"Co'te don't meet till two o'clock—an' I'm always glad to have the chance to chat with distinguished counsel from down below—I don't get down thar oftentimes myself."
The man to whom Judge Renshaw spoke seemed conspicuously out of his own environment in this musty place of unwashed windows, cob-webbed walls and cracking plaster.
His dress bespoke the skill of a good tailor and his fingers were manicured. He drew out a cigar case and proffered a perfecto to his honor, then deliberately snipped the end from his own. Evidently he had something embarrassing to say.
"Judge," he began briefly, "I've been here now for upwards of a week, trying to get this business under way. You know what the results have been—or rather have not been. I've encountered total failure."
"Hasn't the prosecutin' attorney afforded you every facility, Mr. Sidney?" The inquiry was put in a tone of the utmost solicitude.
"That's not the difficulty," objected the visiting lawyer. "Mr. Hurlburt has shown me every courtesy—in precisely the way you have. Your instructions to the grand jurors were admirable. The prosecutor consented at once that I should participate in getting the evidence before them, and in assisting him to punish the guilty when indicted. It is now February. Jerry Henderson was murdered before the first snow flew. Those subpoenas which we have sent out have for the most part come back—unserved. What witnesses we have secured might as well be mutes. The thing is inexplicable. Surely the judge can do something to energize the machinery of his court out of utter lethargy. I appeal to you, sir. We all know that Henderson was murdered ... we all suspect who had it done, yet we make no progress."
Judge Renshaw nodded his head affirmatively.
"It looks right considerably that way." Then seeing the impatient expression on the other face, he spoke again—in a different voice, leaning forward. "Mr. Sidney, I reckon I know what's in your mind. You're thinkin' that both me and the prosecutin' attorney ain't much better than tools of Kinnard Towers.... Maybe there's a grain of truth in it. I'm judge of a district that takes in several county seats and I ride the circuit. Before I was elected to the bench I was a backwoods lawyer that sometimes knew the pinch of hunger. You say Kinnard Towers is dishonest—and worse. If I said it, I might hold office till the next election—but more likely I wouldn't live that long."
As the notable attorney from the city sought to disarm his smile of its satirical barb, the other proceeded: "That strikes you as a thing that's exaggerated—and a thing that a man ought to be ashamed to admit even if it was true. All right. Do you know that when you took the Henderson matter to the grand jury, nine men on the panel sought to be excused from service in fear of their lives? Do you know that on every day they did serve all twelve got anonymous letters threatenin' them with death? They know it anyhow—and you see they haven't brought in any true bills an' I predict that no matter what evidence you put before them—they won't."
"Why were those letters not presented to the Court? You have power to protect your panels with every company of militia in the state if need be."