The story that followed was simply given. It was but the one she had told again and again. Yet the room hung on her every word. And when she had concluded, Cass turned her back again to Simití, and to Rosendo’s share in the mining project which had ultimated in this suit.
A far-away look came into the girl’s eyes as she spoke of that great, black man who had taken her from desolate Badillo into his own warm heart. There were few dry eyes among the spectators when she told of his selfless love. And when she drew the portrait of him, standing alone in the cold mountain water, far up in the jungle of Guamocó, bending over the laden batea, and toiling day by day in those ghastly solitudes, that she might be protected and educated and raised above her primitive environment in Simití, there were sobs heard throughout the room; and even the judge, hardened though he was by conflict with the human mind, removed his glasses and loudly cleared his throat as he wiped them.
Ames first grew weary as he listened, and then exasperated. His lawyer at length rose to object to the recital on the ground that it was largely irrelevant to the case. And the judge, pulling himself together, sustained the objection. Cass sat down. Then the prosecution eagerly took up the cross-examination. Ames’s hour had come.
“Boast not thyself of to-morrow; for thou knowest not what a day may bring forth,” murmured the white-haired man in the clerical garb far back in the crowded room. Had he learned the law of Truth to error, “Thou shall surely die”? Did he discern the vultures gnawing at the rich man’s vitals? Did he, too, know that this giant of privilege, so insolently flaunting his fleeting power, his blood-stained wealth and his mortal pride, might as well seek to dim the sun in heaven as to escape the working of those infinite divine laws which shall effect the destruction of evil and the establishment of the kingdom of heaven even here upon earth?
Ames leaned over to whisper to Hood. The latter drew Ellis down and transmitted his master’s instructions. The atmosphere grew tense, and the hush of expectancy lay over all.
“Miss Carmen,” began Ellis easily, “your parentage has been a matter of some dispute, if I mistake not, and––”
Cass was on his feet to object. What had this question to do with the issue?
But the judge overruled the objection. That was what he was there for. Cass should have divined it by this time.
“H’m!” Ellis cleared his throat and adjusted his glasses. “And your father, it is said, was a negro priest. I believe that has been accepted for some time. A certain Diego, if I recall correctly.”