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Two days later I again met the Warden as he was entering the main door of the jail. He had been over to the Court-house, he said, helping the deputy along with a new "batch of moonshiners." "What became of Bud Tilden?" I asked. "Oh, he got it in the neck for robbin' the mails, just's I told you he would. Peached on himself like a d fool and give everything dead away.
"Very well," said Mr Armstrong; and then going out on to the landing-place, called out over the banisters "Doctor Doctor Colligan! tell his lordship Mr Lynch objects to a private interview: he had better just step down to the Court-house, and issue his warrant. You might as well tell Constable Nelligan to be in the way." "D n!" exclaimed Barry, sitting bolt upright in his bed.
"I lost you at the court-house," the younger man said. "I didn't mean to let you come home alone." "Thank you, Dick." It seemed as if neither joy nor sorrow would find a way into the quiet voice again.
Of these things there is now not a trace, save, perhaps, the stump of the cross, near the south wall of the nave. Nor are there any undoubted remains of the mediæval wall which enclosed the precincts, except the fragment with an archway in it, which still forms the southern entrance. In that year this was pulled down, and the present court-house was built upon the site.
The bodies of the culprits were buried in the jail-yard, on the spot where the court-house stands, and old residents identified Smith's skeleton, when it was accidentally exhumed, by its uncommon size. A farmer from an adjacent town made off with a thigh bone, and a mason clapped mortar into the empty skull and cemented it into the wall, where it long remained.
Friday, the fifth and last day of the trial, was ushered in by a tempest of wind and rain, that drove the blinding sheets of sleet against the court-house windows with the insistence of an icy flail; while now and then with spasmodic bursts of fury the gale heightened, rattled the sash, moaned hysterically, like invisible fiends tearing at the obstacles that barred entrance.
"When Keithley fell in the court-house yard, and while the rifle smoke was still curling from a jury-room window, I rushed into the place and I found this boy there. He was wiping gun grease from his hands, and he testified that he had heard the shot while passing and had come in to detect the assassin. Of course, he was the murderer. He has other crimes of the same type to his damnable discredit.
The Raja's son lay down and slept, and the ants crushed out the oil for him. The prince was very glad when he saw the oil. The next morning he took it to the court-house to the king. But the king said, "You cannot yet marry my daughter. If you wish to do so, you must first fight with my two demons and kill them."
Nearly a year afterwards a motley band of ruffians might have been seen walking up the main road at Mardan towards the Court-House. It was a deputation from a far-away country come to discuss matters with the political officer.
The ragged pathway closed again as the riders swung round, bunched, and launched at the mass from the rear. Those who had turned to face the second charge were crowded back as the cowboys, with guns going, ate into the yelling crowd. The mob turned, and like a great, black wave swept down the street and into the court-house square.
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