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case," was the way he began on me. "From what you said this morning, I was led to infer that you had some notion of trying to shift the responsibility to Mr. Geddis. I won't say that something couldn't be done along that line; not to do you any good, you understand, but to do other folks a lot of harm. You could probably roil the water and stir up the mud pretty badly for all concerned. But in the outcome, and before a jury, you'd be likely to get the hot end of it. I'll be frank with you. If I were in your shoes, I'd rather have Geddis for me than against me. He has money and influence, and you are a young man without either."
"You are trying to advise me to plead guilty?" I asked.
"Oh, of course, the formal plea in court would be 'Not guilty.' I'm merely advising you not to make the fight vindictive. If you don't, I'm inclined to believe that Geddis will stand by you and you'll get off easy."
It was on the tip of my tongue to say that I would fight to the last gasp before I would suffer myself to be tried and condemned for a crime of which I was innocent. Then the distorted sense of honor got in its work again. Agatha Geddis's visit was still recent enough to make me believe that I owed her something.
"You'll have to get me out of it in some way," I returned. "I can't afford to be convicted."
"Abel Geddis has been a pretty good friend of yours in the past, Bert," the lawyer suggested. "You don't want to forget that."
"I'm not forgetting it, and I'm giving him all the credit that is due him. But you can't blame me for thinking a little of my mother and sister, and myself. You know what a prison sentence means to a man, better than I do. I couldn't stand for that."
Whitredge stroked his long chin and looked past me out of the little grated window.
"We'd hope for the best, of course," he returned. "If we can make it appear as an error in judgment"--there was that cursed phrase again--"without any real criminal intention, and if we can prove that you didn't reap any monetary benefit from the transfer of the mining stock, there is good reason to hope that the court may be lenient. Do I understand that you are giving me a free hand in the case, Bert?"
"I don't see that there is anything else for me to do," I said, half-doubtfully; and as he was going I asked him about the question of bail.
"I have waived the preliminary examination for you--merely to save you the humiliation of appearing in a justice's court in Glendale," was the evasive reply.
"But without the examination I shan't have a chance to offer bail, shall I?"
Whitredge shook his head. "The guaranty company that is on your bond beat us to it, I'm sorry to say. They sent their attorney over from Cincinnati last night, and he is here now, prepared to refuse the company's consent in the matter of ball. That is another reason why, acting for you, I have waived the preliminary. Without the guaranty company's assent to the arrangement it would be useless for us to offer sureties, though Geddis and two or three others have expressed their willingness to sign for you."
"Then what am I to expect?"
"Nothing worse than a little delay. Court is in session, and you will be taken to Jefferson. If the grand jury finds a true bill against you, the cause will probably be tried at the present term of court. There need be nothing humiliating or embarrassing for you here in Glendale. Sam Jorkins will take you over to Jefferson on the midnight train, and you needn't see any of the home-town folks unless you want to."
Remembering the clammy handshakings of the forenoon, I thought I should never again want to see anybody that I knew. And thus I made the second of the miserable blunders which led to all that followed.
"Let it be that way," I said. "If Jorkins will go with me up to Mrs. Thompson's so that I can get a few things and pack a grip----"
"Oh, of course," said Whitredge, readily enough. "I'll have a carriage to take you to the train, and it can drive around by your boarding-house. But you mustn't try to run away. I suppose you wouldn't do anything like that, would you?--even if you had a good chance?"
I turned upon him as quick as a flash.
"Do you mean that you're trying to give me a hint that I'd better run away?" I demanded.
He took a step toward the cell door and I had a fleeting impression that he was