ere's the lawyer? Where's my father?"

She looked about eagerly, searching faces. Not one did she know. What
had happened? She felt the spasm of chills returning to her. Had Miss
Craig failed her? Where was the strikers' lawyer? Were there friends
waiting out in the tired audience, among the sleepy witnesses? Suddenly
she saw Blondy laughing and talking with a gaudy woman in the crowd. She
trembled all at once with animal rage.... She could have set upon him
with her nails and her teeth. But she was fearfully afraid, fearfully
helpless. What could she do? What would be done with her?

John pushed her forward a few steps; her own volition could not take
her, and then she saw the judge. This judge--would he understand? Could
he sympathize with a young girl who was wrongly accused? The magistrate
was talking carelessly with his clerk, and Rhona felt in a flash that
all this, which to her was terrible and world-important, to him was mere
trivial routine.

She waited, her heart pounding against her ribs, her breath coming short
and stifled. Then all at once she saw Joe and Myra as they entered the
gate, and a beautiful smile lit up her face. It was a blessed moment.

They came up; Joe spoke in a low breath.

"Rhona, have you seen the lawyer about?"

"No," she muttered.

Joe looked around. He stood above that crowd by half a head. Then he
muttered bitterly to Myra:

"Why isn't that fellow here to-night? You shouldn't have let me sleep!"

Myra was abashed, and Rhona, divining his misery, felt quite alone
again, quite helpless.

Suddenly then she was pushed forward, and next the indoor policeman was
handing her up to the judge, and now she stood face to face with her
crisis. Again her heart pounded hard, her breath shortened. She was
dimly aware of Joe and Myra behind her, and of Blondy and his friends
beside her. She looked straight at the magistrate, not trusting herself
to glance either side.

The magistrate looked up and nodded to the policeman.

"What's the charge?" His voice was a colorless monotone.

"Assault, your Honor. This girl was picketing in the strike, and this
private detective told her to move on. Then she struck him."

Rhona felt as if she could burst; she expected the magistrate to
question her; but he continued to address the policeman.

"Any witnesses?"

"These other detectives, your Honor."

The magistrate turned to Blondy's friends.

"Is what the policeman says true?"

"Yes," they