Blaise felt bound to lodge protest against this monstrous proposition.
“Perhaps, most Elysian of fair ladies, it would be, as one might say, more seemly if I, as a justice of the peace—”
Brilliana daffed him down.
“Sir Blaise, we are at war now, and by your leave I will handle this matter after my own fashion.”
“I must protest,” Blaise bleated, but Brilliana would not listen to him.
“You must do nothing,” she insisted, “but help me to set chairs. One here for me, one there for you, my brother justice; one there for Captain Cloud, who, as a stranger of distinction, shall have a seat on the bench.”
“I thank you for the honor,” said Evander, watching the scene with much entertainment. As Brilliana talked she, with Blaise and Halfman, had been busy placing seats as she directed at the table.
“Captain Halfman,” Brilliana went on, “you write a clerkly hand. Sit you here; you shall be our clerk. Arraign the prisoners.”
By this time all were seated as Brilliana had disposed; Sir Blaise had completely surrendered his dignity to her spell. Even Halfman found pleasure in the grotesque sham trial.
Garlinge and Clupp brought their charges down to face the newly formed tribunal. Halfman spoke.