h you," said Mr. Balfour. "I am not one who regards
Robert Belcher as a good-natured man and a useful citizen, and I, for
one--to use your own phrase--want to kill him. He has preyed upon the
public for ten years, and I owe a duty not only to my client but to
society I understand how good a bargain I could make with him at this
point, but I will make no bargain with him. He is an unmitigated
scoundrel, and he will only go out of this Court to be arrested for
crime; and I do not expect to drop him until I drop him into a
Penitentiary, where he can reflect upon his forgeries at leisure."

"Then you refuse any sort of a compromise."

"My dear sir," said Mr. Balfour, warmly, "do you suppose I can give a
man a right to talk of terms who is in my hands? Do you suppose I can
compromise with crime? You know I can't."

"Very well--let it go. I suppose I must go through with it. You
understand that this conversation is confidential."

"I do: and you?"

"Oh, certainly!"

CHAPTER XXVIII.

IN WHICH A HEAVENLY WITNESS APPEARS WHO CANNOT BE CROSS-EXAMINED, AND
BEFORE WHICH THE DEFENSE UTTERLY BREAKS DOWN.

At the re-assembling of the Court, a large crowd had come in. Those who
had heard the request of Mr. Balfour had reported what was going on,
and, as the promised testimony seemed to involve some curious features,
the court-room presented the most crowded appearance that it had worn
since the beginning of the trial.

Mr. Belcher had grown old during the hour. His consciousness of guilt,
his fear of exposure, the threatened loss of his fortune, and the
apprehension of a retribution of disgrace were sapping his vital forces,
minute by minute. All the instruments that he had tried to use for his
own base purposes were turned against himself. The great world that had
glittered around the successful man was growing dark, and, what was
worse, there were none to pity him. He had lived for himself; and now,
in his hour of trouble, no one was true to him, no one loved him--not
even his wife and children!

He gave a helpless, hopeless sigh, as Mr. Balfour called to the witness
stand Prof. Albert Timms.

Prof. Timms was the man already described among the three new witnesses,
as the one who seemed to be conscious of bearing the world upon his
shoulders, and to find it so inconsiderable a burden. He advanced to the
stand with the air of one who had no stake in the contest. His
impartiality came from indifference. He had an