Meanwhile, preparations went on in England for Guy's approaching
trial. The magistrates committed; the grand jury, of course, found
a true bill; all England rang with the strange news that the man Guy
Waring, the murderer of Mr. Montague Nevitt some eighteen months
before, had returned at last of his own free will, and had given
himself up to take his trial. Gildersleeve was to be the judge,
they said; or if he were too ill, Atkins. Atkins was as sure as a
gun to hang him, people thought--that was Atkins's way--and, besides,
the evidence against the man, though in a sense circumstantial,
was so absolutely overwhelming that acquittal seemed impossible.

Five to two was freely offered on Change that they'd hang him.

The case was down for first hearing at the assizes. The night
before the trial Elma Clifford, who had hurried to Devonshire with
her mother to see and hear all--she couldn't help it, she said;
she felt she MUST be present--Elma Clifford looked at the evening
paper with a sickening sense of suspense and anxiety. A paragraph
caught her eye: "We understand that, after all, Mr. Justice
Gildersleeve still finds himself too unwell to return to England for
the Western Assizes, and his place will, therefore, most probably
be taken by Mr. Justice Atkins. The calendar is a heavy one, and
includes the interesting case of Mr. Guy Waring, charged with the
wilful murder of Montague Nevitt, at Mambury, in Devonshire."

Elma laid down the paper with a swimming head. Too ill to return.
She wasn't at all surprised at it. It was almost more than
human nature could stand, for a man to sit as judge over another
to investigate the details of the crime he had himself committed.