"Let Gilchrist sentence now, and you'll get off with a fine," interposed Flomerfelt; "that was my suggestion."
"That's the whole idea," said Patrick Durand. "The less delay there is, the lighter it will be."
Meanwhile Assistant District Attorney Leech had been moderately successful in his attempt to soothe Leslie. His manner and his words, "I wouldn't worry," had seemed a guarantee to her that her troubles were about to vanish. She began to reason that nothing could happen to her father. Nothing ever did happen to respectable men like him--big men, rich men. And so she watched with increasing confidence the eight men file back into the court-room.
"If the Court please," Beekman was saying gravely, at her side, "instead of fixing a future day for sentence, we suggest that the Court pronounce its sentence now."
The suggestion fell like a bomb-shell in the midst of the crowd. Even District Attorney Murgatroyd rose to his feet in surprise.
"I see no reason," he began, and then remembering that he was not trying the case, he nodded to his assistant; Leech took the cue and pressed to the fore.
"This is an important case, your Honour," he contended, "and one that demands deliberation. It seems to me that it would be preferable to defer sentence until--say, Thursday of next week."
The Court quickly waved Leech back to his seat and addressed himself to the prisoner.
"What does the defendant say? Are you ready for sentence now?"
"I am," said Wilkinson, and rising at Morehead's nudge he stood glaring at the Court. Beekman was at his side, and extended his hand, saying:
"Before sentence is pronounced, if your Honour please, I should like to say a word or two on behalf of the defendant."
"I heard all you told the jury," remarked Judge Gilchrist, somewhat sharply. "You exhausted the subject, there's nothing left to say. I have the floor."
There was a pause during which the Court slowly took off his glasses, wiped them with his handkerchief and put them on again.
"This is an unusual case," he began, looking sternly at the defendant.
Back on the benches the crowd leaned forward eagerly.
On the rear seat, Burns of the Ideal Dairy, who never missed a big trial, turned to his friend Porteous, the Park Row hardware man, and remarked: