with free
hands. Joe's face seemed almost beatific in its exalted serenity as he
saluted his waiting mother with a smile. To those who had seen the gray
pallor of his strained face yesterday, it appeared as if he had cast his
skin during the night, and with it his harassments and haunting fears,
and had come out this morning as fresh and unscarred as a child.

Joe stood for a moment running his eyes swiftly over the room. When they
found the face they sought a warm light shot into them as if he had
turned up the wick of his soul. She was not so near the front as on the
day before, yet she was close enough for eye to speak to eye.

People marked the exchange of unspoken salutations between them, and
nudged each other, and whispered: "There she is!" They wondered how she
was going to cut up today, and whether it would not end for her by
getting herself sent to jail, along with that scatter-feathered young
crow whom she seemed to have taken into her heart.

Ollie was present, although Joe had not expected to see her, he knew not
why. She was sitting in the first row of benches, so near him he could
have reached over and taken her hand. He bowed to her; she gave him a
sickly smile, which looked on her pale face like a dim breaking of sun
through wintry clouds.

To the great surprise and greater disappointment of the public in
attendance upon the trial, Sam Lucas announced, when court opened, that
the state would not proceed with the cross-examination of the defendant.
Hammer rose with that and stated that the defense rested. He had no more
witnesses to call.

Hammer wore a hopeful look over his features that morning, a reflection,
perhaps, of his client's unworried attitude. He had not been successful
in his attempt to interview Alice Price, although he had visited her
home the night before. Colonel Price had received him with the air of
one who stoops to contact with an inferior, and assured him that he was
delegated by Miss Price--which was true--to tell Mr. Hammer that she
knew nothing favorable to his client's cause; that her caution in his
moment of stress had nothing behind it but the unaccountable impulse of
a young and sympathetic girl.

Hammer accepted that explanation with a large corner of reservation in
his mind. He knew that she had visited the jail, and it was his opinion
that his client had taken her behind the door of his confidence, which
he had closed to his attorney. Alice Price knew something, she