Whatcheb say your name was?” demanded No. 8, aggressively.

“I didn’t say,” said Sampson coolly. “Call me No. 3, if you don’t mind. I’ll answer to it.”

“Well, my name is Hooper, and that’s what I want to be called.”

“I’m not going to call you anything,” said Sampson, turning away in his loftiest manner.

“Well, I guess it’s just as well you don’t,” snorted No. 8, sticking out his chest, and it wasn’t a very obtrusive chest at that. Putting it back to where it normally belonged was a much less arduous job for No. 8 than sticking it out. He couldn’t have stuck it out at all if he hadn’t possessed the backing of ten men.

In short, the jury had been out for seven hours and the last ballot stood eleven to one for acquittal. Sampson was the unit.

No. 12 tried diplomacy. “Say, now, fellers, let’s get together on this thing. We don’t get anywhere by knockin’ Mr. Sampson. He’s got a right to think as he pleases, same as we have. So let’s be calm and try to get together.”

“My God,” groaned No. 1, “can you beat that? Eleven of us have been together since five o’clock this afternoon, and you talk about being calm. Now, as foreman of this jury, I think I’ve got some right to be heard. You’ll admit that, won’t you, Mr. Sampson?”

“Certainly. Up to this moment, I’ve had no difficulty in hearing you. It isn’t necessary to shout, either. I’m not deaf.”

“Now, let me talk,” went on the foreman. “Keep still a minute, you fellers. Mr. Sampson is a gentleman. He’s got as much sense, I suppose, as any of us. He—”

“Thanks,” said Sampson.

“Well, here we are, ‘leven to one. You admit that your sympathies are with the old man, same as the rest of us. You say you’d sooner be shot than to send him up. Well, now let’s—wait a minute, Hooper! I’m talking. Let’s talk this thing over as friends. I apologise for what I said just after supper. You’ve got a right to be pig-headed. You’ve got a legal right to hang this jury. But is it right and fair? If ‘leven of us are willing to go on record as—er—as putting credence in the testimony of Mr. Hildebrand, I can’t see why you’re afraid to come in with us. Down in your soul you don’t think he’s guilty. You say that maybe he is shielding some one else. If that’s the way you feel, why not come out like a man and give the poor old lad the benefit of the doubt? Lord knows I’m a hard man. I don’t want to see any guilty man escape. I believe in putting ‘em where they belong, and keeping ‘em there. By Gosh, nobody dares to say to my face that I’m easy on criminals. I’m as hard as nails. My wife says I’m as hard as all get-out. And she ought to know. She’s heard me talk about crime here in New York for nearly fifteen years, and she knows how I feel. Well, if I am willing to give the old man a chance, it ought to stand for something, oughtn’t it? Hard as I am? Just reason it out for yourself, Mr. Sampson. Now, we all agree that the evidence against him is pretty strong. But it is circumstantial. You said so yourself in the beginning. It was you who said that it was circumstantial. You said—just a minute, Hooper! You said that while everything pointed to him as the guilty man, nobody actually swore that he saw him take the money. On the other hand, he swears he didn’t take it. He ought to know, oughtn’t he? If he knows who did take it, why that’s his business. I don’t believe in squealers. I wouldn’t have any mercy on a man who turned State’s evidence to save himself. Well, now, supposing old man Hildebrand knows who got away with the stuff. He is too much of a man to squeal. We oughtn’t to send him up just because he won’t squeal on the man—a friend, for all we know—even though it might save him from going to the pen. I leave it to you, Mr. Sampson: ought we?”

“Of course we oughtn’t,” broke in the irrepressible Mr. Hooper. “Any damn’ fool ought to see that.”

Sampson eyed Mr. Hooper severely. “He’s leaving it to me, Mr. Hooper; not to you.” He leaned a little closer, his eyes narrowing. “And, by the way, Mr. Hooper, before we go any farther, I should like to call your attention to several facts entirely separate and apart from this trial. It may interest you to know that I am six feet one in my stocking feet, that I weigh one hundred and ninety-five pounds, that I am just under thirty years of age, that I was one of the strongest men in college, and that up to a certain point I am, and always have been, one of the gentlest and best-natured individuals in the world.”

“What do you mean by that?” blustered No. 8.

“Gentlemen!” admonished the foreman. The automobile salesman stopped picking his teeth.

“I am merely trying to convince you, Mr. Hooper, that there is a great deal more to be said for circumstantial evidence than you might think. You might go on forever thinking that I am a meek, spineless saphead, and on the other hand you might have it proved to you that I’m not. Please reflect on what I have just said. It can’t do you any harm to reflect, Mr. Hooper.”

“Oh, piffle!” said Mr. Hooper, getting very red in the face.

“Sic ‘em!” said No. 12, under his breath.

“Moreover,” went on Sampson, smiling—but mirthlessly—“I am assuming that your exercises as a hat salesman are not such as one gets in a first-class gymnasium. I hope you will pardon me for asking you to repeat the word you just uttered. I think it was ‘piffle.’”

Mr. Hooper grinned. He didn’t feel like grinning hut something psychological told him to do it—and to do it as quickly as possible. “Aw, don’t get sore, old man. Forget it!”

“Certainly,” said Sampson.

The foreman seized the opportunity. “There, now, that’s better. At last we seem to Be getting together.”

No. 7 spoke up. “This might be a good time to take another ballot. It’s ‘leven minutes to one by my watch. We stand ‘leven to one. That’s a good sign. Say, do you know that’s pretty darned smart, if I do say it myself who—”

“Let’s have Mr. Sampson’s revised views on the subject and then take a final ballot for tonight,” said the foreman, wearily.

“I haven’t revised my views,” said Sampson.

There were several draughty sighs. “I’ve stated them five or six times to-night, and I see no reason to alter them now. Deeply as I regret it, I cannot conscientiously do anything but vote for a conviction.”

“Now, listen to me once more, Mr. Sampson,” began the chubby bachelor. “I’ll try to set you straight in—”

“See here,” said Sampson, arising and confronting his companions, “we may just as well look this thing squarely in the face. I don’t want to send him up any more than the rest of you do. But I am going to be honest with myself in this matter if I have to stay out here for six months. We’ve heard all of the evidence. It seems pretty clear to all of us that the defendant was responsible for the loss of that money, even if he didn’t take it himself. He was the treasurer of the concern. He had absolute charge of the funds. So far as we are concerned the State has made out its case. We are supposed to be impartial. We are supposed to render a verdict according to the law and the evidence. We cannot be governed by sympathy or conjecture.

“When I left the court-room with the rest of you gentlemen to deliberate on a verdict, I will confess to you that I had in my heart a hope that you men would do just what you have done all along: vote for acquittal. When I came into this room seven hours ago, I was eager to vote just as you have voted. Then I began to reflect. I asked myself this question: how can I go back to that court-room and look the district attorney and the Court in the face and say that James Hildebrand is not guilty? If I did that, gentlemen, I am quite sure I could never look an honest man in the face again. We have all been carried away by our sympathies—I quite as much as the rest of you. I am convinced that there isn’t a man among you who can stand up here and say, on his honour, that the evidence warrants the discharge of the defendant.

“God knows I want to set him free. I am inclined to believe his story. He is not the sort of man who would steal. But, after all, we are bound, as honest men, to carry out the requirements of the law. The Court clearly stated the law in this case. Under the law, we can do nothing else but convict, gentlemen.

“You, Mr. Foreman, have said that Hildebrand perhaps knows who took the money. You will admit that you are guessing at it, just as I am guessing. In his own testimony he was careful to say nothing that would lead us to believe that he knows the guilty man. The State definitely charges him with the crime and it produces evidence of an overwhelming nature to support the charge. Against this evidence is his simple statement that he did not take the money. He had already pleaded not guilty. Is it to be expected of him, therefore, that he should say anything else but that he did not rob his partners?

“Only the criminals who are caught redhanded confess that they are guilty. The guiltiest of them go on the stand, as we all know, proclaiming their innocence, and, not one, but all of the men who go to the chair after making such pleas maintain with their last breath that they are innocent. Gentlemen, this is the bitterest hour in all my life. I want to set this old man free, but I cannot conscientiously do so. I took my oath to render a fair and impartial verdict. You all know what a fair and impartial verdict must be in this case. I shall have to vote, as I have voted from the beginning, for conviction.”

He sat down. No. 7, who was directly opposite him across the long table, leaned forward suddenly with an odd expression in his eyes. Then he blinked them.

“Why, by jingo, he’s—he’s crying!” he exclaimed, something akin to awe in his voice. “You got tears in your eyes, darn me if you haven’t.”

There were tears in Sampson’s eyes. He lowered his head.

“Yes,” he said gruffly; “and I am not ashamed of them.”

“Oh, come now, old feller,” said Mr. Hooper, uncomfortably; “don’t make a scene. Pull yourself together. We’re all friends here, and we’re all good fellers. Don’t—”

“I’m all right,” said Sampson coldly. “You see I’m not as hard-hearted as you thought. Now, gentlemen, I shall not attempt to argue with you. I shall not attempt to persuade you to look at the case from my point of view. As a matter of fact, I am rather well pleased with the attitude you’ve taken. The trouble is that it isn’t going to help the poor old man. All we can do is to disagree, and that means he will have to be tried all over again, perhaps after many months of confinement. I should like to ask you—all of you—a few rather pointed questions, and I’d like to have square and fair answers from you. What do you say to that?”

“Fire away,” said the foreman.

“It’s one o’clock,” said No. 7. “Supposin’ we wait till after breakfast.”

“Gawd, I’m sleepy,” groaned No. 12.

“No,” said the foreman firmly; “let’s hear what Mr. Sampson has to say. He’s got a lot of good common sense and he won’t ask foolish questions. They’ll be important, believe me.”

They all settled hack in their chairs, wearily, drearily.

“All right. Go ahead,” sighed the chubby bachelor. “I’ll answer any question except ‘what’ll you have to drink,’ and I’ll answer that to-morrow.”

Sampson hesitated. He was eyeing No. 7 in a retrospective sort of way. No. 7 shifted in his chair and succeeded in banishing the dreamy, faraway look in his eyes.

“Assuming,” began the speaker, “that we were trying a low-browed, undershot ruffian instead of James W. Hildebrand, and the evidence against him was identical with that which we have been listening to, would you disregard it and accept his statement instead?”

“The case ain’t parallel,” said No. 8. “His face wouldn’t be James W. Hildebrand’s, and you can bank a lot on a feller’s face, Mr. Sampson.”

The others said, “That’s so.”

“That establishes one fact very clearly, doesn’t it? You all admit that with a different sort of a face and manner, Mr. Hildebrand might be as guilty as sin. Well, that point being settled, let me ask you another question. If Miss Alexandra Hildebrand, the granddaughter who has faced us for six working days, were a sour-visaged, watery-eyed damsel of uncertain age and devoid of what is commonly called sex-appeal, would your sympathies still be as happily placed as they are at present?”

No man responded. Each one seemed willing to allow his neighbour to answer this perfectly unanswerable question.

“You do not answer,” went on Sampson, “so I will put it in another form. Suppose that Miss Alexandra Hildebrand had not been there at all; suppose that she had not been where we could look at her for six short consecutive days—and consequently think of her for six long consecutive nights—or where she couldn’t possibly have looked at us out of eyes that revealed the most holy trust in us—well, what then? I confess that Miss Hildebrand exercised a tremendous influence over me. Did she have the same effect upon you?”

Several of them cleared their throats, and then of one accord, as if moved by a single magnetic impulse, all of them said, in a loud, almost combative tone, “No!”

The chubby bachelor qualified his negative. “She didn’t have an undue influence, Mr. Sampson. Of course, I liked to look at her. She’s easy to look at, you know.” He blushed as his eyes swept the group with what he intended to be defiance but was in reality embarrassment.

No. 7: “I was awfully sorry for her. I guess everybody was.”

No. 9; “She’s devoted to the old man. I like that in her. I tell you there’s nothing finer than a young girl showing love and respect for—”

No. 12: “She’s a square little scout. Take it from me, gents, she wasn’t thinking of me as a juror when she happened to turn her lamps on me. I’m an old hand at the game. I can tell you a lot about women that you wouldn’t guess in—”

Sampson: “We may, therefore, eliminate Miss Hildebrand as the pernicious force in our deliberations. She has nothing to do with our sense of justice. We would be voting, I take it, just as we have been all along if there were no such person as she. However, it occurs to me that each of you gentlemen may have had the same impression that I had during the trial. I had a feeling that Miss Hildebrand was depending on me to a tremendous extent. You may be sure that I do not charge her with duplicity—God knows I have the sincerest admiration for her—but I found it pretty difficult to meet her honest, serene, trustful eyes without experiencing a decided opinion that it was my bounden duty to acquit her grandfather. Anybody else feel that way about it?”

There was a long silence. Again each man seemed to be waiting for the other to break it. It was the foreman who spoke.

“I’ll be perfectly honest, for one,” he said. “I thought and still think that she looked upon me as a friendly juror. Nothing wrong about it, mind you—not a thin............