t was in the air
until, from street talk, he learned of the tragedy.

The chief issue of fact pivoted on his testimony that on that day he had
not been near the state house or executive building. The Commonwealth
would contradict that claim with the counter assertion that, straight as
a hiving bee, Asa had hastened from the train to the Governor's official
headquarters, where he had been cold-bloodedly rehearsed in his grim
duties. After firing the shot, the prosecution would contend he had
taken command of the other mountaineers who refused to the police the
privilege of entry and search.

Through days, weeks even, after that, Boone sat, always in the same
place, with steadfast confidence in the eyes which he bent upon his
kinsman.

Into the press dispatches began to steal mention of a boy in a cheap but
new suit of store clothes, whose eyes held those of the prisoner with a
rapt and unwavering constancy. It was even said that the amazingly
steady courage of the defendant seemed at times of unusual stress to
lean on that supporting confidence, and that whenever they brought him
from jail to courtroom, he looked first of all for the boy, as a pilot
might look for a reef-light.

Shortly before the Commonwealth was ready to close, rumours went abroad.
It was hinted that new and sensational witnesses would take the stand,
with revelations as spectacular as the climax of a melodrama.

Boone had followed the evidence with a tense absorption. He had marked
the effect of each point; the success or failure of every blow, and he
realized what a powerful web was being woven about the man in whom he
fully believed. There was no escaping the cumulative and strengthening
effect of circumstance built upon circumstance.

He recognized, too, how like a keystone in an arch was the dependence of
the State upon proving one thing: that Asa had been present, just after
the shooting, and in command of those who barred the doors of the
executive building against legitimate search. He took comfort in the
fact that so far it had not been established by one sure piece of
evidence. Then came the last of the Commonwealth's announced witnesses.

Upon the faces of the attorneys for the prisoner quivered a dubious
expression of apprehension--as they waited the promised assault of the
masked batteries. The son of the man who had walked at Senator Goebel's
side, when he fell, took the stand and told with straightforward
directness the story of