Part 41 (2/2)

”Oy's, oy's, oy's! The hon'r'bl' circuit court of the _hum_teenth judicial de-strict is now in session, pursu'nt t' 'j'urnm'nt!”

Captain Taylor turned about as the last word went echoing against the First National Bank, and walked slowly up the stairs. He opened the court-room door and closed it; he placed his back against it, and folded his arms upon his breast, his eyes fixed upon a stain on the wall.

Judge Maxwell took up some papers from the desk, and spread one of them before him.

”In the matter of Case No. 79, State _vs._ Newbolt. Gentlemen, are you ready for trial?”

The judge spoke in low and confidential voice, meant for the attorneys at the bar only. It scarcely carried to the back of the room, filled with the sound-killing vapors from five hundred mouths, and many of the old men in the front seats failed to catch it, even though they cupped their hands behind their ears.

Sam Lucas, prosecuting attorney, rose.

Slight and pale, with a thin chest and a stoop forward, he was distinguished by the sharp eyes beside his flat-bridged nose, so flattened out, it seemed, by some old blow, that they could almost communicate with each other across it. His light, loose hair was very long; when he warmed up in speaking he shook it until it tumbled about his eyes. Then it was his habit to sweep it back with the palm of his hand in a long, swinging movement of the arm. It was a most expressive gesture; it seemed as if by it he rowed himself back into the placid waters of reasoning. Now, as he stood before Judge Maxwell, he swept his palm over his forelock, although it lay snug and unruffled in its place.

”Your honor, the state is ready,” said he, and remained standing.

Hammer pushed his books along the table, shuffled his papers, and rose ponderously. He thrust his right hand into the bosom of his coat and leaned slightly against the left in an att.i.tude of scholarly preparedness.

”Your honor, the defense is ready,” he announced.

CHAPTER XVI

”SHE COMETH NOT,” HE SAID

Joe, his face as white as some plant that has sprung in a dungeon, bent his head toward his mother, and placed his free hand on hers where it lay on the arm of her chair.

”It will soon be over with now, Mother,” he encouraged, with the hope in his heart that it would, indeed, be so.

With an underling in his place at the door, Captain Taylor advanced to take charge of the marshaling of the jury panel. There ensued a great bustling and tramping as the clerk called off the names of those drawn.

While this was proceeding, Joe cast his eyes about the room, animated by a double hope: that Alice would be there to hear him tell his story; that Morgan had come and was in waiting to supply the facts which honor sealed upon his own tongue. He could see only the first few rows of benches with the certainty of individual identification; they were filled with strangers. Beyond them it was conglomerate, that fused and merged thing which seemed a thousand faces, yet one; that blended and commingled ma.s.s which we call the public. Out of the ma.s.s Joe Newbolt could not sift the lean, shrewd face of Curtis Morgan, nor glean from it the brown hair of Alice Price.

The discovery that Alice was not there smote him with a feeling of sudden hopelessness and abandonment; the reproaches which he had kindled against himself in his solitary days in jail rose up in redoubled torture. He blamed the rashness of an unreasoning moment in which he had forgotten time and circ.u.mstance. Her interest was gone from him now, where, if he had waited for vindication, he might have won her heart.

But it was a dream, at the best, he confessed, turning away from his hungry search of the crowd, his head drooping forward in dejection. What did it matter for the world's final exculpation, if Alice were not there to hear?

His mother nodded to somebody, and touched his hand. Ollie it was, whom she greeted. She was seated near at hand, beside a fat woman with a red and greasy face, whose air of protection and large interest proclaimed her a relative. Joe thought that she filled pretty well the bill that Ollie had made out of her mother, on that day when she had scorned her for having urged her into marriage with Isom.

Ollie was very white in her black mourning dress, and thinner of features than when he had seen her last. She smiled, and nodded to him, with an air of timid questioning, as if doubtful whether he had expected it, and uncertain how it would be received. Joe bowed his head, respectfully.

What a wayside flower she seemed, thought he; how common beside Alice!

Yet, she had been bright and refres.h.i.+ng in the dusty way where he had found her. He wondered why she was not within the rail also, near Hammer, if she was for him; or near the prosecutor, if she was on the other side.

He was not alone in this speculation. Many others wondered over that point also. It was the public expectation that she naturally would a.s.sist the state in the punishment of her husband's slayer; but Sam Lucas was not paying the slightest attention to her, and it was not known whether he even had summoned her as a witness.

And now Captain Taylor began to create a fresh commotion by clearing the spectators from the first row of benches to make seats for the jury panel. Judge Maxwell was waiting the restoration of order, leaning back in his chair. Joe scanned his face.

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