“Miller,” he replied, “I have done you a great injustice.  I honor you for the position you have taken.  Were I in your place I should probably act exactly as you are doing.  I cannot promise you a pardon if you testify against Ammon.  I cannot even promise that your wife will receive forty dollars a month, for the money in my charge cannot be used for such a purpose; all I can assure you of is that, should you decide to help me, a full and fair statement of all you may have done will be sent to the Governor with a request that he act favorably upon any application for a pardon which you may make.  The choice must be your own.  Whatever you decide to do, you have my respect and sympathy.  Think well over the matter.  Do not decide at once; wait for a day or two, and I will return to New York and you can send me word.”

The next day Miller sent word that he had determined to tell the truth and take the stand, whatever the consequences to himself and his family might be.  He was immediately transferred to the Tombs Prison in New York City, where he made a complete and full confession, not only assisting in every way in securing evidence for the prosecution of Ammon, but aiding his trustee in bankruptcy to determine the whereabouts of some sixty thousand dollars of the stolen money, which but for him would never have been recovered.  At the same time Ammon was re-arrested upon a bench warrant, and his bail sufficiently increased to render his appearance for trial probable.  As Miller had foreseen, the monthly payment to his wife instantly stopped.

The usual effect produced upon a jury by the testimony of a convict accomplice is one of distrust or open incredulity.  Every word of Miller’s story, however, carried with it the impression of absolute truth.  As he proceeded, in spite of the sneers of the defence, an extraordinary wave of sympathy for the man swept over the court-room, and the jury listened with close attention to his graphic account of the rise and fall of the outrageous conspiracy which had attempted to shield its alluring offer of instant wealth behind the name of America’s most practical philosopher, whose only receipt for the same end had been frugality and industry.  Supported as Miller was by the corroborative testimony of other witnesses and by the certificates of deposit which Ammon had, with his customary bravado, made out in his own handwriting, no room was left for even the slightest doubt, not only that the money had been stolen but that Ammon had received it.  Indeed so plain was the proposition that the defence never for an instant contemplated the possibility of putting Ammon upon the stand in his own behalf.  It was in truth an extraordinary case, for the principal element in the proof was made out by the evidence of the thief himself that he was a thief.  Miller had been tried and convicted of the very larceny to which he now testified, and, although in the eyes of the law no principle of res adjudicata could