“I say you do not know,” Brant insisted, going back of the admonition and speaking to the assertion. “Let me ask you one question, Judge Langford: Have you remembered that, as my counsel, you would be obliged to cross-examine your own son?”
“I have.”
“Good God! And you would do it? Why—” The prisoner checked himself suddenly, as one on the verge of a precipice, faced about, and went on more calmly: “But you must know that I wouldn’t allow it. It is the height of generosity and unselfishness on your part to offer it, but I can not accept—indeed, I can not.”
“You must accept; it is my privilege to insist.”
“And mine to refuse, ungracious as it may seem. I can not give you my reasons, and you must not ask them. But I’ll say to you what I have not said to anybody else. If I should suffer you to do this thing which you propose you would never forgive me as long as you live!”
The judge met him firmly on his own ground. “That is only adding mystery to mystery. Be frank with me, Mr. Brant, at whatever cost to yourself, or to any one.”
There was no reply to this, and the judge pressed his advantage vigorously. “Let us put away all equivocation and seek only to understand each other,” he went on. “You have committed this crime”—the prisoner looked up quickly, and seemed to draw breath of relief—“you have committed this crime, and for some reason, real or fancied, you are determined to make no effort to save yourself. From a purely self-centred point of view this may seem right and proper; but you must remember that no man lives or dies to himself. You owe something to your friends; you owe something to me, since it was at least a part of your errand last Friday night to find my son and to send him home.”
“Then you know—” Brant began, but the judge went on quickly:
“I know that much, and no more. It is for you to tell me the rest.”
“I can’t do it, Judge Langford, and you must forgive me if I still insist that you do not know what you are asking of me. I appreciate your kindness more than I can tell, but I can not suffer it. I have sins enough to answer for, God knows, without adding another for which there would be no forgiveness in this world or the next.”