Mason said, “No, I’m finishing yours.”
“I’m perfectly capable of finishing my own,” the district attorney shouted.
“You try to finish that speech you started,” Mason told him, “and you’ll...”
The coroner’s gavel banged. The sheriff, jumping from his seat, came striding forward.
“We’re going to have order,” the coroner said.
“You can have it from me,” Mason told him, “if you keep the district attorney from making speeches. The facts of the matter are that this young woman, who has been subjected to a nerve strain well calculated to make her hysterical, is suddenly confronted with a gruesome, gory spectacle. Her natural repugnance is interpreted by the district attorney as an indication of guilt. That’s his privilege. But when he starts making a speech about it...”
“I didn’t make a speech about it,” the district attorney said.
“Well,” the coroner observed, “we’re going to have no more speeches made by either side. The coroner is inclined to feel that it’s asking pretty much of any young woman to have a gruesome spectacle like this suddenly thrust in front of her.”
“It was done,” Mason said, “purely as a grandstand, purely for the purpose of capitalizing on Miss Monteith’s overwrought condition.”
“I had no such intention,” the district attorney said.