't you to eat anything?" He
turned to Mrs. Waldron. "Aren't you hungry?"

"Very," said the lady, "but I can't do a thing with Sylvia. I----"

She would have said more, but the jury had filed in. The judge was
entering, preceded by the cry "Hats off!"

Orr slipped back to his corner, to which Annandale, with his matinee
air and the keeper for usher, had already returned. For a moment Orr
bent to him, then to his associates but briefly. Bending again to
Annandale he told him to take the stand.

The move, wholly unexpected, unusual, almost exceptional in murder
cases, created an impression that was excellent, a sense of admiration
for the fearlessness of the defense. From the prosecution came low
growls of content. They were to be fed at last. In anticipation they
licked their chops.

But the excellence of the impression dwindled. In the direct,
Annandale denied, of course, that he had committed the murder, denied
that he had ever contemplated it, swearing that to the best of his
recollection he had made no threat at all.

"To the best of your recollection," Orr repeated after him. "Now
please tell me, had anything occurred that night to impair your memory
in any way?"

"Well--er--yes. Yes. I had been drinking."

"Had you any animosity toward the deceased?"

"Toward Loftus? None whatever. On the contrary, he was my best
friend."

Peacock jumped. "I ask that that be stricken out."

Quietly Orr continued: "Had you known Loftus long?"

"All my life."

"Was he a friend of yours?"

"An intimate friend."

Orr turned to Peacock. "Your witness."

Peacock jumped again. "You say that on the night of the murder you had
been drinking. Were you drunk?"

Paternally the Recorder looked over and down. "The witness need not
answer that unless----"

Annandale interrupted him. "I am much obliged to Your Honor, but
really I have nothing to conceal. I was drunk, deplorably so."

"Habit of yours, is it?" Peacock snapped.

Annandale took a monocle from a pocket, screwed it in his eye, looked
through it at Peacock, smiled at him, with an air of fathomless good
fellowship, answered: "Dear me, no. Is it one of yours?"

"Oho!" cried Peacock, pocketing the insult but pouncing at the point,
"you were drunk on this occasion only. Got drunk for it, did you?"

"No," Annandale blandly and confidentially replied. "You see, don't
you know, it was the day of the panic. I had dropped a good lot of
money--a good lot, I mean, for m