“I had told him that it wasn’t any use to try to keep up the fiction; that the truth would all come out at the trial; that the court would appoint a lawyer to defend him, and that any counsel he might have, save and excepting only your father, would break your brother’s testimony down in five minutes. Do you know what he did when I told him this?”
“No.”
“He sat down and scribbled a note for me to take to Forsyth. In that note he told Forsyth that he had reconsidered; that he would accept your father as his counsel. He believed it was the only way to save your brother from a cross-examination which would undo what he was staking his life to do. That is all.”
They had reached the Hollywood gate, and he opened it for her, and when she stood beyond it, lifted his hat.
“I hope I haven’t said too much, or asked too much, Miss Langford.”
She came close to the gate, and he could see her eyes shining in the twilight.
“No, you haven’t said too much, and you haven’t asked too much. I shall go down on my knees to my father, Mr. Jarvis, and—and as God helps me, he shall go to you believing as we do. And for yourself—” But he was gone before she could thank him.
CHAPTER XXXV
THE WISDOM OF MANY AND THE WIT OF ONE
It was quite dark when the reporter left the Langford gate and set out at a rapid walk toward the nearest street-car corner. As he was turning out of Altamont Terrace a four-wheeler with two men on the box swung into the curving street of the suburb from the boulevard. Jarvis gave a shrill whistle, and the carriage drew up at the curb.
“Is that you, Jarvis?” said Antrim, from his seat beside the driver.