“I humbly crave your pardon, sir, if I have said the slightest thing to offend; but I only meant to ask, was he the officer they were making such a fuss about?” “He is an officer of the highest distinction, and a wellborn gentleman to boot,—two admirable reasons for the assaults of a contemptible party. Look you, Kinshela; you and I are neither of us very young or inexperienced men, but I would ask you, have we learned any wiser lesson from our intercourse with life than to withhold our judgment on the case of one who rejects the sentence of a mob, and appeals to the verdict of his equals?”
“But if he cut the people down in cold blood,—if it be true that he laid open that poor black fellow's cheek from the temple to the chin—”
“If he did no such thing,” broke in Barrington; “that is to say, if there is no evidence whatever that he did so, what will your legal mind say then, Joe Kinshela?”
“Just this, sir. I'd say—what all the newspapers are saying—that he got the man out of the way,—bribed and sent him off.”
“Why not hint that he murdered him, and buried him within the precincts of the jail? I declare I wonder at your moderation.”
“I am sure, sir, that if I suspected he was an old friend of yours—”
“Nothing of the kind,—a friend of very short standing; but what has that to say to it? Is he less entitled to fair play whether he knew me or not?”
“All I know of the case is from the newspapers; and as I scarcely see one word in his favor, I take it there is not much to be said in his defence.”
“Well, if my ears don't deceive me, that was the guard's horn I heard then. The man himself will be here in five minutes or so. You shall conduct the prosecution, Kinshela, and I 'll be judge between you.”
“Heaven forbid, sir; on no account whatever!” said Kinshela, trembling all over. “I'm sure, Mr. Barrington, you couldn't think of repeating what I said to you in confidence—”