"A half of bitter would elucidate it wonderful to my mind," was the answer.
But already a policeman had been sworn, and given his evidence with the decisiveness of a gramophone.
"Any questions?" said the foreman, looking round the table. No one spoke.
"Signify, gentlemen, signify!" cried the genial usher, and all but Mr. Clarkson held up a hand.
"Two, four, six, eight, ten, twelve," counted the usher, totting up the hands till he reached a majority. "True Bill, True Bill! Next case. Page eleven, number fifty-two."
"Do you mean to tell me that is all?" asked Mr. Clarkson, turning to his neighbour.
"Say no more, and I'll make it a quart," replied the red-faced man, ticking off the last case and turning up the new one, in which a doctor was already giving his evidence against a woman charged with the wilful murder of her newly-born male child.
"Signify, gentlemen, signify!" cried the usher. "Two, four, six, eight, ten, twelve. True Bill, True Bill! Next case. Page fourteen, number seventy-two."
"Stop a moment," stammered Mr. Clarkson, half rising; "if you please, stop one moment. I wish to ask if we are justified in rushing through questions of life and death in this manner. What do we know of this woman, for instance—her history, her distress, her state of mind?"
"Sit down!" cried some. "Oh, shut it!" cried others. All looked at him with the amused curiosity of people in a tramcar looking at a talkative child. The usher bustled across the room, and said in a loud and reassuring whisper: "All them things has got nothing to do with you, sir. Those is questions for the Judge and Petty Jury upstairs. The magistrates have sat on all these cases already and committed them for trial; so all you've got to do is to find a True Bill, and you can't go wrong."