"deserters' gang," as it was called, his opponents were taken by surprise. One day only was taken up with their evidence. Each witness, debarred by Judge Randolph's orders from communicating with the other, told a rambling, lying, frightened story, out of which Pembroke gleaned the midnight carousal, a quarrel, a blow—all of them running away, and leaving Hackett to his fate. In one point, however, they all agreed—that the man, William Marsh, who was fearfully cut by Hackett's knife, and who disappeared to die, was the one who struck the fatal blow that knocked Hackett senseless, and from which he never rallied. All were eager to lay it on the dead man, and so to shift the suspicion from themselves. The State, of course, impugned the character of the witnesses, but that was a work of supererogation. They had no characters to impugn. Yet, both judge and jury saw, that without the slightest objection to perjuring themselves on the part of this precious gang, they were involuntarily proving that Marsh, not Bob Henry, was the murderer. Then Cave's protégé, a small, ragged, undersized boy of fifteen, was introduced. He was diffident, and shy, and trembling in every limb, but his testimony was perfectly plain and straightforward, so much so that an eminent gentleman on the side of the prosecution, roared out to him, "Now, young man, tell us if this remarkably straight story of yours didn't have help from somewhere. Have you talked with anybody about this evidence?"
