The Law of the Four Just Men

Opening

“The jury cannot accept the unsupported suggestion⁠—unsupported even by the prisoner’s testimony since he has not gone into the box⁠—that Mr. Noah Stedland is a blackmailer and that he obtained a large sum of money from the prisoner by this practice. That is a defence which is rather suggested by the cross-examination than by the production of evidence. The defence does not even tell us the nature of the threat which Stedland employed⁠ ⁠…”

The remainder of the summing up was creditable to the best traditions of the Bar, and the jury, without retiring, returned a verdict of “Guilty.”

There was a rustle of movement in the court and a thin babble of whispered talk as the Judge fixed his pince-nez and began to write.