“This line of questioning is not permissible, as I told you before,” said the judge in stern reproof.
But Hammer was obdurate. He was for arguing it, and the judge ordered the sheriff to conduct the jury from the room. Mrs. Greening, red and uncomfortable, and all at 263 sea over it, continued sitting in the witness-chair while Hammer laid it off according to his view of it, and the prosecutor came back and tore his contentions to pieces.
The judge, for no other purpose, evidently, than to prove to the defendant and public alike that he was unbiased and fair–knowing beforehand what his ruling must be–indulged Hammer until he expended his argument. Then he laid the matter down in few words.
Mrs. Greening had not been present when her husband knocked on the door of Isom Chase’s kitchen that night; she did not know, therefore, of her own experience what was spoken. No matter what her husband told her he said, or anybody else said, she could not repeat the words there under oath. It would be hearsay evidence, and such evidence was not admissible in any court of law. No matter how important such testimony might appear to one seeking the truth, the rules of evidence in civilized courts barred it. Mrs. Greening’s lips must remain sealed on what Sol said Joe said, or anybody said to someone else.
So the jury was called back, and Mrs. Greening was excused, and Hammer wiped off the sweat and pushed back his cuffs. And the people who had come in from their farmsteads to hear this trial by jury–all innocent of the traditions and precedents of practice of the law–marveled how it could be. Why, nine people out of nine, all over the township where Sol Greening lived, would take his wife’s word for anything where she and Sol had different versions of a story.
It looked to them like Sol had told the truth in the first place to his wife, and lied on the witness-stand. And here she was, all ready to show the windy old rascal up, and they wouldn’t let her. Well, it beat all two o’clock!
Of course, being simple people who had never been at a university in their lives, they did not know that Form and 264 Precedent are the two pillars of Strength and Beauty, the Jachin and Boaz at the entrance of the temple of the law. Or that the proper genuflections before them are of more importance than the mere bringing out of a bit of truth which might save an accused man’s life.
And so it stood before the jury that Sol Greening had knocked on the door of Isom Chase’s kitchen that night and had not been bidden to enter, when everybody in the room, save the jury of twelve intelligent men–who had been taken out to keep their innocence untainted and their judgment unbiased by a gleam of the truth–knew that he had sat up there and lied.
Hammer cooled himself off after a few minutes of mopping, and called Ollie Chase to the witness-chair. Ollie seemed nervous and full of dread as she stood for a moment stowing her cloak and handbag in her mother’s lap. She turned back for her handkerchief when she had almost reached the little gate in the railing through which she must pass to the witness-chair. Hammer held it open for her and gave her the comfort of his hand under her elbow as she went forward to take her place.
A stir and a whispering, like a quick wind in a cornfield, moved over the room when Ollie’s name was called. Then silence ensued. It was more than a mere listening silence; it was impertinent. Everybody looked for a scandal, and most of them hoped that they should not depart that day with their long-growing hunger unsatisfied.