Litchfield enquirer., 1880-10-07
THE ROMANCE OF THE CAFE
-.:s..4! . .:s: D1TALIA. ai1T'' ~
A Story in Three Chapters.
!, oH Hal, IA nEspERArE Ruvrr.N.

The criminal court was stlHlngly hot that
sultry summers afternoon. The sun beat
down fiercely through the windows upon the
heavy horse iIair; denominations wherewith
brains of the British bench and bar, and throw
more light upon the piles of musty brief pa
pers piled on tie desks, or lurking within the
half-open jaws Of the solicitors brief bags.
than ever they received from the minds or ex-
position of their learned holders; aud bench,
bar, solicitors, ushers. police. and public, all
simmered gently in their own heat while
awaiting the return of the jury. who had re-
tired to consider their verdict. p, .f,-r + a.;l
My ,ord, ON the red cushions which cover
the bench. dozed behind the leader in the
Times il would perhaps have. been injuri-
GUS to public morality and he,dgnity Of his
office had he used penny publication to con
ccal his slumbers elderly barrsters who were
Sin" the case which stood next on the list
were studying their briefs. while young bar
risters who were not ''in'' anything, pushed
their wigs far back on their forcheads (wigs
fresh and white as the unboiled caulitlower),
and drew carcatures on ends of draft-p paper !;
aud the public-a greasy, unwashed public it
was, the public which is wont to hang about
the doors of criminal courts at assize times,
most of its members looking as if they had
themselves drunk lavishly of the corrective
justice administered to the prisoner within
this public munchcd an infinity of apples, con-
versed in whispers, and stared at the prisoner
at the bar. .., ....-,-s ..~g.
He was desperate ruffian, this prisoner at
the bar, at least tue counsel for the crown had
certainly made him out to be 'se and the
learned one, who. defended him, by no means
demurring to the charge, had certainly ad-
mitted that his client was a desperate ruffian.
In fact he had taken the bull by the horns,
and seeing that there was no sort of use in
denying the. actual deed of which his client
was accused, had done his best to assist the
prosecution to show that a murder had been
committed of such cold-blooded and unpro-
voked atrocity that it was impossible to regard
the deed as the work of a sane man, and so to
establish successfully plea of insanity.
There could be no doubt about the murder
or its atrocity. The prisoner at the bar was
described as Frenchman, by name Gustave
Mas speaking very good English, and his age
by his own account was forty, but his hair
was quite gray and he might, from his whole
appearance, have been man fully twenty
years above that age. y. ..:-'.,r, z-rs' ..
He was at the time of the murder, and had
been for some years previously, waiter in q
small restaurant somewhere in the foreign
quarter of London not many hundred yards
from Leicester Square. a. tnr.s} .7ai,
While the jurymen are yet weighing the
question of the prisoners death or life. let me
tell you something of the scene and circuu.
stances of the murder.
The Cafe d'ltalia is, as its name would i'm.
ply, haunt of members of the Italian colony
in that part of London. It is kept by an
Italian its walters are, most of them, Italian
its crockery is Italian with a truly Italian
oh, IF niIN. ,to oil Italian YE
and, lastly, the subtle odor OF garlic which
pervades its dining-room is as thoroughly
Italian as the majority Of the frequenters OF
/ Not that the Cafe dItsla is without a
sprinkling of English A certain number OF
city men dine there, who know their London
WELL and not few briefess barristefs ami
young solicitors, who have discovered that
they can dine as well there for two shillings
as they can for ten at the more pretentious
West End restaurants ..,, ...,.. s,.
A swing door, near which. Dryad-lik amid
forest of asparagus, sits a neat dame de
compton, admits you from the street into a
long low room furnished with dozen small
tables. The wall paper is dingy and the
furniture plain, but the Cafe d'Italia burns in
wnter.a CHEEKY British coal fire at the end OF
the long room, and has always cosy homely
appearance. a.. ~...-. go.
1t was on an early summers evening some
weeks before the day of the trial in question,
in this very room, that Gustave Mas, had as the
self did not attempt to deny, done the deed
for which he was then being tried for his life
The circumstances were as follows:
At about seven O'Clock on the evening Of
the murder, two Englishmen had entered the
Cafe. They were both men of middle age.
we'll dressed, and a stranger would probably
have guessed them to be, as they both were,
something ip the city - They had sat down
opposite to each other at n table, ordered din
ner and champagne, and the order had been
taken and their dinner served by Gustave
Mas. This is some of the evidence as to what
occurred. s7 '''tt
Madame Pirri, the dame de compton, and
wife of the proprietor of the cafe, said:
Il saw the genHemen'come ins They were
both strangers / do not remember having
ever seen them there before There were two
walters: Gustave Mas and Giuseppe Nava, an
Italian. The Englishmen sat down at one OF
Mass tables. Mas took their hats and coats,
and | did not notice anything unusual in his
appearance or any agitation in his behavior
Both the gentlemen appeared to be perfect
strangers to him." ..... .,,.,.,.-,-.. az
James johnson said: 81 am a member of
the Stock Exchange. had a slight acquant.
ance with the deceased, Reginald Richards.
He was of the same profession as myself. On
the day of the murder he asked me to dine
with him, saying: 1--WE will try new place
which have heard well spoken Of and he
took me to the Cafe dItalia. The prisoner
waited on US. Apparently he had never seen
either Of US. We conyersed on. various sub.
-jects. The deceased talked most, and in a
rather loud voice. The prisoner waited on us
very attentiyely, and was never far from our
table. He must have been able to hear d
great deal of what we were saying. In the
middle of dinner the prisoner dropped plate
which be was bringing to US, and, as he steop-
ed to pick up the pieces, we both noticed that
he trembled very much and that his face was
very white, and the deceased said, THAT fell
low looks ill., Presently the prisoner brought
US coffee. He placed it before ME, and stood
behind the chair of the deceased. As was
occupied in pouring out the coffee he suddenly
drew from his pocket a table-knife, seized
Reginald Richards. by the hair, forced his
head back, and, in "a moment, cut his throat
from ear to ear. He made no attempt to es-
cape, and refused to utter a word in explana-
ton Of his motives" "a ia aea j -
Questioned as to the conversation which had
passed between himself and the deceased
outiuS diuuCi, Vic WIttiCoS jdO tcplicu
II cannot speak positiTely-we talked on
various subjects, but was suffering from q
severe headache and was glad to let the de-
ceased, who was a. very laxative man., do
most of the talking "a Later in the dinner
know he was speaking of politics, English
politics, and just as. we came into the restau.
rant, and while weswere beginning dinner, he
was telling me of some intrigue with a girl in
France but. whether it was himself or some
one else who was the hero of it cannot recol
lect- He showed me a. gold ring with some
French words on it which lie wore, and j
gathered that the ring was connected with tina,
affair.". but do not know howl. tsst s.ai 81.
f The proprietor Of the, cafe, being called fol
the defence, Had given the prisoner annexed
lent character extending over period Of
several years. AsnsA.HRs y.
II That was the whole case Gustave Mas
| would say nothing about himself or his mo
tives. and he did not seem to have friend ii
the world to say a word either for or against
him, except the energetic young counsel who
had done his best to make out that the waiter