Page:MacGrath--The luck of the Irish.djvu/233



ILLIAM found it hard to resist the desire to leap the rail, swim out to Camden, and throttle him. He might have done so but for one thing. Aden was English. Recently he had heard something about the immutability of the English law. If you killed a man in cold blood they really made you pay the penalty, these Britishers. It did not matter a continental whoop how many dollars and lawyers you could mobilize; if they found you guilty you paid the penalty. You couldn't lug in brain-storms, alienists, and handwriting experts, appeal from court to court until for very weariness some jury would let you go. No; these Britishers hanged you or sent you to penal servitude for life, and no back talk.

So William did not jump overboard. They would have locked him up in Aden, tried him, and hanged him. Under such conditions the death of Camden would benefit no one but Colburton, who might be pleased to hear of the death of his jackal. Besides, William saw another side of the square: he hadn't a shred of real evidence against Camden, he had only suppositions. He knew, but the law would not be able to recognize what he knew as evidence.