Page:The Fate of Fenella (1892).djvu/114

 "When you say your life, you mean probably more, do you not?" inquired the barrister who was examining her; and she answered him simply, "I do—I mean that which to a woman is dearer than life itself;" and at the words a sort of shiver of suppressed excitement ran through that packed and crowded court—a shiver that made as though one heart-throb of sympathy and of admiration. But more than all else did Fenella owe her salvation to the man who stood up for a whole hour to defend her.

Clitheroe Jacynth, it was said afterward, made his professional reputation over the defense of Lady Francis Onslow. He had been known to be clever, he had been reckoned among the rising men of his day, but never until now had the world quite realized the power that was in him. He had all the eloquence, the fire, the passionate pleading of a man whose whole soul was in the cause that he advocated, and his arguments carried all before them by the sheer force of will and talent. No one who saw the dark, passionate face—the eyes that shone with righteous wrath—who listened to the strong, sinuous words that seemed to burn into the hearts of his hearers as they fell, like living fire, from his lips, ever forgot Jacynth as he was that day. And when, at the last, he looked round the court, and, after a moment of silence, more eloquent than words, began with a deep and low-voiced impressiveness; "I see