was reserved for a point of even greater import than the value of any separate piece of evidence.  If, said the judge, the inferences and theory of the prosecution were correct; if this unhappy woman, driven to desperation by her husband, and knowing where he kept his pistols, had taken his life with one of them, and afterwards manufactured the traces of a supposititious burglary; then there was no circumstance connected with the crime which could by any possibility reduce it from murder to manslaughter.  The solemnity of this pronouncement was felt in the farthest corner of the crowded court.  So they were to find her guilty of wilful murder, or not guilty at all!  Every eye sped involuntarily to the slim black figure in the dock; and, under the gaze of all, the figure made the least little bow—­a movement so slight and so spontaneous as to suggest unconsciousness, but all the more eloquent on that account.

Yet to many in court, more especially to the theatrical folk behind the man with the white hair, the gesture was but one more subtle touch in an exhibition of consummate art and nerve.

“If they do acquit her,” whispered one of these wiseacres to another, “she will make her fortune on the stage!”

Meanwhile the judge was dealing at the last with the prisoner’s evidence in her own behalf, and that mercifully enough, though with less reticence than had characterized the earlier portions of his address.  He did not think it possible or even desirable to forget that this was the evidence of a woman upon trial for her life.  It must not be discredited on that account.  But it was for the jury to bear in mind that the story was one which admitted of no corroboration, save in unimportant details.  More than that he would not say.  It was for them to judge of that story as they had heard it for themselves, on its own merits, but also in relation to the other evidence.  If the jury believed it, there was an end of the case.  If they had any reasonable doubt at all, the prisoner was entitled to the full benefit of that doubt, and they must acquit her.  If, on the other hand, the facts taken together before and after the murder brought the jury to the conclusion that it was none other than the prisoner who had committed the murder—­though, of course, no one was present to see the act committed—­they must, in duty to their oaths, find her guilty.

During the judge’s address the short November day had turned from afternoon to night, and a great change had come over the aspect of the dim and dingy court.  Opaque globes turned into flaring suns; incandescent burners revealed unsuspected brackets; the place was warmed and lighted for the first time during the week.  And the effect of the light and warmth was on all the faces that rose as one while the judge sidled from the bench, and the jury filed out of their box, and the prisoner disappeared down the dock stairs for the last time in ignorance of her fate.  Next moment there was the buzz of talk