"And this particular inquiry—my inquiry? How soon shall I be inquired into?" she asked again, with a scornful inflection of voice, and a little smile.
"Judge Anstice is the District Judge for New York," he replied, in his coldest and most professional manner; "this particular examination will come on next week at the latest, it has only been delayed on account of Anstice's unavoidable absence."
"I see," she answered. "And what happens next, Philip? You must forgive my utter ignorance, the situation is a novel one for me."
Again there was a sufficiency of mockery in her voice to strike Mr. Tremain afresh with the complete incongruity of the entire situation. It was evident she either did not, or would not, comprehend the gravity of her position; she was still looking at it as an outsider and not as the principal actor, the pivot upon which all turned; just as she forgot or put aside the terrible nature of the charge, and the fearful compensation demanded should that charge be substantiated.
"Good heavens," thought Philip; "she cannot realise it is for complicity in a murder that she stands accused! She cannot realise the nature of the obstacles that lie between her and acquittal, or how awful will be the consequences should our efforts in her behalf fail."
"Well," she said again, "what happens next, Philip? What is the next proceeding of the law? You have brought me as far as the Judge and the inquiry, what follows after?"
"Should there be any fault in the warrant papers," answered Mr. Tremain, speaking against his will, and in short detached sentences, "or should the evidence brought forward by those who obtained the arrest fail to be of such a character as to justify the person under arrest being put on trial, that person would be discharged, and therefore freed from any further action. The arrest in fact falls to the ground, unsubstantiated, there being no primâ facie case."
"And if otherwise, Philip? If the evidence is of such a nature as to prove a primâ facie case, what then?"
She asked this question very slowly, looking at him steadily with unflinching eyes.
"Then," he answered as slowly, and with every line of his stern face tense and drawn, "then I fear—I believe, that the person under arrest would be dealt with in the same manner as though legally proved guilty; the accused would doubtless be sent back to the country from which the request for arrest emanated, and where the crime was committed, for trial according to that country's laws."