her
over.

"'It's none of your look-out what I do!' she told me. 'You get away from
here, now--this minute! You'll be sorry if you don't!' There was
something about her that frightened me, mad as I was. I'd never seen her
like that before."

"What do you mean?" Garnet urged him.

"I thought she would kill me, or somebody else would, and she knew it. I
got the idea that she was like a crazy woman, out of her head about
Webster, ready to do anything desperate, anything wild. I can't explain
it any better than that."

"And did you leave her?"

"Yes, sir."

"At once?"

"Practically. A sort of panic got hold of me. I can't explain it,
really."

Russell, seeking an illuminative phrase, gave vent to a long-drawn,
anxious sigh. He appeared to feel no shame for his flight. His fear was
that he would not be believed.

"Just as she told me a second time to leave her, I thought I heard
somebody coming toward us, a slushy, dull sound, like heavy footsteps on
the wet grass. Mildred's manner, her voice, had already scared me.

"When I heard those footsteps, I turned and ran. My heart was in my
mouth. I ran out to the road and back toward Washington. I ran as fast
as I could. Twice I fell on my hands and knees. I can't tell you exactly
how it was, why it was. I just knew something terrible would happen if I
stayed there. I never had a feeling like that before. I was more afraid
of her than I was of the man coming toward us."

Members of the jury pushed back their chairs, were audible with subdued
exclamations and long breaths, relieved of the nervous tension to which
Russell's story of the encounter at the gate had lifted them. They were,
however, prejudiced against him, a fact which he grasped.

One of them asked him:

"Can you tell us why you followed her out here?"

"Why?" Russell echoed, like a man seeking time for deliberation.

"Yes. What did you think you'd do after you'd overtaken her?"

"Persuade her to go back home with me. I wanted to save her from doing
anything foolish--anything like that, you know."

"But, from what you've told us here this morning, it seems you never had
much influence on her behaviour. Isn't that true?"

"I suppose it is.--But," Russell added eagerly, "I can prove I had no
idea of hurting her, if that's what you're hinting at. I can prove I
never struck her. At twenty minutes past eleven last night I was four
miles from here. Mr. Otis, a Washington commission merchant, picked me