A Case that Was Never Tried

For reasons which will soon be obvious, I shall forbear giving real names in this recital.

Within a week after my installation as prosecuting attorney, it became my duty to take charge of a case, the details of which would make an interesting narrative, if related in a more dramatic style than can be expected of an old lawyer whose literary efforts have been mainly confined to drafting briefs.

Agag Sayles was shot dead in his own sitting-room. He was a man whom few loved, and whom so many had reason to dislike, that had there been no other clew to his murderer than that afforded by the motive of ill will, it would have led in so many different directions that the keenest scent would have been put at fault.

But there were “reasons more relative than this.” Mr. Sayles had been left guardian of George Wilson by the latter’s father. Young Wilson, when he came of age, disputed his guardian’s account, and a bitter quarrel arose between them.

On the night of the murder Wilson was apprehended, fleeing from the victim’s house, by those who first rushed to the scene on hearing the assassin’s shot, and on his person was found a pistol which seemed to have been recently discharged. A note, too, was found in the slain man’s pocket, in Wilson’s handwriting, appointing a meeting for that evening, and threatening that, unless redress were at once accorded for his wrongs, he would seek it in another… Read More