THE STREETS AND THE COURT HOUSE.
The next day found a crowd around the court house, hours before the time
for opening--an eager-eyed, jostling throng, to whom a trial for life
was sure to bring keen excitement of some kind. In a Puritan State,
where places of amusement are seldom found, any thing calculated to
excite public curiosity is an event which makes the most painful
occasions a sort of holiday for the populace. The horrible fascination
which a trial like that always possesses for the human mind was added to
other feelings with which the people of that day frequented the courts
of justice, and any trial which had a tragic interest for the people,
drew crowds around the court house, full of eager curiosity, and
sometimes almost ferocious excitement--crowds which watched the progress
of events like men enthralled by the horror of a terrible play.
The events which caused the arrest of Katharine Allen had been a
favorite theme of conversation for months. Public excitement was at its
highest pitch; and, when the day of her trial came, a stranger, passing
through the streets, might have believed that some event was transpiring
in which the highest interests of the whole community were at stake.
A crowd gathered about the old jail, which loomed up in the midst of the
town--a dark monument of human sorrow and human crime. A moving throng
was in every street which led from thence to the court house--men,
women, and little children, brought out as for a holiday show, all
waiting, breathless and eager, for the appearance of the poor girl they
were ready to hunt to an ignominious death.
Now and then you passed a face that looked grave or sad, as if the moral
lesson of that trial was felt, and not without sympathy for the poor
young creature who was to be its object.
The crowd had been waiting for hours, and so singularly organized is
this miserable human nature of ours, so dependent are our feelings upon
the position in which we are placed, so completely do our sympathies
waver to and fro, according to our particular situation, that it was
noticeable, as time wore on, that murmurs grew harsher and more sullen.
The hard faces grew harder; even those which had expressed something
akin to pity lost their softness, and wherever a knot of such women as
love scenes of this kind were gathered, execrations and complaints
against the criminal were the most severe and cruel.
At last there was a little bustle in the jail yard; the crowd responded
by eager murmurs. Slowly the heavy gates swung open; a simultaneous rush
was made toward them, and it required all the efforts of the armed
constables to force back the eager mob.
At length, a passage was made down the street, and the crowd pushed back
on either side. Then slowly, with a dull, ominous sound, a wagon, drawn
by a single horse, rolled out of the jail yard and took its way through
the street.
In this wagon, with an officer upon either side, sat Katharine Allen.
She was deadly pale, her sunny hair, too bright for a scene like that,
was brushed smoothly back under her bonnet; a large shawl was thrown
over her white dress, and she sat between her guards so still and silent
that she hardly seemed conscious of her position, or terrified by the
danger which gathered closer and closer about her.
A new murmur of pity went up from the people who thronged the sidewalks.
In her statue-like quiet, the girl looked so young and fair, it appeared
incredible that she could have been guilty of the crime with which she
was charged.
At that sound, Katharine raised her head quickly, her great eyes
wandered to and fro, hopeless, helpless, a vivid crimson swept over her
whole countenance, then it faded almost as quickly as it came, leaving
the features paler than before. With a low moan, the poor young creature
closed her eyes, her lips moved tremulously. Amid all the terror of that
scene--with judgment and death so near--a calm, such as she had not
before felt, settled down upon her soul.
I do believe that in that hour of supreme agony, God sent His angels to
whisper comfort and peace. By no human law could one have accounted for
the change which came over her.
On through the street passed the little cortege, the constables marching
in front, and pushing aside the people, who, faithful to their New
England instincts, yielded almost ungrumblingly to the dictates of those
armed with the power they so reverenced--that of the law.
Katharine did not look up again; the deathly pallor had left her face;
but around the lips, which still moved at intervals, a smile had settled
like a ray of sunlight.
It was a glorious morning; the sun lay golden and warm upon the town; it
fell caressingly upon the girl in the prison wagon, revealing her
broadly to the rude gaze of those curious eyes.
As they approached the court house, the crowd grew denser. The wagon
moved more and more slowly, and the people grew keenly eager, as if
curiosity and interest had reached a climax when the victim was about
disappearing from their sight.
The court room was a bare, gloomy apartment, where every thing seemed to
deepen the usual horror connected with such a place--a dark chamber
where the shadows never wholly dispersed. No matter how brightly the sun
shone without, the golden radiance broke against the window panes, as if
frightened by the appearance of the place, and in passing through the
dusty windows, seemed to lose all brilliancy and warmth.
On that day it was packed with a dense crowd, all waiting eagerly for
the entrance of the girl whose conviction they had come to witness.
Every one was there--the judge upon his bench, cold and silent as a
marble image of justice; the jury in their box, and, a little way off,
the witnesses.
Mrs. Allen sat by the side of old Mr. Thrasher; he had taken her hand,
meaning to speak some last word of consolation, but the agony in her
eyes froze the words upon his lips; he could only hold fast to that
withered hand, which in her anguish she wrenched away from him,
impatient even of sympathy.
The dead silence of the court room was broken by a dull murmur from
without, through which the rattle of the wagon wheels was distinctly
audible.
A sound upon the stairs--the tread of heavy feet, and the door swung
slowly upon its hinges. A shiver ran through Mrs. Allen's frame; she
sank heavily back, moaning. She knew that her child had been brought in;
she heard the bustle with which they placed her in the criminal's seat,
but when she tried to raise her eyes it seemed as if the lids had turned
to iron.
When silence was again restored she made one violent effort and looked
up. Katharine was sitting still and white in her place of shame. The
mother half rose, with a vague impulse to rush forward and save her
child. That moment Katharine lifted her heavy eyes, and met that longing
gaze--unconsciously she extended her arms.
"Mother! oh, mother!"
The words died on those white lips in a moan so faint that it failed to
reach the most eager listener. Then the stern old woman leaned heavily
back in her seat, and fainted away so quietly that no human soul was
aware of it.