"The People against Henry Woodman."
The judge looked at the dazed prisoner and said:
"What have you to say, Henry Woodman, why sentence should not be imposed upon you for the crime of which you stand convicted by your own plea?"
With a quick movement of his tall figure Stuart was on his feet, every nerve and muscle strung to the highest tension. His long sinewy hands were trembling so violently he could scarcely hold the slip of paper containing the notes he had scrawled for guidance in his address. And yet when he spoke it was with apparent calmness. Only the deep tremulous notes of his voice betrayed his emotion.
"May it please your honour," he slowly began, "I wish to establish to the court before I say anything in behalf of my client, the important fact that he offered to make full restitution of the property taken, that he did this voluntarily before he was even suspected of the crime, and that his offer was refused."
The judge turned to Bivens's lawyers.
"Is this admitted, gentlemen?"
"Without question, your honour," was the instant answer.
The old Recorder lifted his gray eyebrows in surprise, and settled back into his seat with a low grunt.
"I make the fair inference therefore in the beginning," Stuart went on evenly, "that the prosecutor in the case, who appears in this court to-day with an array of distinguished lawyers, whose presence is unnecessary to serve the ends of justice, is here actuated solely by a desire for personal vengeance."