"A Sense of Story" Summary

After four days of sitting silently at his murder trial, Robert L. Charles interrupts his attorney'x summation to tell the jury calmly he killed the sonofabitch and is only sorry the gun broke before he could get six slugs into him. Having ensured his doom and ended the trial, Charles sits down and the judge, a thoughtful, painstaking man, retreats to his book-lined office to read rapidly through the transcripts and decide whether evidence tip the scales against Charles, rendering the outburst moot. The facts present an open-and-shut case. Charles shoots his employer of 13 years, Frank Johnson. After hearing the shots, mechanic Jed Jones finds Charles bending over Johnson with a smoking gun in his left hand and stuffing bullets into Johnson's mouth with his right. Charles waits to be arrested, does not resist officers...