him."

"That's all Young knows about it," growled the minister. "You and I know
these people, Bates, better then Young does, and Skinner's word isn't
worth the powder to blow it up with."

Bates took his accustomary position on the book-keeper's stool and
spread his long hands out on his knees.

"Well, the professor says," he went on, "that Skinner can prove that he
didn't use the gun."

"How can he prove it?" asked Graves sharply, "only by the oaths of men
with no more veracity than he has. I wouldn't believe one of those
squatters if he used the sacred oath twenty times over."

"Maybe the next jury will think differently," argued the druggist.

"Bigger fools they then," interrupted Graves. "I don't know what the
town is coming to if the fishermen can shoot down our officials without
even remonstrance. I'll tell you what, Bates, there'll be a city war
over Skinner. Let Young take up the cudgel, and I'll see what the church
can do. There's power in the pulpit, I can tell you that."

Bates agreed to this.

"If the citizens of this city," continued the minister, encouraged by
the evident acquiescence of the druggist, "should take this matter up as
a body, ten men like Young couldn't bring about Skinner's acquittal."

"I'm not so sure," muttered Bates.

"I'm sure," insisted Graves strenuously, "very sure, for, if to a man
every one is ready to do his duty, what kind of a jury could they have?
Like yesterday's--conviction, swift and sure."

"But" objected the druggist, "a juror who takes his oath in a murder
case, must know little or nothing of it. Men would not be accepted if
for a week or month they had listened to combative sermons against the
prisoner. And you certainly wouldn't have a juror perjure himself, would
you, Graves?"

"The district attorney is no fool," replied the minister, softening his
argument under the shocked expression of Bates; "he knows when the state
is to be benefited by the outcome of a trial. He can leave off certain
questions; it has been done."

"I know it," interrupted Bates. "But--it seems hardly fair."

Just then the door opened, and Silas Jones, the richest man in the town,
took his seat with the other two "Ameners." The fascinating subject of
the day, the unusualness of the squatter trial and the girl with the
singing voice, continued to be the topic of conversation. Minister
Graves' family, in standing out against him in a matter so near his
heart, only strengthened his