The jurymen, tired and unshaved, and over the momentary thrill of Ollie’s disclosure, lolled and sprawled in the box. It seemed that they now accepted the thing as settled, and the prospect of further waiting was boresome. The people set up a little whisper of talk, a clearing of throats, a blowing of noses, a shifting of feet, a general preparation and readjustment for settling down again to absorb all that might fall.
The country folk seated in the vicinity of Alice Price, among whom her fame had traveled far, whom many of their sons had loved, and languished for, and gone off to run streetcars on her account, turned their freed attention upon her, nudging, gazing, gossiping.
“Purty as a picture, ain’t she?”
“Oh, I don’t know. You set her ’longside of Bessie Craver over at Pink Hill”–and so on.
The judge looked up from his paper suddenly, as if the growing sound within the room had startled him out of his thought. His face wore a fleeting expression of surprise. He looked at the prosecutor, at the little group in conference at the end of the table below him, as if he did not understand. Then his judicial poise returned. He tapped with his pen on the inkstand.
“Gentlemen, proceed with the case,” said he.
The prosecuting attorney turned from the window with alacrity, and Hammer, sweating and shaking his head in one last gesture of protest to his client–who leaned back and folded his arms, with set and stubborn face–rose ponderously. He wiped his forehead with his great, broad handkerchief, and squared himself as if about to try a high hurdle or plunge away in a race.
“Joseph Newbolt, take the witness-chair,” said he.