“Do you know anything about this charge of your own knowledge?” questioned the Judge kindly, for the woman’s generous recklessness had made its impression on him.
“Know, Mr. Judge. Yes, I know that it’s a shame and a disgrace that we shall never get over as long as my name is Smith. Why, sir, if you could have seen that boy tending my Jerusha Maria, his innocence would be clear as clear to you. No paid nurse was ever so careful or so handy—the way he used to hold up her two feet in them red morocco shoes for her to crow over, was a sight in itself. He steal. He rob a store—nothing but a heathen would think of it.”
Here Mrs. Smith turned upon her husband, and flashed a storm of wrathful glances on him from her yet tearful eyes.
“You’re a pretty man, ain’t you—an honor to the name of Smith, oh yes! It would make you happy to see these two innocent creatures in States Prison, with balls and chains on their ankles. I can see you now a gloating over it, and those two girls breaking their hearts. Oh, Smith! Smith! I wouldn’t have believed it of you!”
“There, there, my good lady, I can honor your feelings, but you interrupt the case. Pray step down and let me take the evidence of these persons,” said the Judge.
“But you won’t believe them, just promise that you won’t believe them, and I’ll be still enough.”
“Believe me, they shall have justice,” answered the judge, kindly.
“That is all any of us want,” said Mrs. Smith, and stepping down, she took her place by Mrs. Laurence, resolute to stand by her to the last.
“Young man, step this way.”
Jared Boyce obeyed this order from the magistrate, and mounted the step which ran in front of the judge’s seat. His face was flushed to a bricky red now, and his eyes wandered away from any one who attempted to look into them. They were turned furtively aside from the judge while Boyce told his story in a hard, cruel voice, which never faltered or softened in its tone from beginning to end. We know what that story was, and how the wicked plot to ruin this brave, innocent lad had grown and perfected itself in the craft and greed of a few base creatures, who at first thought only of throwing their own guilt on him, but afterwards broadened their plot in hopes of great future gain.