I began my letter to Paulus after the appeal was denied, and it may be worth something, for the record, but not very much. The memory of newspaper readers is remarkably short, I think. Last week there was the inevitable frenzy over the execution here in Winchester, and I guess elsewhere--I haven't looked at the out-of-town papers. Mostly pointless--all of it, so far as saving Callista's life was concerned--the few reasonable voices drowned out by the crackpots petting their emotions in public. This week--oh, in the houses and bars and restaurants this week I doubt if there's very much talk about Callista Blake. And if a few newspapers publish my letter, or as much of it as will fit comfortably in half a column, most readers will be honestly puzzled: Terence Mann, who the devil's he? It's natural, you needn't tell me, Jack. We aren't geared to endure sustained high tension very long--though didn't I hear you say once that some patients have surprised you in that respect? The week of the trial was enough to kill Cecil Warner--understandable of course, he must have been ill before it began. I wish you could have met him. I saw him only once after his collapse the night of the verdict. He got home--I think I never told you this--by himself, walked home I believe. His housekeeper called me in the morning because he was asking to see me. His doctor wouldn't let me stay very long--he grew too distressed by the effort to tell me something when words wouldn't come. It was mostly about Callista's letters, something he wanted me to understand, as if I were capable of sitting in judgment--but I was not then, Jack, and never have been. Edith was there too--the first time I'd met her outside the courtroom. Warner said, so far as I can bring back the words: "I couldn't believe the letters wouldn't get through to them. I thought they _had_ to hear the truth in them, the reason and the sweetness--but I was only sending a child into a snake pit." He said: "The guilt's mine, Judge--I've killed her, by trusting human nature." That's when his doctor told me I had to go, but he let Edith stay, easy to see why. She has that ability--I think you've felt it yourself--of sharing her own steadiness. It's a personal magic--I'll never know how she does it. I have, myself, achieved enough tranquillity, mental security, to see me through, especially since our marriage and my resignation from the bench. But I seldom seem able to give others the benefit of it; they are most likely to be irritated because I don't share their excitements of the moment. You have a good deal of her kind of magic yourself.