of that heart-beating
expectation--soothing, and bulwarking me around with domesticity. But
the excitement of the city kept invading my retreat, as if it were so
full of that great matter that it had to spill over even into houses
where it wasn't wanted. The first ripple had been the sight of my name
in the paper that morning; but the wave went quite over me when, just
before luncheon, Hallie rushed in. She had been at the trial all the
morning, and had only just seen the _Alta_ with my name.

She hugged me a number of times, with exclamations of how awful but
fascinating it must be, to be a witness, and what was it I knew--why
hadn't I told her--she would never have divulged one word of it--though
of course if I was under oath! Still, couldn't I tell her all about it
now?

I believe that Hallie's respect for me had taken a leap with the news
of my position, and when I explained that I was still under oath, and
couldn't tell anybody anything until I told it from the witness-stand,
she looked at me with positive awe.

She stayed to luncheon, and it was a trying but most exciting meal.
Alas for my elaborate salad! We might have been eating india-rubber
for all we knew or cared. For Hallie poured forth all the history of
the trial, from the time I left the court room, and I would not have
stopped her had it been possible to do so.

It seemed that the afternoon of the opening day a man who was a waiter
at the Poodle Dog was put on the stand. This was the new witness Mr.
Dingley had spoken of. He told how Mr. Rood had been at supper in the
restaurant at about midnight, how Mr. Montgomery had come in with
another gentleman, and gone up to the table where Rood was sitting.
While he did so the other gentleman sat at a table near the door. Mr.
Rood and Mr. Montgomery did not have supper together, the waiter said;
did not even drink together. They talked only for a few minutes, and
he thought they were disagreeing because, though their voices were not
loud, they sounded angry. Then Mr. Rood got up suddenly, overturning
his chair, and said, "I won't hear anything from you," and though he
had not finished supper, paid his bill and went out of the restaurant.
Mr. Montgomery had waited a few moments before he followed him. The
gentleman who had sat near the door had been the last to leave the
restaurant.

"And then," said Hallie, warming to her narrative, "they called the man
who had come into the Poodle Dog with Jo