 Strong Poison by Dorothy L. Sayers, narrated by Ian Carmichael Chapter 1 There were crimson roses on the bench. They looked like splashes of blood. The judge was an old man. So old he seemed to have outlived time and change and death. His parrot face and parrot voice were dry like his old, heavily veined hands. His scarlet robe clashed harsh with the crimson of the roses. He had sat for three days in the stuffy court, but he showed no sign of fatigue. He did not look at the prisoner as he gathered his notes into a neat sheaf and turned to address the jury. But the prisoner looked at him. Her eyes, like dark smudges under the heavy square brows, seemed equally without fear and without hope. They waited. Members of the jury. The patient-old eyes seemed to sum them up and take stock of their united intelligence. Three respectable tradesmen, a tall, argumentative one, a stout, embarrassed one with a drooping moustache, and an unhappy one with a bad coat. A director of a large company, anxious not to waste valuable time, a publican, incongruously cheerful, two youngish men of the artisan class, a nondescript elderly man of educated appearance who might have been anything, an artist with a red beard disguising a weak chin, three women, an elderly spinster, a stout-capable woman who kept a sweet shop, and a harassed wife and mother whose thoughts seemed to be continually straying to her abandoned half. Members of the jury. You have listened with great patience and attention to the evidence in this very distressing case, and it is now my duty to sum up the facts and arguments which have been put before you by the learned attorney general and by the learned counsel for the defense, and put them in order as clearly as possible so as to help you in forming your decision. But first of all, perhaps I ought to say a few words with regard to that decision itself. You know, I am sure, that it is a great principle of English law that every accused person is held to be innocent unless and until he is proved otherwise. It is not necessary for him or her to prove innocence. It is in the modern slang phrase, up to the crown to prove guilt. And unless you are quite satisfied that the crown has done this beyond all reasonable doubt, it is your duty to return a verdict of not guilty. Now that does not necessarily mean that the prisoner has established her innocence by proof. It simply means that the crown has failed to produce in your minds an undoubted conv- Sample complete. Ready to continue?