ke you who doesn't
understand the legal point of view."

"No point of view can alter facts," said the Major, "supposing they are
facts, which of course they're not."

"Yes, it can," said Meldon. "To the legal mind a fact ceases to be a
fact the moment a properly qualified court has decided the other way.
The judge may be, in this particular case he is, as we know, absolutely
convinced that his niece is a murderess. But a jury says she isn't,
and so from a legal point of view she's a perfectly innocent and
upright woman. The judge can't hang her. He can't even warn her not
to do it again. He is bound, whatever his private feelings and
convictions are, to accept the jury's verdict at its face value, and to
treat his niece exactly as he did before all the unpleasantness arose."

"He needn't kiss her," said the Major.

"If he's a consistently just man and was on what we may call kissing
terms with her before," said Meldon, "he'll of course kiss her again
afterwards. He can't do anything else. In the eye of the law--that's
what I mean by the legal standpoint--she's an innocent woman. Now the
judge's whole position in society and even his income depends on his
keeping up the theory that the law is infallible. Whatever you and I
as private individuals may do, a judge has only one course open to him.
He must take the view that the law takes. That's why I say that it's
quite natural for Sir Gilbert to go and stop with his niece and kiss
her, though, as I said before, it was really she who kissed him. If he
didn't, he'd be admitting publicly that the law was wrong, and he can't
do that without giving himself and his whole position away hopelessly."

"It doesn't strike me as a bit natural," said the Major. "In fact,
it's quite impossible. That's why I say--"

"I can understand your feeling," said Meldon. "Indeed I was a good
deal surprised at first; but when I came to think it all out, and to
realise the sort of way the judge would look at it, I saw, as you'll
probably be able to see some time tomorrow--"

"No. I won't. I'll never see that. It's absurd to suppose--"

"I don't deny," said Meldon, "that when we consider Sir Gilbert
Hawkesby as a private individual, separating for a moment the man from
the judge, we must credit him with the feeling that Miss King is rather
a--what the French would call a _mauvais sujet_."

"A what?"

"A black sheep," said Meldon, "a disgrace to the family. The sort of
re