The colonel, left alone, stood a moment looking after him, considering him. Come to look at it, he thought, it was a pretty bad place—even for a lummox. He had always thought well of William, he had once imagined him as the possible husband of Virginia, but now——
The colonel tugged at his white mustache with a grim face. He was thinking of Virginia’s face on the stairs, the soft sadness of that profile.
“It can’t be that Jinny cares!” he cried indignantly under his breath.
Then, unable to endure the idea, he swung open the baize doors and worked his way into the crowded court-room. There was a little stir in it now, an air of relief. The twelfth juror had just been accepted.
XXIII
The trial dragged its way through the rest of the afternoon and all the next day, the colonel sitting dutifully beside his good friend, Johnson Carter. The old man leaned forward on his cane, an interested spectator, hoping in his heart that he was thus killing off any gossip about that old attachment between William Carter and his granddaughter. It was from him that Virginia got her news of the proceedings, and an account of Daniel as a lawyer.
“Say, Jinny, that boy’s as smart as a steel trap,” said the colonel delightedly. “If William had had half his gumption, he wouldn’t be in the fix he’s in now. You ought to see Dan get a jury. By gum, I had to laugh at the way he got Haskins on the hip every time. Got the indictment in the second degree, too, Jessup says.”
“It would have been terrible to try that boy for murder in the first degree,” said Virginia. “Why, grandpa, I don’t believe Major Haskins would do it.”
“Jinny, Haskins would indict his own grandmother for grand larceny if he thought it would get him a seat in the Legislature,” retorted the colonel with asperity. “I reckon I know Jim Haskins!”
At which Virginia had to laugh; but she felt very little like laughing as the trial dragged on. She went over twice to carry flowers, and what comfort she could to Mrs. Carter and Emily. The last time she regretted it, for Mrs. Carter lost her head and sobbed on the young comforter’s shoulder.