Page:Henry Northcote (IA henrynorthcote00snairich).pdf/231

 patient, I can promise that your time to receive them will arrive."

The measured dryness of the young man's manner set the bar in a twitter.

"Damn his young eyes," said a barrister of elephantine proportions on the back bench to a colleague; "two birds with one stone. I shall stand him a bottle. I like his mug."

The opinion of the ex-president of the Oxford Union was less favorable.

"Funny chap, isn't he?" drawled the product of Eton and Christchurch. "What can he do for the case by trying to score off the judge and a silk gown?"

"Theoretically he's wrong," said the son of the Master of the Rolls; "but it was very nicely done. I am sure my guv'nor would have liked it."

Divested of its endless interruptions, the cross-*examination of the woman was conducted with that persuasiveness he had used from the first. And to those acquainted with the immensely difficult art Northcote was essaying, it became a source of surprise that so young a man should evince this perfect command over the means he employed, when the high-strung nerves of the natural man were subjected to such severe trials from an opponent. And the reward of his restraint came to him as he proceeded, for the wretched woman was melted to tears by such a sympathetic tenderness; and further, the intercourse he had already established with the jury seemed to deepen.

"It is due to the courtesy of the police that you are able to follow your calling?"

"Yes, sir."