Not that he needed their support for himself, but for the effect they
might have on the jury. Harley had shrewdly guessed that the white-faced
child he had married, whose pathetic beauty was of so haunting a type, and
whose big eyes were so quick to reflect emotions, would be a valuable asset
to set against the black-clad widow of Vance Edwards.
For its effect upon himself, so far as the trial was concerned, Simon
Harley cared not a whit. He needed no bolstering. The old wrecker carried
an iron face to the ordeal. His leathern heart was as foreign to fear as to
pity. The trial was an unpleasant bore to him, but nothing worse. He had,
of course, cast an anchor of caution to windward by taking care to have the
jury fixed. For even though his array of lawyers was a formidably famous
one, he was no such child as to trust his case to a Western jury on its
merits while the undercurrent of popular opinion was setting so strongly
against him. Nor had he neglected to see that the court-room was packed
with detectives to safeguard him in the event that the sympathy of the
attending miners should at any time become demonstrative against him.
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