The old man came round the house, and Guinea sprang back. I was still holding her hand. "Hah," he grunted. "Got home all right, eh? Parker was over here just now and said that the trial had been set for next Thursday, not quite a week from now, you understand. He seems to think we are goin' to pull through all right; said that you've made friends with everybody in the town. That's good, both for now and also for after a while, when you set in as a lawyer. I tell you, Parker's visit helped us mightily, and Susan has eat a right smart snack, and I didn't know how hungry I was till right then. You better go to town to-morrow." I went in early the next morning and found nothing to serve as a basis for the hopefulness that Parker had given the old people. Conkwright was busy with the case, frowning over his papers, but he had no words of encouragement, except to say that he was going to do the best he could. But after a while he flashed a gleam of hope by remarking that there was one important factor in our favor. And eagerly I asked him what it was. "It won't do to talk it around," said he, "but we can count on the judge doing the square thing. He is comparatively new in our district, and the Stuart influence hasn't taken hold on him--has had no cause to. His favor, or, at least, his lack of a cause to be directly against us, will mean a good deal; it will enable us to secure a new trial at any rate." As I entered the corridor of the jail I saw Alf's face brighten behind the bars. "Have you seen Millie?" he asked. "No, your sister commanded me not to go near the General's house." His countenance fell, but he said: "I reckon she's right. And I didn't mean that you should make a dead-set call, you know--didn't know but you might happen to meet her. That preacher, the one I told you about, has been round again, and he declares that I must come into his church. They do pull and haul a fellow when they get him into a corner, don't they? Well, I don't see what else can be done now except to go into court and have the thing over with. I know as well as I know my name that he would have killed me if I hadn't killed him; not that night, of course, but some time. I am sorry, though, that I stood there in the road, waiting for him, for that does look like murder, Bill. But look how he had drawn his sight between my eyes and abused me for everything he could think of. And whenever I see him now, there he sits on his horse, with one eye half shut and the other one looking down the barrel of his revolver at me. I can see his lips moving and can hear every word he says."