"Now you answer or go to jail," said Glassford, with the most impressive sternness he could command.
Then Marriott said again:
"I asked you where you had been staying since you came to town and who provided for you?"
The old man looked at him an instant, a peculiar cunning stole gradually into his swimming eyes, and then slowly he lifted his right hand to his face. His middle finger was missing, and thrusting the stump beneath his nose, he placed his index finger to his right eye, his third finger to his left, drew down the lower lids until their red linings were revealed, and then he wiggled his thumb and little finger.
The court-room burst into a roar, the laughter pealed and echoed in the high-ceiled room, even the jurymen, save Broadwell, permitted themselves wary smiles. The bailiff sprang up and pounded with his gavel, and Glassford, his face red with fury, shouted:
"Mr. Sheriff, take the witness to jail! And if this demonstration does not instantly cease, clear the courtroom!"
The contretemps completed Marriott's sense of utter humiliation and defeat. As if it were not enough to be beaten, he now suffered the chagrin of having been made ridiculous. He was oblivious to everything but his own misery and discomfiture; he forgot even Archie. Bentley and a deputy were hustling the offending old man from the court-room, and he shambled between them loosely, grotesquely, presenting the miserable, demoralizing and pathetic spectacle that age always presents when it has dishonored itself.
As they were dragging the old man past Archie, his feet scuffling and dragging like those of a paralytic, Archie spoke:
"Why, Dad!" he said.
In his tone were all disappointment and reproach.