The girl from the Louisville paper stood up abruptly. “I think I’ll get a little air,” she said, and added in a somewhat apologetic voice, “It’s my first murder trial.”
“It’s my last,” said the red-headed girl grimly.
The officer of the court had disappeared, and all about her there were rising once more the little blue coils of smoke—incense on the altars of relaxation. Why didn’t he come back. . . . The clock over the courtroom door said five.
On the courtroom floor there was a mounting tide of newspapers, telegraph blanks, leaves from notebooks and ruled pads—many nervous hands had made light work, tearing, crumpling, and crushing their destructive way through the implements of their trade. There was an empty pop bottle just by the rail, apple cores and banana skins were everywhere, clouds of smoke, fragments of buns, a high, nervous murmur of voices; a picnic ground on the fifth of July would have presented a more appetizing appearance. Over all was a steady roar of voices, and one higher than the rest, lamenting: “Over two hours—that’s a hung jury as sure as shooting! I might just as well kiss that ten dollars good-bye here and now. Got a light, Larry?”
The door to the left of the witness box opened abruptly, and for a moment Judge Carver stood framed in it, tall and stern in his black robes. Under his accusing eye, apples and cigarettes were suddenly as unobtrusive as the skin on a chameleon, and voices fell to silence. He stood staring at them fixedly for a moment and then withdrew as abruptly as he had come. While you could have counted ten, silence hung heavy; then once more the smoke and the voices rose and fell. . . . The clock over the courtroom door said six.
The red-headed girl moved an aimless pencil across an empty pad with unsteady fingers. There were quite a lot of empty seats. What were those twelve men doing now? Weighing the evidence? Well, but how did you weigh evidence? What was important and what wasn’t? . . . And suddenly she was back in the only courtroom that she could remember clearly—the one in Alice in Wonderland, and the King was saying proudly, “Well, that’s very important.” “Unimportant, Your Majesty means.” And she could hear the poor little King trying it over to himself to see which sounded the best. “Important—unimportant—important——” There was the lamp—and the date on the letters—and the note that nobody had found—unimportant—important. . . . There was a juryman called Bill the Lizard. She remembered that he had dipped his tail in ink and had written down all the hours and dates in the case on his slate, industriously adding them up and reducing the grand total to pounds, shillings, and pence. Perhaps that was the safest way, after all.
June 19, 1926, and May 8, 1916. . . . A boy came running down the aisle with a basketful of sandwiches and chewing gum; there was another one with pink editions of the evening papers; it was exactly like a ball game or a circus. . . . Where was he? Wasn’t he coming back at all? . . . Outside the snow was falling; you could see it white against the black windowpanes, and all the lights in the courtroom were blazing. . . . Well, but where was he?
A voice from somewhere just behind her said ominously, “Can’t bear me, can’t she? I’ll learn her!”
The red-headed girl screwed around in her seat. He was leaning over the back of the chair next to her with a curious expression on his not unagreeable countenance.
The red-headed girl said in a small, abject voice that shocked her profoundly, “Don’t go away—don’t go away again.”