long trial, but willing to wait until six o'clock, the usual hour of adjournment, for the jury. The shabby court-room was filled with men, eager, talkative, but almost breathless with excitement—for by some occult means, they divined that the jury wouldn't be long making up its verdict.
The negro sat in the dock, more ghastly, more ashy than ever. Pembroke rose to go to his office. He felt his iron nerve beginning to give way, but a voice—piteous and pleading—reached him.
"Fur God's sake, Marse French, doan' go 'way. I want you fur ter stay by me."
Pembroke sat down again, this time a little nearer the poor prisoner, whose eyes followed him like a dog's.
A hush settled down upon the audience. There was no pretense of attending to any other business. The opposing lawyers rested wearily in uncomfortable postures about the court-room. They talked in whispers among themselves. Pembroke knew by instinct what they were saying. It was that the jury was hopelessly gone, but that there remained hope yet in the stern and silent Judge, whose instructions had been brief and in no way indicative of which way his judgment inclined. It was not the result of this trial which concerned them, it was the prospect of another.
Among practiced lawyers, nothing is easier to tell than the views of a judge on a criminal case—after the decision has been rendered. About an hour of the suspense had been endured when a message
