor. His name will be chiefly known to the public in connection with a patent corkscrew, but he had devised many other useful implements from which he derived a comfortable income; for Sadd was a Scotchman, and had carefully protected his rights against all persons piratically inclined. He was born near Glasgow, where he remained for some five-and-twenty years. Then, like many of his countrymen, he came to England, and settled in the town of —, a manufacturing community in the North.

He was a sanguine, good-tempered little man, and had married a sanguine and good-tempered little wife, who bore him three sanguine and good-tempered little boys. He had at one time possessed a chum—another Scotch inventor. This man of genius—McAllister by name—had died, leaving certain papers to his friend as he lay on his death-bed. These documents, chiefly relating to uncompleted inventions, he confided to his friend with a last injunction that he should under no circumstances surrender them, but complete and patent them for the benefit of mankind and of his own pocket. Sadd gave the promise readily enough, feeling that nothing was more unlikely than that the papers would be inquired after. Much to his surprise, however, McAllister’s executors, having by some means heard of the existence of the documents, applied for them as essential evidence in a case then in hand. Sadd replied that they were not essential nor even relevant. His assertion, however, availed him nothing. Finally, the judge made an order for their production. Sadd calmly, but determinedly, refused to comply with the mandate, and was thereupon ordered to be confined in Marston Castle.

Although William Sadd felt acutely that it was an inconvenient thing to be separated from his family even for one night, he was sustained by the thought that he had done his duty, that he was the victim of a misconception on the part of the learned judge, and that his solicitor would, no doubt, set things right in the morning. When, about an hour after his introduction to the debtors and first-class misdemeanants occupying a common room in the Castle, his solicitor visited him, he became quite indignant with that luminary for suggesting that he should give up the papers. He urged the man of law to have His Lordship informed by the mouth of eminent counsel that the documents had no earthly bearing on the case.

“The whole thing’s jest re-deeckless,” said the prisoner, absolutely smiling at the absurdity of the judge’s order.

His solicitor only shook his head and went away.

Among the other prisoners William Sadd became instantly popular. He had the latest news from the outer world, and as he was going to rejoin it on the morrow, he essayed to execute all kinds of commissions for this brotherhood of misfortune. His cheery conversation had aroused the drooping spirits of those around him, when suddenly one and all became depressed again. William, following the eyes of the other victims, glanced towards the door, and, seeing a clergyman enter, instinctively rose to his feet. His example was not followed by any of the others, who turned sulkily away from beholding the ecclesiastic.

The new arrival was the Rev. Joseph Thorns, Chaplain of Marston Castle, and was familiarly alluded to by his congregation as “Holy Jo.” He was a man of small stature, and was afflicted with a deformity between the shoulders, the knowledge of which had permanently soured a temper not originally angelic. He strode up to the latest arrival, who bowed respectfully, and pulling out a note-book, asked brusquely,—

“Your name?”

The prisoner told him: but with the air of a man who regarded the formality of taking it down in a book as an operation quite superfluous, he being merely a lodger for the night.

“For what have you been committed?”

“Well, ye ken,” replied Mr. Sadd, “it’s jest a bit mistake. I’ve been neglacted by my soleecitor.”

“I see,” said the Chaplain. “Contempt of Court,” and he wrote that down opposite the inventor’s name. “What religion?”

“A’m a member of the Auld Kirk,” replied the contemptuous prisoner.

“I should have thought that even in the Auld Kirk,” said the clergyman, “they would have taught you to obey the law. Here is a book for you,” and he handed him a copy of the hymn-book used in the chapel, turned sharply round, and left the long, bare apartment, now looking longer and more bare than ever in the eyes of the latest inmate. Sadd soon, however, recovered his accustomed spirits, and eventually became sufficiently composed to look through the hymnal. As he by no means relished the chaplain’s sneer at the Church of his fathers, he observed somewhat maliciously to his companions, holding up the book of sacred songs,—

“Comparrit wi’ the Psawlms of David, they’re a wheen blithers,” an observation which was heartily applauded by the other misdemeanants as indirectly reflecting on the parson.

The next day Mrs. Sadd appeared upon the scene, conveying a basket of delicacies not included in the prison fare, and conveying also the information that it would take some days before the judge was in a temper to be addressed on the subject of Sadd’s contempt. When three days had passed, and the judge was tackled by an eminent Queen’s Counsel, he absolutely refused to reconsider his sentence.

“Let the prisoner surrender the documents, and then the Court will consider whether or not he has purged the contempt.”

Thus my lord on the Bench.

But Sadd was firm, and through his solicitor petitioned the Home Secretary. The Home Secretary, having taken three weeks to consider the matter, refused to interfere with the order of the judge.

Then the spirits of the sanguine inventor fell suddenly to zero. Nor were they manifestly revived by the daily visits of his wife, for she, poor woman, with tears in her eyes, begged and prayed her recalcitrant husband to give up the documents. But even his love for her did not induce him to forget his duty to the dead.

Sadd was committed to Marston Castle in the early part of November. And before a month had passed over his head he had become the most melancholy and morose of those resorting to the common room. The others had some hope of release. It seemed that he must remain there for ever, unless he relinquished the sacred papers. His cheeks became sunken, his shoulders bent, and his hair prematurely grey. He sat apart from his fellows and mumbled continually to himself.

It was during the first week in December that the others thought he had gone mad. His “little woman,” as he fondly called her, did not pay her customary visits. His solicitor looked in and informed him that Mrs. Sadd was dangerously ill in bed, and urgently pleaded this as an additional reason for complying with the order of the Court. Duty to the dead, love for the living—these conflicting emotions tore his heart. In an agony of spirit he motioned his solicitor to withdraw. Then he burst out crying like a child, and never again opened his lips to mortal man.

On Christmas Day there was service in the jail chapel. Mr. Thorns preached an excellent sermon from the text—“The law is good if a man use it lawfully.” This exemplary cleric dwelt with great severity on the evil that is in the world, and particularly on the evil which brought men into jails. He then proceeded to inform his attentive congregation of a fact which one would have thought was painfully obvious to them—that punishment did not fall only on the wrong doer, but also upon those who were near and dear to him. “Picture to yourselves,” went on the minister of the Gospel, “picture your wives on this holy anniversary, seated in silence and sadness, surrounded by their weeping children. Think of their untold agony as these innocent children—inheritors of a parent’s brand—put the tormenting question, ‘Where’s father?’ Picture—”

It all happened in a moment; a prisoner had burst from the benches occupied by the first-class misdemeanants; had scaled the pulpit like a wild cat; had caught the chaplain by the throat; had suddenly released his grasp; and, with a groan which those who heard it will never forget, had fallen back on to the stone pavement in front of the pulpit—dead.

When the body was searched the precious documents were found stitched beneath his waistcoat. They disclosed an unfinished scheme of the late Mr. McAllister’s for so dealing with horsehair as to render the wigs of judges not only awful to the multitude, but comfortable to the wearer.