Page:The Art of Cross-Examination.djvu/272

 Mr. Sage read the letter, handed it back to Norcross, and suggested that he had a gentleman waiting for him in his private office, and could be through his business in a couple of minutes when he would give the matter his attention.

Norcross responded: "Then you decline my proposition? Will you give it to me? Yes or no?" Sage explained again why he would have to postpone giving it to him for two or three minutes to get rid of some one in his private office, and just at this juncture Mr. Laidlaw entered the office, saw Norcross and Sage without hearing the conversation, and waited in the anteroom until Sage should be disengaged. As he waited, Sage edged toward him and partly seating himself upon the table near Mr. Laidlaw, and without addressing him, took him by the left hand as if to shake hands with him, but with both his own hands, and drew Mr. Laidlaw almost imperceptibly around between him and Norcross. As he did so, he said to Norcross, "If you cannot trust me, how can you expect me to trust you?"

With that there was a terrible explosion. Norcross himself was blown to pieces and instantly killed. Mr. Laidlaw found himself on the floor on top of Russell Sage. He was seriously injured, and later brought suit against Mr. Sage for damages upon the ground that he had purposely made a shield of his body from the expected explosion. Mr. Sage denied that he had made a shield of Laidlaw or that he had taken him by the