that seemed most like a toy or ornament - some hand had
touched the chords, and there came forth music that brought tears. Half a year
before, Esther's dread of being ridiculous spread over the surface of her life;
but the depth below was sleeping.
    Harold Transome was ready to give her his hand and lead her back to her
place. When she was there, Felix, for the first time, could not help looking
towards her, and their eyes met in one solemn glance.
    Afterwards Esther found herself unable to listen so as to form any judgment
on what she heard. The acting out of that strong impulse had exhausted her
energy. There was a brief pause, filled with a murmur, a buzz, and much
coughing. The audience generally felt as if dull weather was setting in again.
And under those auspices the counsel for the prosecution got up to make his
reply. Esther's deed had its effect beyond the momentary one, but the effect was
not visible in the rigid necessities of legal procedure. The counsel's duty of
restoring all unfavourable facts to due prominence in the minds of the jurors,
had its effect altogether reinforced by the summing-up of the judge. Even the
bare discernment of facts, much more their arrangement with a view to
inferences, must carry a bias: human impartiality, whether judicial or not, can
hardly escape being more or less loaded. It was not that the judge had severe
intentions; it was only that he saw with severity. The conduct of Felix was not
such as inclined him to indulgent consideration, and, in his directions to the
jury, that mental attitude necessarily told on the light in which he placed the
homicide. Even to many in the court who were not constrained by judicial duty,
it seemed that though this high regard felt for the prisoner by his friends, and
especially by a generous-hearted woman, was very pretty, such conduct as his was
not the less dangerous and foolish, and assaulting and killing a constable was
not the less an offence to be regarded without leniency.
    Esther seemed now so tremulous, and looked so ill, that Harold begged her to
leave the court with his mother and Mr Lingon. He would come and tell her the
issue. But she said, quietly, that she would rather stay; she was only a little
overcome by the exertion of speaking. She was inwardly resolved to see Felix to
the last moment before he left the court.
    Though she could not follow the address of the counsel or the judge, she had
a keen ear for what was