In a small unventilated room overlooking the Keep the Jury considered their share of the verdict.
"Gentlemen," said one (he was an auctioneer and a Town Commissioner), "you heard what the Deemster said. We can't let her off but we can recommend her to mercy."
"Why should we?" said another, a tall landowner with a bad reputation about women. "She killed her child. Let her swing, I say."
"But she said she didn't intend to and that she was out of herself and frightened by her step-father," said a third—a fat butcher who was sitting astride on a chair and making it creak under him.
"Chut! That was only an after-thought," said a fourth—a little bald-headed English grocer.
"Still and for all we know what Dan Baldromma is," said the butcher, "an infidel who believes neither in God nor the devil."
"He's devil enough himself," said the grocer. "His father was the 'angman."
"That was his uncle," said the butcher.
"No, but his father. They called him Dan the Black, and after the 'anging of Patrick Kelly of Kentraugh...."
"Question! Question!" cried the Town Commissioner. "Let's keep to the point, gentlemen."