The prosecutor, all on fire from his smothered attempt to uncover the information which he believed himself so nearly in possession of, started to say something, and Hammer got the first syllable of his objection out of his mouth, when the judge waved both of them down. He turned in his chair to Joe, who was waiting calmly now the next event.

Judge Maxwell addressed him again. He pointed out to Joe that, since he had taken the witness-stand, he had thus professed his willingness to lay bare all his knowledge of the tragedy, and that his reservation was an indication of insincerity. The one way in which he could have withheld information not of a self-incriminating nature, was for him to have kept off the stand. He showed Joe that one could not come forward under such circ.u.mstances and tell one side of a story, or a part of it, confessing at the same time that certain pertinent information was reserved.

"No matter who it hurts, it is your duty now to reveal the cause of your quarrel between yourself and Isom Chase that night, and to repeat, to the best of your recollection, the words which pa.s.sed between you."

He explained that, unless Joe should answer the question, it was the one duty of the court to halt the trial there and send him to jail in contempt, and hold him there, his case undecided, until he would answer the question asked.

Joe bowed respectfully when the judge concluded, conveying in that manner that he understood.

"If anything could be gained by it, sir, by anybody--except myself, perhaps--or if it would bring Isom back to life, or make anybody happier, I wouldn't refuse a minute, sir," said Joe. "What Mr. Lucas asks me to tell I've refused to tell before. I've refused to tell it for my own mother and Mr. Hammer and--others. I respect the law and this court, sir, as much as any man in this room, and it pains me to stand in this position before you, sir.

"But I can't talk about that. It wouldn't change what I've told about the way Isom was killed. What I've told you is the truth. What pa.s.sed between Isom and me before he took hold of the gun isn't mine to tell.

That's all there is to be said, Judge Maxwell, sir."

"You must answer the prosecuting attorney's question," said Judge Maxwell sternly. "No matter what motive of honor or fealty to the dead, or thought of sparing the living, may lie behind your concealment of these facts, the law does not, cannot, take it into account. Your duty now is to reply to all questions asked, and you will be given another opportunity to do so. Proceed, Mr. Prosecutor."

Hammer had given it up. He sat like a man collapsed, bending over his papers on the table, trying to make a front in his defeat before the public. The prosecuting attorney resumed the charge, framing his attack in quick lunges. He was in a clinch, using the short-arm jab.

"After Isom Chase came into the room you had words?"

"We had some words," replied Joe slowly, weary that this thing should have to be gone over again.

"Were they loud and boisterous words, or were they low and subdued?"

"Well, Isom talked pretty loud when he was mad," said Joe.

"Loud enough for anybody upstairs to hear--loud enough to wake anybody asleep up there?"

"I don't know," said Joe coldly, resentful of this flanking subterfuge.

He must go through that turmoil of strain and suffering again, all because Morgan, the author of this evil thing, had lacked the manhood to come forward and admit his misdeeds.

The thoughts will travel many a thousand miles while the tongue covers an inch; even while Joe answered he was thinking of this. More crowded upon him as he waited the prosecutor's next question. Why should he suffer all that public misjudgment and humiliation, all that pain and twisting of the conscience on Morgan's account? What would it avail in the end? Perhaps Ollie would prove unworthy his sacrifice for her, as she already had proved ungrateful. Even then the echo of her testimony against him was in his ears.

Why should he hold out faithfully for her, in the hope that Morgan would come--vain hope, fruitless dream! Morgan would not come. He was safe, far away from there, having his laugh over the muddle that he had made of their lives.

"I will ask you again--what were the words that pa.s.sed between you and Isom Chase that night?"

Joe heard the question dimly. His mind was on Morgan and the white road of the moonlit night when he drove away. No, Morgan would not come.

"Will you answer my question?" demanded the prosecutor.

Joe turned to him with a start. "Sir?" said he.

The prosecutor repeated it, and stood leaning forward for the answer, his hands on the table. Joe bent his head as if thinking it over.

And there lay the white road in the moonlight, and the click of buggy wheels over gravel was in his ears, as he knew it must have sounded when Morgan drove away, easy in his loose conscience, after his loose way.

Why should he sacrifice the promise of his young life by meekly allowing them to fasten the shadow of this dread tragedy upon him, for which Morgan alone was to blame?

It was unfair--it was cruelly unjust! The thought of it was stifling the breath in his nostrils, it was pressing the blood out of his heart! They were waiting for the answer, and why should he not speak? What profit was there in silence when it would be so unjustly interpreted?

As Ollie had been thoughtless of Isom, so she might be thoughtless of him, and see in him only a foolish, weak instrument to use to her own advantage. Why should he seal his lips for Ollie, go to the gallows for her, perhaps, and leave the blight of that shameful end upon his name forever?

He looked up. His mind had made that swift summing up while the prosecutor's words were echoing in the room. They were waiting for his answer. Should he speak?

Mrs. Newbolt had risen. There were tears on her old, worn cheeks, a yearning in her eyes that smote him with an accusing pang. He had brought that sorrow upon her, he had left her to suffer under it when a word would have cleared it away; when a word--a word for which they waited now--would make her dun day instantly bright. Ollie weighed against his mother; Ollie, the tainted, the unclean.

His eyes found Ollie's as he coupled her name with his mother's in his mind. She was shrinking against her mother's shoulder--she had a mother, too--pale and afraid.

Mrs. Newbolt stretched out her hands. The scars of her toilsome years were upon them; the distortion of the labor she had wrought for him in his helpless infancy was set upon their joints. He was placing his liberty and his life in jeopardy for Ollie, and his going would leave mother without a stay, after her sacrifice of youth and hope and strength for him.

Why should he be called upon to do this thing--why, _why_?

The question was a wild cry within his breast, lunging like a wolf in a leash to burst his lips. His mother drew a step nearer, unstayed by the sheriff, unchecked by the judge. She spread her poor hands in supplication; the tears coursed down her brown old cheeks.

"Oh, my son, my son--my little son!" she said.

He saw her dimly now, for tears answered her tears. All was silent in that room, the silence of the forest before the hurricane grasps it and bends it, and the lightnings reave its limbs.

"Mother," said he chokingly, "I--I don't know what to do!"

"Tell it all, Joe!" she pleaded. "Oh, tell it all--tell it all!"

Her voice was little louder than a whisper, yet it was heard by every mother in that room. It struck down into their hearts with a sharp, riving stab of sympathy, which nothing but sobs would relieve.

Men clamped their teeth and gazed straight ahead at the moving scene, unashamed of the tears which rolled across their cheeks and threaded down their beards; the prosecutor, leaning on his hands, bent forward and waited.

Joe's mind was in a tornado. The debris of past resolutions was flung high, and swirled and dashed in a wild tumult. There was nothing tangible in his reasoning, nothing plain in his sight. A mist was before his eyes, a fog was over his reason. Only there was mother, with those soul-born tears upon her face. It seemed to him then that his first and his most sacred duty was to her.

The seconds were as hours. The low moaning of women sounded in the room.

Somebody moved a foot, sc.r.a.ping it in rude dissonance across the floor.

A girl's voice broke out in sudden sobbing, which was as quickly stifled, with sharp catching of the breath.

Judge Maxwell moved in his chair, turning slowly toward the witness, and silence fell.

They were waiting; they were straining against his doubts and his weakening resolution of past days, with the concentration of half a thousand minds.

A moment of joy is a drop of honey on the tongue; a moment of pain is bitterer than any essence that Ignatius ever distilled from his evil bean. The one is as transitory as a smile; the other as lingering as a broken bone.

Joe had hung in the balance but a matter of seconds, but it seemed to him a day. Now he lifted his slim, white hand and covered his eyes. They were waiting for the word out there, those uplifted, eager faces; the judge waited, the jury waited, mother waited. They were wringing it from him, and honor's voice was dim in its counsel now, and far away.

They were pressing it out of his heart. The law demanded it, justice demanded it, said the judge. Duty to mother demanded it, and the call of all that lay in life and liberty. But for one cool breath of sympathy before he yielded--for one gleam of an eye that understood!

He dropped his hand at his side, and cast about him in hungry appeal.

Justice demanded it, and the law. But it would be ign.o.ble to yield, even though Morgan came the next hour and cleared the stain away.

Joe opened his lips, but they were dry, and no sound issued. He must speak, or his heart would burst. He moistened his lips with his hot tongue. They were demanding his answer with a thousand burning eyes.

"Tell it, Joe--tell it all!" pleaded his mother, reaching out as if to take his hand.