THE HUMAN TRAGEDY

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LI, Issue 222, 12 September 1908, Page 3

THE HUMAN TRAGEDY

Tim SEW GOVERNESS. (By Geo. R. Sims.) • Oil a bright October day in 1880 a jaunting-car drew up in front o£ Shandy toll, in County Cork, ami a pretty, graceful girl of twenty jumped down. Her luggage was lifted oil' tin; ear by itlie driver. Aliss Ellie Skinner had arrived at the Hall to take up her position as governess to the younger children of ■Dr. and Airs. Philip Cross. Dr. Philip Henry Eustace Cross was a retired Army surgeon, a well-preserved, ■military-looking man of sixty-two. Airs. Cross was ail amiable lady of fortyseven, and the children, the eldest >f whom wis then about sixteen, were devoted to their parents. It was a happy and well-to-do family ■that Alisa Skinner was about to become a member of, Mrs. Cross, when she fouud that Miss Skinner was about to leave her place, -at once suggested that she should come to Shandy llall, and take charge of the ■education of her little ones. DARKENING SHADOWS. That evening, ill the drawing-room after dinner, the two women sat together and gaily discussed the arrangements for the future. No thought of evil could have entered the mind of either; yet Ellie Skinner, the laughing girl of twenty, a favourite alike" with the gentry and the villagers, had entered a ■home which, all unwittingly, she was to make doubly desolate. ■ Her coining meant a death of agony to tin' wife, and a death of shame to tile husband.

lint there was no sign of trouble when ■Hiss Skinner commenced her duties in the doctor's house. She took to the children, and lliiey took to her, and she was treated quite like one of the family. ' Towards the end of the year Airs. Cross begun to be a little jealous of the attentions her husband was paying the young governess. They might be iatberly; lie said they were. But it was not pleasant for the woman of forty-seven, devoted to h,*r husband, and hitherto accustomed lo have his Jirst consideration, to see him paying the girl of twenty the kind of homage that she might have expected from a vuunger man who was free 0 'win her heart. ■.SOLVING THE DII'I'TCULTY. All's. Cross asked her husband not lo be quite so gallant to the young governess. " You'll turn her head, Phil," she said. "She will begin to think that .she na; captivated you." "Nonsense!" replied the doctor, laughing. "Miss ■Skinner is much too i-ensible a girl for that!" Airs. Cross, reassured by her husband's good-humoured reception'of her protests, admitted tlmt the doctor was right. Miss Skinner was a very sensible and amiable girl. ■But the doctor still continued to pay more attention to the governess than lie did to his .wife, and -Mrs. Cross determined to take a definite course. ■ 'She called the girl to her, and (old her quite kindly that she was thinking of sending tlie younger children to school, and on that account she would not require her services any longer. Then she formally, gave the governess notice. ■ Dr. Cross was very angry when he heard that Aliss Skinner was to go. He had ascertained that the young lady would leave the neighbourhood altogether, and go to Dublin.

Qle remonstrated with his wife. It •was absurd for her to !>e jealous. But Mrs. Cross was Jinn, and tho doctor had reluctantly to consent to her arrangement. But he sought an interview with ■Miss Skinner, and assured her that hedeeply regretted her departure. She had been a very pleasant personality in Ins home, and lie should miss her very much. Jle hoped that she would 'write to him as soon as -she had settled holier •new home, and that she would permit him to take a fatherly interest in her welfare. THIS MYSTERIOUS ILLNESS. .Miss Skinner, grateful for the doetor's kind words, promised to write to him. and when her month expired took an atl'ectionate leave of Mrs. and the el'ildren. In the spring of the year 1887, Dr. Cross went to Dublin, and there he met .Miss Skinner again. He remained in Dillon some little time, and then returned to Shandy Hall. The doctor returned from Dublin at the end of April. On the 10th of May Mrs. Cross began to sull'er from mysterious symptoms. She suffered great pain ami sometimes acute agony after taking the medicine that her husband, atj lending hrr as a medical man, prescribed ' for her.

She got little better, anil was able to go out; but oil the 2tlth of May there was a recurrence of the illness, ami the symptoms were more violent than they had been previously. DICATII COil ICS. On Ihe iltli, the symptoms were so alarming that her husband called ill a medical man, a relative, and told him that .Mr-. Cross was suffering fromi typhoid fever. ' He took his relative to the bed-room, and let him see Mrs. Cross. Then he took him in tlie next 100111, told him what he was prescribing for the illness, and called Hie interview a ''consultation.*'

The medical relative called in said ■that if Dr. Cross was satislied it 'was typhoid, this treatment was perfectly correct, and left the house. On dune Ist ill's. Cross was very bad indeed. The nurse who attended to her in Ihe anytime went to bed, leaving her in charge of the d'Oclor. The doctor said 110 doubt a change for the better ■would soon take place. He hoped his wife would be much better in the niorning. About midnight one of the servants! ■heard a shriek, and then a low. wailing orv. She started up and listened, ami was preparing lo go to Iver mistress's room, but all became still, and she lay down ami went to sleep again. I At six o'clock in the morning Ihe doetor knocked at the servants' bedroom door. <unt bade them get up.

"Wake up, girls!'' he said. " Your mistress lias been gone since one o'clock!" "MAY Sill". CO TO III'.AVF.X!" The maids found ills. Cross lying dead, with her (ace downwards. She ( had evidently died in the'grwitesl agony* 'j The ihictor waited a little while in ihe room, then he went lo lied. ■ The death anil funeral of his wife he recorded in his diary, lie was not at anv time a man oi' many words, and ■the onirics are brief: '■ ilary Laara Cross departed this life 2nd.' May she go to Heaven is my |,pravcr. Buried on tie- llh. I I " I; 1.11.—I'or Laura Cross's funeral, etc.. I illve guineas.' 1 , The dead body of the doctor's wife did not lie long at Shandy Hall. She died

at one a.m. 011 the 2nd of June, and she was buried on the 4th at six o'clock 1111 the morning, the little inournin"iparty consisting of the doctor, Ids voAcliimui, iliti driver of the oue-Jiorso ■hearse, a villager, and the village puo- . an. The doctor, who had himself ■signed the certificate of his wife's death, /explained that, being a ciiae of typhoid, fit was not advisable for the body to remain long in the house. 1 On the Oth of June Dr. Cross went to .London, where Miss Skinner then was. ■He told her that he was a widower, that Mrs. Cross had been de-ad some time, and on the 17th of J line he was married ■to the young governess at St. James's Church, Piccadilly. MURDER! -the doctor did not bring his young (wife back to Shandy liall at first. He ■returned alone, and no one at the time of his return had heard of his marriage. ■ • ' .

1 But someone in the neighbourhood got [ ito ktaow of it. It was openly stated ■that Dr. Cross, who had buried his wife, ithe .mother of his children, on the 4th ■of June, had on the 17th of June been married in London to the young girl who had been the governess at Shandy 'llall, and of whom Airs. Cross had been .jealous. The neighbours met and talked. The doctor's conduct was considered not only scandalous, but inhuman. The feeling against him increased, and-presently it was boldly stated that Dr. Cross had ■murdered his wife in order to marry the young governess. Finding that it was perfectly well known that he had married again, Dr. Cross fetched his young wife, and duly installed her at Shandy llall as its mistress. KILLED BY POISON.

lie heard the rumours that were current, and treated them with proud disdain.

| But an order ,I'or the exhumation of 1 his first wife's body had been obtained, and 011 .July 21st an inquest was opened and adjoui'ncd. ■When the inquest was resumed 011 July 2!ltli, the medical evidence showed that there were no signs of typhoid, and that the body contained a sulticieut quantity of arsenic to have caused death. The presence of strychnine was also proved. At the coroner's inquiry it was shown that -Miss Skinner could not have had any knowledge of the cause of All's. Cross's death. ■ 011 the Ist of August Dr. Cross was ■arrested at Shandy Hull. ; The inquiry dragged 011 till the stli of September, lly that date the case ngainst the ex-Army surgeon had be■come a very strong one indeed. '■ It was proved that previous to his ■wife's alarming illness he had had in his possession two small bottles containing arsenic, and that after his wife died ■these bottles had been destroyed. A CURIOUS DEFENCE.

He was committed to the Cork Winter Assizes, and on the 14th of December he was tried for the murder of his wife. .The trial lasted four days. • He was found guilty, hut before being sentenced he was asked if he had ■anything To say. The doctor, who had heard the verdict without betraying any emotion, made a. curious speech. If the medical experts said his wife died from the effects of arsenic, he supposed she did. But .she might have poisoned herself, fjlie was always making .washes for her complexion, and for these she used arsenic, ■if the fatality did not, come" about in ■that way then somebody must havc poisoned her. lie did nut. As to the hurried funeral, he thought it the best thing, in the circumstances; and he married in little over a fortnight "after 'lis I .wile's death "because he felt so lonely"!

C When the doctor had concliuled his explanation, the judge sentenced him to death, saying that the evidence made it perfectly clear that Mrs. Cross had bceu slowly poisoned by her husband, it) order thiit be might marry Miss Skinner. Tho date of the execution was lixed for the 10th of January. Up to the last ;tho condemned man had an idea that a petition for a reprieve would be successful. lie wrote to his young wife, and told her of his hopes, and implored her to come and see him. VAIN APPEALS.

But she never came. The woman, to gain whose hand he had not scrupled to murder the wife who hud been his faithful companion for so many years, shrank with horror from the man who hud pursued lwr with protestations of love under such awful conditions. 11a made appeal after appeal to her. He asked her, as his wife, to come to him, and lei him see her once again. And there was no answer. Between the murderer and the woman for whose sake he had put a faithful ami loving wife to a lingering death of torture, the silence of the grave had already fallen. (In 'the Kltli of .lauuarv, 1888, Dr. Philip Cross, aged sixty-three, retired Army surgeon, was pinioned by Berry, the executioner, and led out to die.

: lie had, after the rejection, of the petition for his reprieve, been nervous and restless. On tho last night of bis life he sal. up till after midnight, and then slept very little. THE FINAL SCENE.

lint iii tin 1 morning lie had recovered something of Ids old bearing. lie told 1110 warder* and those about him Hull lie did not fear to die. Me lmd faced death again and again oil tile battlefield, and lie feared it now no more than lie feared it llien. I lie went to the scall'old resolutely, and died without a word. IXDI-FFEBKNT TO THE LAST. This cultural and well-to-do gentleman, whose whole lil'e had been devoted to the alleviation o£ pain, saw to the pofeoning of his wife us calmly as he saw to the cutting of his hay. From first, to last he maintained nis contemptuous iiulillVrence to what was happening around him. The only time that he showed emotion was 'when the woman for whom he had sacrificed not only his wife's life, but, his own, refused even to let his eyes look upon her once before he died. ' Little dill the inmates of Shandy Hall 'who welcomed the new governess to their home that bright October day in 'Sli imagine that the shadow of the hangman entered with her!