And then, suddenly, they could look at me too. Because I was called as the thirteenth juror on the John Hastings trial.
I walked into it after a night that held no sleep. And looked at it. The yawning amphitheatre where humanity poured. And saw it. The thirteen chairs raised high in the center. And heard it. The crowd's susurrus gentling under insistent reminders from a bodiless Questioner.
I glanced at the faces in the other twelve boxes, recognizing some of them. Angus Vortler, the psychosurgeon. William Bax, head of Intergalactic, a bleak, wintery man who doodled constantly. Dollar signs, probably. Fred Kitson, of the horny palms, chief mechanic on the Darkness. All men who, because they had once reached out and touched hands with John Hastings, were now called to judge him. Several of them nodded to me as I took my place.
Wait.
They brought him in. I remembered the first time I had ever seen him, in the classroom. Eager and tall ... tall and eager. Lord, what changed him? Something had taken the straightness from his shoulders, the sureness from his stride. There were furrows on his face where the tears had already been.
He stood silently in the box where they had put him. A box just big enough for his bulky body, and maybe a little of the misery he carried with him.
A voice spoke.
"This, John Hastings, is your trial. You stand before this Court of Truth-Probity, accused of registering the emotion of hate. A hatred so violent, that had we permitted you to carry out your anticipated actions, it would have resulted in the murder of one Mary Hastings, your wife. Do you understand the charge?"
"I do." He didn't know what to do with his hands.