"I will have a new copy of the paper brought in at once," said the judge as calmly as before.
"You have an hour. I shall wait in the building that time for your answer. You are too fond of delay and prevarication; I intend to show you that the time for such evasions is now past."
The accused answered only with an oath.
A moment after, he heard the door open, and imagined that the visitors had left. He did not trouble himself to open his eyes and look.
"That slip of a boy will never dare to condemn me," he thought. "Not as long as I stick to a firm denial. As for his paper, I've no need to answer that. Why should I?"
And, lying stretched on his bench, he saw in his mind's eye the same scenes as he had seen before; repeated his former arguments, growing ever more and more convinced of his entire innocence. He was certain now that the two old villagers had been in the habit of laying traps for lonely wanderers; they must have had more than one such life on their conscience.
At the same time, he found something pleasant in the thought that the judge had come in person to ask him to confess. It was proof that they regarded him as an important and dangerous man, whom they were loth to release.
"There you are!" he said to himself proudly. "That's how it is. People all round are afraid the murderer may escape after all. All that crowd there was in the court this morning. And the papers taking it up so eagerly. And the judge himself uncertain what to do; yes, it's all easy enough to understand. They'd like to condemn, but they haven't proof enough. And so they're trying to wring out a confession to help them. They know they can't condemn a man without proof as long as he denies it and sticks to it."
He felt so sure of his safety now that he began to whistle.
Perhaps, after all, it might turn out that this sore trial had not been in vain. "After this," he thought to himself, "there'll be no need to be content with cold potatoes and scrapings of porridge when you come to a lonely hut. After this, you'll only have to say your name, Julius Martin Lamprecht, and people 'll know what they've got to do. They'll get busy then, soon enough, with pots and pans on the fire, and serve up the best they've got. No more lying on a bit of mattress on the floor; no, it 'll be the visitor, the stranger within their gates, that sleeps in the best bed, and the others can sleep on the floor or out in the shed, if they like."