Aylmer's eyes still met his with level contempt.
"I know Despard, I've known him since boyhood," he answered. "He does not do these things."
Landon shrugged his shoulders.
"Of course! I'm down and you're all stamping me into the mud, lower and lower. You've all taken the accepted view, and when I cry out against it I'm told I've had my chance. So I did, but it was never a fair one."
"You have still six months in which to give your version to the King's Proctor if you have any new facts to support your statement," said Aylmer, coldly.
"Facts! How am I to get the benefit of facts when the other side can manufacture answers for them with a dollar for my every penny? I've supplied 'facts' to the King's Proctor till I'm sick of the sight of his office paper assuring me that he has 'no evidence to justify my contentions.' I can give facts enough. It's a hearing I want—an impartial hearing!"
Aylmer shook his head.
"You got it," he said doggedly. "You got it!"
Landon rapped his stick upon the pavement.
"I tell you I didn't!" he cried. "I tell you that I could tell you things that would prove to you—yes, prove—that the whole job was got up by that scoundrel who's just left us—got up by him to steal my wife from me. I ask you to hear me; I appeal to you to listen to my side; I appeal to your sense of justice!"