rists. She groaned as if they clamped the flesh of her own.

"Oh, they didn't need to do that," she moaned.

Joe doubtless heard her, for he lifted his face and ran his eyes through
the crowd which had gathered. When he found her he smiled. That was the
first look Colonel Price ever had taken into the lad's face.

"No," said he, answering her anguished outbreak with a fervency that
came from his heart, "there was no need of that at all."

They followed the sheriff and his charge into the court-room, where Mrs.
Newbolt introduced Colonel Price to her son. While Joe and his mother
sat in whispered conversation at the attorney's table, the colonel
studied the youth's countenance.

He had expected to meet a weak-faced, bony-necked, shock-headed type
of gangling youngster such as ranged the Kentucky hills in his own
boyhood. At best he had hoped for nothing more than a slow-headed,
tobacco-chewing rascal with dodging, animal eyes. The colonel's
pleasure, then, both as an artist and an honest man, was great on
beholding this unusual face, strong and clear, as inflexible in its
molded lines of high purpose and valiant deeds as a carving in Flemish
oak.

Here was the Peter Newbolt of long ago, remodeled in a stronger cast,
with more nobility in his brow, more promise in his long, bony jaw. Here
was no boy at all, but a man, full-founded and rugged, and as honest as
daylight, the colonel knew.

Colonel Price was prepared to believe whatever that young fellow might
say, and to maintain it before the world. He was at once troubled to see
Hammer mixed up in the case, for he detested Hammer as a plebeian
smelling of grease, who had shouldered his unwelcome person into a
company of his betters, which he could neither dignify nor grace.

The proceedings in court were brief. Joe stood, upon the reading of the
long, rambling information by the prosecuting attorney, and entered a
calm and dignified plea of not guilty. He was held without bond for
trial two weeks from that day.

In the sheriff's office Mrs. Newbolt and the colonel sat with Joe, his
wrists free from the humiliating irons, and talked the situation over.
Hammer was waiting on the outside. Colonel Price having waved him away,
not considering for a moment the lowering of himself to include Hammer
in the conference.

The colonel found that he could not fall into an easy, advisory attitude
with Joe. He could not even suggest what he had so strongly recommended
to Mrs