"Ha, ha! a lady!" cried Jeffries, with a leer round the table; "we must see the lady. Is she young, fellow? Is she pretty?"
"Quite beautiful, sir," replied the man; "and such a dress!"
"'Twill do--'twill do!" cried the judge; "show her into a private room--quite private, and I will come to her anon. I must steady myself, gentlemen--I must steady myself. I'll even drink a cup of water--that is the most steadying thing I know;" and, after a moment's thought, Jeffries rose and walked out of the room coolly and straightly enough, for it required an infinite quantity of strong drink to produce any thing more in him than a sort of boisterous merriment, in which he strangely forgot all dignity and propriety.
As the reader has probably by this time supposed, the person whom he found waiting for him was Lady Danvers. She was accompanied by her maid, however, and two of her men were stationed at the door of the room.
"My lord," she said, as soon as she entered, "I am glad to see you. You have condemned my young friend, Ralph Woodhall, this day: I come to intercede for him."
"All in vain, my lady--all in vain!" said Jeffries, glancing his eye at the maid-servant. "Found guilty by a jury, he can expect no mercy."
Hortensia had spoken very calmly, and she knew the man too well to let him see any agitation. "Why not?" she asked, in the same quiet tone. "If his guilt were proved, which you, my lord, know quite well it is not, and which I deny, still he would be very much less culpable than any of the others whom you have condemned. You must, and of course will, pardon some, in mere compassion to the executioner. Is it not right, then, to choose the least guilty? Alice, go to the door and stay with the two men; shut the door, remember."
Jeffries grinned; for he saw that Lady Danvers was now coming to the point.
"I do not mean to say," he answered, "that this young man's guilt is quite as atrocious as that of some others, but--"
"The levying of a severe fine," replied Hortensia, "will meet the justice of the case better than execution."