"Tar and feathers fer ye ef
ye don't hang him!" These were the mildest threats, and Joe Louden,
watching from an upper window of the Court-house, observed with a
troubled eye how certain of the jury shrank from the pressure of the
throng, how the cheeks of others showed sudden pallor. Sometimes
"public sentiment" has done evil things to those who have not shared
it; and Joe knew how rare a thing is a jury which dares to stand square
against a town like Canaan aroused.

The end of that afternoon's session saw another point marked for the
defence; Joe had put the defendant on the stand, and the little man had
proved an excellent witness. During his life he had been many
things--many things disreputable; high standards were not brightly
illumined for him in the beginning of the night-march which his life
had been. He had been a tramp, afterward a petty gambler; but his
great motive had finally come to be the intention to do what Joe told
him to do: that, and to keep Claudine as straight as he could. In a
measure, these were the two things that had brought him to the pass in
which he now stood, his loyalty to Joe and his resentment of whatever
tampered with Claudine's straightness. He was submissive to the
consequences: he was still loyal. And now Joe asked him to tell "just
what happened," and Happy obeyed with crystal clearness. Throughout
the long, tricky cross-examination he continued to tell "just what
happened" with a plaintive truthfulness not to be imitated, and
throughout it Joe guarded him from pitfalls (for lawyers in their
search after truth are compelled by the exigencies of their profession
to make pitfalls even for the honest), and gave him, by various
devices, time to remember, though not to think, and made the words
"come right" in his mouth. So that before the sitting was over, a
disquieting rumor ran through the waiting crowd in the corridors,
across the Square, and over the town, that the case was surely going
"Louden's way." This was also the opinion of a looker-on in Canaan--a
ferret-faced counsellor of corporations who, called to consultation
with the eminent Buckalew (nephew of the Squire), had afterward spent
an hour in his company at the trial. "It's going that young fellow
Louden's way," said the stranger. "You say he's a shyster, but--"

"Well," admitted Buckalew, with some reluctance, "I don't mean that
exactly. I've got an old uncle who seems lately to think he's a great
man."