“Public opinion changes over night,” said Mr. Sage. “The light of understanding—”
“The public!” broke in his wife scornfully. “What is the public? I can tell you, my friends. It is the most fickle thing in all this world. No matter how long, how faithfully you serve the public, it turns upon you in time, like the adder, and stings you to death. It feeds you with praise, it fattens you with applause, it clothes you in garments of gold, and then it strips you clean and leaves you to starve. It turns its back on you and fattens another favorite. You can’t tell me anything about the blooming public. I know it to the core, and I am jolly well fed up with it.”
“Bravo!” cried the Judge. “And let me add, Miss Judge, it’s easy to put a ring through the public nose and lead it around in circles.”
“Yes, but the thing is,” broke in Mr. Link, “they’re accusing Oliver of murder. If they make up their minds he’s guilty—well, it’ll take a lot of evidence to convince ’em he ain’t.”
“My dear man,” said Mrs. Sage, “I was the defendant in the most celebrated murder trial ever known in London.”
“Bless my soul, Josephine!” gasped her husband, startled.
“And I was sentenced to be hanged by the neck till dead,” she finished in tragic tones.
“Mercy!” cried Mrs. Grimes weakly.
“My dear wife, have you gone stark, staring mad?”
“Not a bit of it. Would you like to know how I got out of it in the end? I was able to show that my beast of a husband committed the murder.”