They knew that she could bring forth no witnesses in her defense. That was what made the challenge so cruel. They knew that she had had no lovers since before her first child was born, nineteen years ago. She had been a virtuous wife, a faithful wife. And now they were turning her very virtue against her! "Do you have such a witness?" Justice Klyutch asked her attorney. "I ask the court's permission to confer privately with my client," the lawyer replied, rising hastily from his seat. "Granted." "No," Sar said abruptly. Her lawyer had hardly started across the room to the witness seat when her voice stopped him. "No," Sar repeated, "we have no witness." "Your Honors," her lawyer said hurriedly, "I request that my client's remark be stricken from the record. It was not made in reply to a question, nor was it on advice of counsel." To Sar he said, "Please, Mrs. Wisson, do not volunteer information before you consult me." "Why not?" Sar asked sadly. "There is no one. What good would it do to consult you?" "Please, Mrs. Wisson," the lawyer insisted. "Perhaps there is someone whom you've forgotten. Perhaps you'll remember if you discuss it with me. Perhaps...." "No," Sar pronounced, finally. "There has been no one. I won't invent a mythical lover. We have no witness." The lawyer returned to his seat dejectedly. Sar had ruined whatever chance he might have had to bring in a false witness to dispute those presented by her husband. If the court accepted the testimony of the four supposed lovers, the case was lost. Even without their testimony, it was a toss-up between Sar's word and her husband's. After all, records of an ability possessed twenty years ago really proved nothing about the present. So what if she had been an exceptionally apt student in school? After twenty years, she might be different--altogether different. She might very well be incompetent. Sar, too, knew that she had spoiled her own opportunity to counteract the fraudulent testimony of her husband's friends. Yet, although she was afraid of the consequences of losing the case, she could not bring herself to lie about her private life. She could not claim lovers she had not had. It was ridiculous, she knew, in this day and age, but she was actually proud of her fidelity. She watched the three judges lean together in conference. The million eyes still peered at her. They pawed at her body, probed at her thoughts. She fidgeted under their merciless scrutiny as the minutes crept by and the judges' conference continued. _Stop!_ she wanted to shout. _Stop this torture! Say something--anything! But don't make me sit here like a freak on exhibition!_ Justices Jones and Schluss straightened in their seats on either side of the presiding judge. Chief justice Klyutch cleared his throat importantly.