entirely out of order!" Then he quickly covered his face with his
handkerchief. "Proceed!" he directed in a muffled tone.

"Where were we?" asked Mr. Tutt dreamily.

"Fatima, the daughter of Abbas," assisted the foreman, sotto voce.

"And I objected to Fatima, the daughter of Abbas!" snapped Pepperill.

"Well, well!" conceded Mr. Tutt. "She's dead, poor thing! Let her be.
That is all, Mr. Kahoots."

It is difficult to describe the intense excitement these digressions
from the direct testimony occasioned among the audience. The reference
to the billiard-table cover and the murder of the unfortunate Fatima
apparently roused long-smoldering fires. A group of Syrians by the
window broke into an unexpected altercation, which had to be quelled by
a court officer, and when quiet was restored the jury seemed but
slightly attentive to the precisely similar yarns of Nicola Abbu,
Menheem Shikrie, Fajal Mokarzel and David Elias, especially as the
minutes of the Grand Jury showed that they had sworn to three entirely
different sets of facts regarding the cause of Babu's death. Yet when
the People rested it remained true that five witnesses, whatever the
jury may have thought of them, had testified that Hassoun strangled
Sardi Babu. The jury turned expectantly to Mr. Tutt to hear what he had
to say.

"Gentlemen," he said quietly, "the defense is very simple. None of the
witnesses who have appeared here was in fact present at the scene of the
homicide at all. I shall call some ten or twelve reputable Syrian