three rows of seats on graduated levels. This was the jury box. Ranged
in front of the table were the counsel for the King, the clerk of the
court, and two or three lawyers. An ancient oak chest, ribbed with
iron and secured by several massive padlocks, stood on the table.

The day was cold. A close mist that had come from the mountains
hovered over the court and crept into every crevice, chilling and
dank.

There was much preliminary business to go through, and the people who
thronged the court watched it with ill-concealed impatience. True
bills were found for this offence and that: assaults, batteries,
larcenies.

Amid a general hush the crier called for Ralph Ray.

Ralph stepped up quietly, and laid one hand on the rail in front of
him. The hand was chained. He looked round. There was not a touch
either of pride or modesty in his steady gaze. He met without emotion
the sea of faces upturned to his own face. Near the door at the end of
the court stood the man who had been known in Lancaster as Ralph's
shadow. Their eyes met, but there was no expression of surprise in
either face. Close at hand was the burlier ruffian who had insulted
the girl that sang in the streets. In the body of the court there was
another familiar face. It was Willy Ray's, and on meeting his
brother's eyes for an instant Ralph turned his own quickly away.
Beneath the bar, with downcast eyes, sat Simeon Stagg.

The clerk of the court was reading a commission authorizing the court
to hear and determine treasons, and while this formality was
proceeding Ralph was taking note of his judges. One of them was a
stout, rubicund person advanced in years. Ralph at once recognized him
as a lawyer who had submitted to the Parliament six years before. The
other judge was a man of austere countenance, and quite unknown to
Ralph. It was the former of the two judges who had the principal
management of the case. The latter sat with a paper before his face.
The document sometimes concealed his eyes and sometimes dropped below
his mouth.

"Gentlemen," said the judge, beginning his charge, "you are the grand
inquest for the body of this county, and you have now before you a
prisoner charged with treason. Treason, gentlemen, has two aspects:
there is treason of the wicked imagination, and there is treason
apparent: the former poisons the heart, the latter breaks forth in
action."

The judge drew his robes about him, and was about to continue, when
the paper