“He was in the room in the basement with you then, when Yarnall was shot,” said Judge Hollis, his eyes kindling with triumph. “He was.” She had scarcely uttered the words, and Caleb Trench’s white face had flushed deeply, when some one cheered. In an instant there was a wave of applause. It swept through the room, it reached the corridors and descended the stairs; the sentries heard it in the quadrangle. Men stood up on the rear benches and shouted. Then Judge Ladd enforced silence; he even threatened to clear the court by force and lock the doors, and like a wave of the sea, the wild enthusiasm receded, only to gain force and roll back at the first opportunity. Meanwhile Colonel Royall sat behind the witness-stand, leaning on his cane, his head bowed and his fine aristocratic face as bloodless as a piece of paper. There were many who pointed at him and whispered, and the whisper traveled. “Was he thinking of his girl’s mother?” That foul hag, the world, has a heart that treasures scandal, and the lips of malice! The court-room seethed with excitement, but silence reigned again; the lights were flaring now on the judge’s desk and on the reporters’ table; the busy scratch of the stenographers’ pens was audible. Diana was still on the stand, and she explained how Caleb Trench left her to ascertain the results of the shots, and how he returned and got her father and herself into their carriage. Her testimony was simple and direct, and, though she was briefly cross-examined by Colonel Coad, the prosecuting attorney, she sustained her position and suffered nothing at the hands of that pompous but courteous gentleman.