THE TRIAL
In a few moments more the storm had passed completely; only the wet city
streets, the mist over the lake, and the moist warmth of the air
remained. For some time the three visitors to this extraordinary world
stood silent at the latticed windows, awed by what they had seen. The
noise of the panels as the Chemist slid them back brought them to
themselves.
"A curious land, gentlemen," he remarked quietly.
"It's--it's weird," the Very Young Man ejaculated.
The Chemist led them out across the roof to its other side facing the
city. The street upon which the house stood sloped upwards over the hill
behind. It was wet with the rain and gleamed like a sheet of burnished
silver. And down its sides now ran two little streams of liquid silver
fire.
The street, deserted during the storm, was beginning to fill again with
people returning to their tasks. At the intersection with the next road
above, they could see a line of sleighs passing. Beneath them, before
the wall of the garden a little group of men stood talking; on a
roof-top nearby a woman appeared with a tiny naked infant which she sat
down to nurse in a corner of her garden.
"A city at work," said the Chemist with a wave of his hand. "Shall we go
down and see it?"
His three friends assented readily, the Very Young Man suggesting
promptly that they first visit Lylda's father and Aura.
"He is teaching Loto this morning," said the Chemist smiling.
"Why not go to the court?" suggested the Big Business Man.
"Is the public admitted?" asked the Doctor.
"Nothing is secret here," the Chemist answered. "By all means, we will
go to the court first, if you wish; Lylda should be through very
shortly."
The court of Arite stood about a mile away near the lake shore. As they
left the house and passed through the city streets the respect accorded
the Chemist became increasingly apparent. The three strangers with him
attracted considerable attention, for, although they wore the
conventional robes in which the more prominent citizens were generally
attired, their short hair and the pallid whiteness of their skins made
them objects of curiosity. No crowd gathered; those they passed stared a
little, raised their hands to their foreheads and went their way, yet
underneath these signs of respect there was with some an air of
sullenness, of hostility, that the visitors could not fail to notice.
The Oroid men, in street garb, were dressed generally in a short
metallic-looking tunic of drab, with a brighter-colored girdle. The
women, most of them, wore only a sort of skirt, reaching from waist to
knees; a few had circular discs covering their breasts. There were
hardly any children to be seen, except occasionally a little face
staring at them from a window, or peering down from a roof-top. Once or
twice they passed a woman with an infant slung across her back in a sort
of hammock.
The most common vehicle was the curious form of sleigh in which they had
ridden down through the tunnels. They saw also a few little two-wheeled
carts, with wheels that appeared to be a solid segment of tree-trunk.
All the vehicles were drawn by meek-looking little gray animals like a
small deer without horns.
The court-house of Arite, though a larger building, from the outside was
hardly different than most others in the city. It was distinct, however,
in having on either side of the broad doorway that served as its main
entrance, a large square stone column.
As they entered, passing a guard who saluted them respectfully, the
visitors turned from a hallway and ascended a flight of steps. At the
top they found themselves on a balcony overlooking the one large room
that occupied almost the entire building. The balcony ran around all
three sides (the room was triangular in shape) and was railed with a low
stone parapet. On it were perhaps fifty people, sitting quietly on stone
benches that lay close up behind the parapet. An attendant stood at each
of the corners of the balcony; the one nearest bowed low as the Chemist
and his companions entered silently and took their seats.
From the balcony the entire room below was in plain view. At the apex of
its triangle sat the judge, on a raised dais of white stone with a
golden canopy over it. He was a man about fifty--this leader of the
court--garbed in a long loose robe of white. His hair, that fell on his
shoulders, was snowy white, and around his forehead was a narrow white
band. He held in his hand a sort of scepter of gold with a heavy golden
triangle at its end.
In six raised tiers of unequal length, like a triangular flight of
stairs across the angle of the room, and directly in front of the judge,
was the jury--twenty men and twenty women, seated in alternate rows. The
men wore loose robes of gray; the women robes of blue. On a seat raised
slightly above the others sat a man who evidently was speaker for the
men of the jury. On a similar elevated seat was the woman speaker; this
latter was Lylda.
Near the center of the room, facing the judge and jury were two
triangular spaces about twenty feet across, enclosed with a breast-high
wall of stone. Within each of these enclosures were perhaps ten or
twelve people seated on small stone benches. Directly facing the members
of the jury and between them and the two enclosures, was a small
platform raised about four feet above the floor, with several steps
leading up to it from behind.
A number of attendants dressed in the characteristic short tunics, with
breastplates and a short sword hanging from the waist, stood near the
enclosures, and along the sides of the room.
The Chemist leaned over and whispered to his friends: "Those two
enclosed places in the center are for the witnesses. Over there are
those testifying for the accused; the others are witnesses for the
government. The platform is where the accused stands when----"
He broke off suddenly. An expectant hush seemed to run over the room. A
door at the side opened, and preceded and followed by two attendants a
man entered, who walked slowly across the floor and stood alone upon the
raised platform facing the jury.
He was a man of extraordinarily striking look and demeanor. He stood
considerably over six feet in height, with a remarkably powerful yet
lean body. He was naked except for a cloth breech clout girdled about
his loins. His appearance was not that of an Oroid, for beside his
greater height, and more muscular physique, his skin was distinctly of a
more brownish hue. His hair was cut at the base of the neck in Oroid
fashion; it was black, with streaks of silver running through it. His
features were large and cast in a rugged mold. His mouth was cruel, and
wore now a sardonic smile. He stood erect with head thrown back and arms
folded across his breast, calmly facing the men and women who were to
judge him.
The Very Young Man gripped the Chemist by the arm. "Who is that?" he
whispered.
The Chemist's lips were pressed together; he seemed deeply affected. "I
did not know they caught him," he answered softly. "It must have been
just this morning."
The Very Young Man looked at Lylda. Her face was placid, but her breast
was rising and falling more rapidly than normal, and her hands in her
lap were tightly clenched.
The judge began speaking quietly, amid a deathlike silence. For over
five minutes he spoke; once he was interrupted by a cheer, instantly
stifled, and once by a murmur of dissent from several spectators on the
balcony that called forth instant rebuke from the attendant stationed
there.
The judge finished his speech, and raised his golden scepter slowly
before him. As his voice died away, Lylda rose to her feet and facing
the judge bowed low, with hands to her forehead. Then she spoke a few
words, evidently addressing the women before her. Each of them raised
her hands and answered in a monosyllable, as though affirming an oath.
This performance was repeated by the men.
The accused still stood silent, smiling sardonically. Suddenly his voice
rasped out with a short, ugly intonation and he threw his arms straight
out before him. A murmur rose from the spectators, and several
attendants leaned forward towards the platform. But the man only looked
around at them contemptuously and again folded his arms.
From one of the enclosures a woman came, and mounted the platform beside
the man. The Chemist whispered, "His wife; she is going to speak for
him." But with a muttered exclamation and wave of his arm, the man swept
her back, and without a word she descended the steps and reentered the
railed enclosure.
Then the man turned and raising his arms spoke angrily to those seated
in the enclosure. Then he appealed to the judge.
The Chemist whispered in explanation: "He refuses any witnesses."
At a sign from the judge the enclosure was opened and its occupants left
the floor, most of them taking seats upon the balcony.
"Who is he?" the Very Young Man wanted to know, but the Chemist ignored
his question.
For perhaps ten minutes the man spoke, obviously in his own defence. His
voice was deep and powerful, yet he spoke now seemingly without anger;
and without an air of pleading. In fact his whole attitude seemed one of
irony and defiance. Abruptly he stopped speaking and silence again fell
over the room. A man and a woman left the other enclosure and mounted
the platform beside the accused. They seemed very small and fragile, as
he towered over them, looking down at them sneeringly.
The man and woman conferred a moment in whispers. Then the woman spoke.
She talked only a few minutes, interrupted twice by the judge, once by a
question from Lylda, and once by the accused himself.
Then for perhaps ten minutes more her companion addressed the court. He
was a man considerably over middle age, and evidently, from his dress
and bearing, a man of prominence in the nation. At one point in his
speech it became obvious that his meaning was not clearly understood by
the jury. Several of the women whispered together, and one rose and
spoke to Lylda. She interrupted the witness with a quiet question. Later
the accused himself questioned the speaker until silenced by the judge.
Following this witness came two others. Then the judge rose, and looking
up to the balcony where the Chemist and his companions were sitting,
motioned to the Chemist to descend to the floor below.
The Very Young Man tried once again with his whispered question "What is
it?" but the Chemist only smiled, and rising quietly left them.
There was a stir in the court-room as the Chemist crossed the main
floor. He did not ascend the platform with the prisoner, but stood
beside it. He spoke to the jury quietly, yet with a suppressed power in
his voice that must have been convincing. He spoke only a moment, more
with the impartial attitude of one who gives advice than as a witness.
When he finished, he bowed to the court and left the floor, returning at
once to his friends upon the balcony.
Following the Chemist, after a moment of silence, the judge briefly
addressed the prisoner, who stolidly maintained his attitude of ironic
defiance.
"He is going to ask the jury to give its verdict now," said the Chemist
in a low voice.
Lylda and her companion leader rose and faced their subordinates, and
with a verbal monosyllable from each member of the jury the verdict was
unhesitatingly given. As the last juryman's voice died away, there came
a cry from the back of the room, a woman tore herself loose from the
attendants holding her, and running swiftly across the room leaped upon
the platform. She was a slight little woman, almost a child in
appearance beside the man's gigantic stature. She stood looking at him a
moment with heaving breast and great sorrowful eyes from which the tears
were welling out and flowing down her cheeks unheeded.
The man's face softened. He put his hands gently upon the sides of her
neck. Then, as she began sobbing, he folded her in his great arms. For
an instant she clung to him. Then he pushed her away. Still crying
softly, she descended from the platform, and walked slowly back across
the room.
Hardly had she disappeared when there arose from the street outside a
faint, confused murmur, as of an angry crowd gathering. The judge had
left his seat now and the jury was filing out of the room.
The Chemist turned to his friends. "Shall we go?" he asked.
"This trial--" began the Big Business Man. "You haven't told us its
significance. This man--good God what a figure of power and hate and
evil. Who is he?"
"It must have been evident to you, gentlemen," the Chemist said quietly,
"that you have been witnessing an event of the utmost importance to us
all. I have to tell you of the crisis facing us; this trial is its
latest development. That man--"
The insistent murmur from the street grew louder. Shouts arose and then
a loud pounding from the side of the building.
The Chemist broke off abruptly and rose to his feet. "Come outside," he
said.
They followed him through a doorway on to a balcony, overlooking the
street. Gathered before the court-house was a crowd of several hundred
men and women. They surged up against its entrance angrily, and were
held in check there by the armed attendants on guard. A smaller crowd
was pounding violently upon a side door of the building. Several people
ran shouting down the street, spreading the excitement through the city.
The Chemist and his companions stood in the doorway of the balcony an
instant, silently regarding this ominous scene. The Chemist was just
about to step forward, when, upon another balcony, nearer the corner of
the building a woman appeared. She stepped close to the edge of the
parapet and raised her arms commandingly.
It was Lylda. She had laid aside her court robe and stood now in her
glistening silver tunic. Her hair was uncoiled, and fell in dark masses
over her white shoulders, blowing out behind her in the wind.
The crowd hesitated at the sight of her, and quieted a little. She stood
rigid as a statue for a moment, holding her arms outstretched. Then,
dropping them with a gesture of appeal she began to speak.
At the sound of her voice, clear and vibrant, yet soft, gentle and
womanly, there came silence from below, and after a moment every face
was upturned to hers. Gradually her voice rose in pitch. Its gentle tone
was gone now--it became forceful, commanding. Then again she flung out
her arms with a dramatic gesture and stood rigid, every line of her body
denoting power--almost imperious command. Abruptly she ceased speaking,
and, as she stood motionless, slowly at first, the crowd silently
dispersed.
The street below was soon clear. Even those onlookers at a distance
turned the corner and disappeared. Another moment passed, and then Lylda
swayed and sank upon the floor of the balcony, with her head on her arms
against its low stone railing--just a tired, gentle, frightened little
woman.
"She did it--how wonderfully she did it," the Very Young Man murmured in
admiration.
"We can handle them now," answered the Chemist. "But each time--it is
harder. Let us get Lylda and go home, gentlemen. I want to tell you all
about it." He turned to leave the balcony.
"Who was the man? What was he tried for?" the Very Young Man demanded.
"That trial was the first of its kind ever held," the Chemist answered.
"The man was condemned to death. It was a new crime--the gravest we have
ever had to face--the crime of treason."