Page:Held to Answer (1916).pdf/434

 "No. Furthermore—" began the witness.

"That will do! That will do!" exclaimed Searle rising, and motioning with his hand as if to stop the witness's mouth. "That is all," he added quickly. "Cross-examine."

Wilson turned expectantly to Hampstead. He was aching to be permitted to say more, to offer testimony that would break the force of that which he had just given. But the minister, comprehending fully the generous desire of his friend, merely looked him in the eye and shook his head; for this was one of the trails neither he nor any one else must be permitted to pursue.

Having asked this series of questions of Wilson about the money, apparently as an afterthought, which it was not, Searle then recalled Hayes and Wadham, and put the same questions to them. Each made the same attempt to qualify and enlarge, but each was carefully held to a statement which pictured John Hampstead making desperate efforts among his friends to raise quickly what must have been a very large sum of money, for an unexplained purpose.

Searle felt this to be the climax of his case.

"The People rest," he exclaimed with dramatic suddenness, sitting down and inserting a thumb in his arm-hole, while after a defiant glance at the minister, he turned and scanned the spectators outside the rail for signs of approval of the skillful handling of their cause by him, their oath-bound servant.

But the eyes of the spectators were on the defendant, who now stepped to the platform and stood with upraised right hand before the clerk to be sworn. As he composed himself in the witness chair, his manner was cool and even meditative. The central figure in this tense, emotional drama, which had every significance for himself, he seemed scarcely more than aware of his surroundings.