"
Sir Ernest Heavywether, the famous K. C., had been engaged to
defend him.
Mr. Philips, K. C., opened the case for the Crown.
The murder, he said, was a most premeditated and cold-blooded
one. It was neither more nor less than the deliberate poisoning
of a fond and trusting woman by the stepson to whom she had been
more than a mother. Ever since his boyhood, she had supported
him. He and his wife had lived at Styles Court in every luxury,
surrounded by her care and attention. She had been their kind
and generous benefactress.
He proposed to call witnesses to show how the prisoner, a
profligate and spendthrift, had been at the end of his financial
tether, and had also been carrying on an intrigue with a certain
Mrs. Raikes, a neighbouring farmer's wife. This having come to
his stepmother's ears, she taxed him with it on the afternoon
before her death, and a quarrel ensued, part of which was
overheard. On the previous day, the prisoner had purchased
strychnine at the village chemist's shop, wearing a disguise by
means of which he hoped to throw the onus of the crime upon
another man--to wit, Mrs.
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