ng protectingly across his
shoulder, while Billy's father was bellowing like a bull:

'Be you goin' to let him go! Ain't you goin' to git a writ and arrest
him! Why don't you handcuff him, somebody? And you, Bill, be you a fool
to stan' there a huggin' him as if he was a gal! What do you mean?'

'Ha-Hal is my fr-friend, father. He never to-took the diamonds,' Billy
answered, sadly, while Judge St. Claire, who had the box of jewels in
his hand and was looking very anxious, turned to the angry man clamoring
so loudly for a _writ_ and said, sternly:

'Even if Harold took the diamonds--which he did not, I am certain of
that--there is some mistake which he will explain; but if he took them,
it is too late to arrest him. A theft commited ten years ago cannot be
punished now.'

'May the Lord give you sense,' Peterkin rejoined, with a derisive laugh.
'Don't tell me that a body can't be punished for stealin' diamonds ef
'twas done a hundred years ago,'

'But it is true, nevertheless,' the judge replied.

Turning to another lawyer who was standing near, Peterkin asked:

'Is that so, square? Is it so writ? Is that the law?'

'That is the law,' was the response.

'Wall, I'll be condumbed, if that don't beat all!' Peterkin exclaimed.
'Can't be sent to prison! I swow! There ain't no law or justice for
nobody but _me_, and I must be kicked to the wall! I'll give up, and
won't try to be nobody, I vurm!' And as he talked he walked away to
ruminate upon the injustice of the law which could not touch Harold
Hastings, but could throw its broad arms tightly around himself.

Meanwhile the Judge had ordered a carriage and taken Harold with him to
his private room in the hotel, where the hardest part for Hal was yet to
come.

'Now, my boy,' the judge said, after he had made Harold lie down upon
the couch and had locked the door, 'now, tell me all about it. How came
you by the diamond?'

It was such a pitiful, pleading, agonized face which lifted itself from
the cushion and looked at Judge St. Claire, as Harold began:

'I cannot tell you now--I must not? but by and by perhaps I can. They
were handed to me to keep by some one, just for a little while. I cannot
tell you who it was. I think I would die sooner than do it. Certainly I
would rather go to prison, as Peterkin wishes me to.'

There was a thoughtful, perplexed look on the judge's face as he said:

'This is very strange, Harold, that you cannot tell who gave them to
you,