The Trial of Callista Blake

Francis Fielding's buttoned-in upper lip. A statistician in the records office of Winchester's biggest department store, forty, consciously literate, rather too g

not quite four. The heat had been turned higher after the noon recess, the courtroom growing sickly with a mustiness of flesh, disinfectant, dust. Edith's head ached, a dull frontal throb. The hard seat nagg

d together so in the loud human tide, that hadn't been quite possible even for Victoria Chalmers. The Pale Professor might even have rebelled at it-he was bravely friendly, pleased to stoop in his weedy tallness and shake hands, keeping haunted uncourageous eyes obstinately turned away fro

as though she could not be bothered with anything so simple as direct observation. Her hands were stodgy, unalive-nothing there of Callista, and nothing of Callista in her mother's rugged frame and Madam-Chairman chestiness. Edith could picture that bust inflating for voice projection when Victoria was about to read a pape

rength of emotion remained, with whatever capability of love may exist in a person who must be always right, Victoria would be feeling a genuine distress for her maverick daughter, perhaps also for dead Ann Doherty, even for J

of pain; under such conditions it might be hard to tell the difference between grief and the pinch of a tight girdle. Then the crowd had thinned enough to let them

scrap of eternity chipped off as Mr. Fielding declared: "I have no obj

rtones. In this case Cecil Warner-(Edith understood it fully today for the first time)-was not interested in the fee, the publicity, or the abstraction of justice. He was there because, with the curious devotion of an old man, he loved Callista. To use one of his own worn phrases, it was tha

nder the clever lights while she examined the faults, planes, good points, chatted with them to let self-consciousness and vanity subside, searched for the portrai

sta might have said in one of her fantastic moods, more impudent than funny, more funny than spiteful. Anson's chubbiness would be deceptive, his good natu

e. Dora would want to be photographed with a

ket of the White Mountains, he should have been. Humanity gleam

iginal idea, capable of talking both arms off at the deltoids, but not a bad old girl. Edith estimated that she

t be expected to teach them much about the passion and confusion of the world: not for Stella the sweat and garbage, the sunrises and the music of moon-drenched nights, the labors of love, the fields of

Mrs. Grant, reflecting what atrocious cruelty can be accomplished by well-meaning souls devoid of humor and imagination. The

lond hair and somewhat mannered accent betraying it. Cecil Warner might be counting on LaSalle to show fairness toward a white crow of another sort; Hunter possibly expected h

ay with it; warmth and gentleness were in her; she would not knowingly burn another woman for a witch. And when Edith took the stand, she might look for this

elf hell on the women until snared and housebroken by some broad-beamed breeder who knew what she wanted. A born No. 12 s

mistress, maybe was. Edith also guessed that anywhere outside the region of sexual competition Dolores might be generous and kind, even very kind-and admitted that it was no more than a guess. For that matter, would a woman as outrageously lovel

ed she had not given Miss Butler her name, though they enjoyed a quarter-hour of small talk. Books mostly; some deprecating mention by Miss Butler of her landscape painting, or was it still life? Nothing in that to make the lady

re the

rayed her into speaking out of turn. Even a kind of friendliness behind the rebuke he had been forced to make. He would be harder to photograph than an

ago, Cal's ordeal of love with Jim Doherty had not even begun. It occurred to Edith that for the human race a magic power of foresight would be a burden

by a series of meaningless reprieves. In Salem, less than three hundred years ago, they had crushed Giles

s round shoulders with a tired twist. "Thank you, Mr. Fielding.

pocket a gleaming triangle of handkerchief shone, still perfect,

the burbling of Mr. Delehanty of the perfect handkerchief. They swore. Too much finality. A true verdict render?-

hat what we wish to call truth may emerge from it. We accept the ludi

jury took their seats. The prosecutor stood. Edith's stom

: But I kno

od, needed, desired so much-everything that was Callista could be and might be charred to rubbish, to sa

d Callista Blake guilty of this and a thousand other crimes. A storm including persona

e we do