“Very well; on condition we recommend him to mercy.”
“What do you say, gentlemen; shall we recommend him to mercy?”
“'Ear, 'ear!” burst from the commercial traveller, and from the chemist came the murmur:
“No harm in that.”
“Well, I think there is. They shoot deserters at the front, and we let this fellow off. I'd hang the cur.”
Mr. Bosengate stared at that little wire-haired brute. “Haven't you any feeling for others?” he wanted to say. “Can't you see that this poor devil suffers tortures?” But the sheer impossibility of doing this before ten other men brought a slight sweat out on his face and hands; and in agitation he smote the table a blow with his fist. The effect was instantaneous. Everybody looked at the wire-haired man, as if saying: “Yes, you've gone a bit too far there!” The “little brute” stood it for a moment, then muttered surlily:
“Well, commend 'im to mercy if you like; I don't care.”
“That's right; they never pay any attention to it,” said the grey-haired man, winking heartily. And Mr. Bosengate filed back with the others into court.
But when from the jury box his eyes fell once more on the hare-eyed figure in the dock, he had his worst moment yet. Why should this poor wretch suffer so—for no fault, no fault; while he, and these others, and that snapping counsel, and the Caesar-like judge up there, went off to their women and their homes, blithe as bees, and probably never thought of him again? And suddenly he was conscious of the judge's voice:
“You will go back to your regiment, and endeavour to serve your country with better spirit. You may thank the jury that you are not sent to prison, and your good fortune that you were not at the front when you tried to commit this cowardly act. You are lucky to be alive.”