Page:Harold Titus--Timber.djvu/279

Rh His hand on the table clenched and his eyes showed no humor as they fixed a penetrating gaze on the nervous little judge.

"If she comes off all right, we'll be able to answer the old question about who cracked cock robin, an' when I'm through with him he can squawk as loud as he wants about Chief Pontiac's valuation and they'll laugh him out of the country. I'm afraid of no robber of orphans!" He mouthed the words in satisfaction.

And so while the county buzzed with hostility against Helen Foraker, that little group waited for the hour when Bryant, her only support, would walk from the court house a discredited man, for they knew, as well as the editor himself knew, that for their purposes the charge was as good as conviction.

Humphrey was to have gone to Detroit Monday night to find an investor to take up the mortgage which Wilcox, the new cashier of the Pancake Bank, had informed Helen by mail must be met at the end of the month, when it was due. But the serving of that notice to appear in court Thursday altered all plans.

It was on Tuesday morning that John Taylor entered the Banner office and confronted the editor. The old man looked up from his desk with a searching stare instead of his usual smile.

"You've heard, of course, about me," John said after a brief exchange.

Humphrey pushed up his spectacles and nodded "Everything."

"And you think that I'm—"

He did not finish. The other examined his pencil tip carefully; then looked up once more.