Her Eyes, Your Honor

Her Eyes, Your Honor by H.D. Umbstaetter

In "Her Eyes, Your Honor," H.D. Umbstaetter opens in a packed court room where a mysterious woman stands trial for the murder of Charlotte Ames, a young, rich and notorious woman found stabbed in her bed on the second day of November with a gold hair ornament driven into her heart. Nothing in the room was disturbed and nothing was stolen. The prosecuting attorney argues that the prisoner, who has refused to give any account of herself, was seen near the scene by four people, had high words with the dead woman that day, and owned the kind of ornament used. He calls this an unbreakable chain of circumstantial evidence. The defence lawyer, Delos McWhorter, was brought two hundred miles to represent the woman. He is young and plain-faced, and he rises with boyish embarrassment. The spectators expect a merciless cross-examination and are disappointed. He questions the janitor, Mr. Slade, who swears he saw the prisoner enter the apartment house shortly before eight. McWhorter presses him on exactly what let him identify her in a dimly lit hallway four months earlier. Slade finally answers, "It was her eyes, your honor!" McWhorter lets the matter drop. Other witnesses follow, including a patrolman and the dead woman's coachman, who says he heard the prisoner threaten his mistress. Each insists he cannot be mistaken, and the defence does not challenge any of them. When the government rests, McWhorter stuns the court by announcing that the defence has no evidence to offer. The prosecutor mocks him for relying on oratory instead of facts. McWhorter's own speech is brief. He says that visiting a house, quarreling with a woman, or wearing a gold ornament is not murder, and that circumstantial evidence proves nothing, so the jury must acquit. The spectators are let down, and the crowd, especially the women, who resent the prisoner's pale beauty, expects a conviction. Within ten minutes the jury returns and pronounces her guilty. The prisoner stays calm. She then rises and, in a firm, clear voice, points to the door behind the witness stand. A tall, heavily veiled woman enters with one of the defence's associate counsel, lifts her veil, and takes her place beside the prisoner. The room erupts. McWhorter, now fiery, tells the court that facing such odds, he had to answer the devil's trick of circumstantial evidence with cunning. He asks everyone to look at the two women side by side. They differ in height, hair color, eye color, skin tone and age by eight years. The woman just convicted, he says, is his own wife, who has sat near the jury throughout the trial. She is innocent, and every moment of her life can be accounted for. He explains that the substitution was meant to show that such identification evidence cannot be accepted as conclusive. He moves to set the verdict aside. The court grants the motion. McWhorter is charged with unprofessional conduct and threatened with disbarment, but his client is acquitted at the new trial the court orders.

By H.D. Umbstaetter · First published 1895 · Genre: Legal fiction, Crime fiction, Mystery · 2,893 words

First lines

"The witness is yours."

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Tags

legal thriller · courtroom drama · murder trial · circumstantial evidence · defense attorney · wrongful conviction · identity substitution · eyewitness identification · mistaken identity · gold hair ornament · janitor testimony · jury verdict

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Her Eyes, Your Honor is listed on Textopian as a short story by H.D. Umbstaetter, dated 1895 CE.

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