Part 75

“Don't know why we withdrew, Mr. Foreman!”

Mr. Bosengate looked round to where, at the head of the table, Gentleman Fox sat, in defensive gentility and the little white piping to his waistcoat saying blandly:

“I shall be happy to take the sense of the jury.”

There was a short silence, then the chemist murmured:

“I should say he must have what they call claustrophobia.”

“Clauster fiddlesticks! The feller's a shirker, that's all. Missed his wife--pretty excuse! Indecent, I call it!”

The speaker was the little wire-haired man; and emotion, deep and angry, stirred in Mr. Bosengate. That ill-bred little cur! He gripped the edge of the table with both hands.

“I think it's d-----d natural!” he muttered. But almost before the words had left his lips he felt dismay. What had he said--he, nearly a colonel of volunteers--endorsing such a want of patriotism! And hearing the commercial traveller murmuring: “'Ear, 'ear!” he reddened violently.

The wire-headed man said roughly:

“There's too many of these blighted shirkers, and too much pampering of them.”

The turmoil in Mr. Bosengate increased; he remarked in an icy voice:

“I agree to no verdict that'll send the man back to prison.”

At this a real tremor seemed to go round the table, as if they all saw themselves sitting there through lunch time. Then the large grey-haired man given to winking, said:

“Oh! Come, sir--after what the judge said! Come, sir! What do you say, Mr. Foreman?”

Gentleman Fox--as who should say 'This is excellent value, but I don't wish to press it on you!'--answered:

“We are only concerned with the facts. Did he or did he not try to shorten his life?”

“Of course he did--said so himself,” Mr. Bosengate heard the wire-haired man snap out, and from the following murmur of assent he alone abstained. Guilty! Well--yes! There was no way out of admitting that, but his feelings revolted against handing “that poor little beggar” over to the tender mercy of his country's law. His whole soul rose in arms against agreeing with that ill-bred little cur, and the rest of this job-lot. He had an impulse to get up and walk out, saying: “Settle it your own way. Good morning.”

“It seems, sir,” Gentleman Fox was saying, “that we're all agreed to guilty, except yourself. If you will allow me, I don't see how you can go behind what the prisoner himself admitted.”

Thus brought up to the very guns, Mr. Bosengate, red in the face, thrust his hands deep into the side pockets of his tunic, and, staring straight before him, said:

“Very well; on condition we recommend him to mercy.”

“What do you say, gentlemen; shall we recommend him to mercy?”

“'Ear, 'ear!” burst from the commercial traveller, and from the chemist came the murmur:

“No harm in that.”

“Well, I think there is. They shoot deserters at the front, and we let this fellow off. I'd hang the cur.”

Mr. Bosengate stared at that little wire-haired brute. “Haven't you any feeling for others?” he wanted to say. “Can't you see that this poor devil suffers tortures?” But the sheer impossibility of doing this before ten other men brought a slight sweat out on his face and hands; and in agitation he smote the table a blow with his fist. The effect was instantaneous. Everybody looked at the wire-haired man, as if saying: “Yes, you've gone a bit too far there!” The “little brute” stood it for a moment, then muttered surlily:

“Well, commend 'im to mercy if you like; I don't care.”

“That's right; they never pay any attention to it,” said the grey-haired man, winking heartily. And Mr. Bosengate filed back with the others into court.

But when from the jury box his eyes fell once more on the hare-eyed figure in the dock, he had his worst moment yet. Why should this poor wretch suffer so--for no fault, no fault; while he, and these others, and that snapping counsel, and the Caesar-like judge up there, went off to their women and their homes, blithe as bees, and probably never thought of him again? And suddenly he was conscious of the judge's voice: