s the next witness
called. He was asked by Moxlow to examine a Mount Hope Gas Company bond,
and then the prosecuting attorney placed in his hands a triangular piece
of paper which he selected from among the other fragments on the table.

"Mr. Harden, will you kindly tell the jury of what, in your opinion,
that bit of paper in your hand was once a part?" said Moxlow.

Very deliberately the banker put on his glasses, and then with equal
deliberation began a careful examination of the scrap of paper.

"Well?" said Moxlow.

"A second, please!" said the banker.

But the seconds grew into minutes before he was ready to risk an
opinion.

"We are waiting on you, Mr. Harden," said Moxlow at length.

"I should say that this is a marginal fragment of a Gas Company bond,"
said the banker slowly. "Indeed there can be no doubt on the point. The
paper is the same, and these lines in red ink are a part of the
decoration that surrounds the printed matter. No,--there is no doubt in
my mind as to what this paper is."

"What part of the bond is it?" asked Moxlow.

"The lower right-hand corner," replied the banker promptly. "That is why
I hesitated to identify it; with this much of the upper left-hand corner
for instance, I should not have been in doubt."

"Excused," said Moxlow briefly.

The room became blank before John North's eyes as he realized that a
chain of circumstantial evidence was connecting him with the McBride
murder. He glanced about at a score of men--witnesses, officials, and
jury, and felt their sudden doubt of him, as intangibly but as certainly
as he felt the dead presence just beyond the closed door.

"We have one other witness," said Moxlow.

And Joe Montgomery, seeming to understand that he was this witness,
promptly quitted his chair at the back of the room and, cap in hand,
slouched forward and was duly sworn by the coroner.

If Mr. Montgomery had shown promptness he had also evinced uneasiness,
since his fear of the law was as rock-ribbed as his respect for it. He
was not unfamiliar with courts, though never before had he appeared in
the character of a witness; and he had told himself many times that day
that the business in which he had allowed Mr. Gilmore to involve him
carried him far behind his depths. Now his small blue eyes slid round in
their sockets somewhat fearfully until they rested on Mr. Gilmore, who
had just taken up his position at Marshall Langham's elbow. The gambler
frowned and th