Mr. Sheare made a small gesture of despair and turned away.
“I’m saying it again,” said Hube Hemus to the sheriff and the policeman. “Go away and leave us to our own.”
Sheriff Mothless jammed his straw hat over his ears. “What is this, a dime-store revolution? Shinn Corners secedin’ from the forty-eight states? You folks stop this time-wastin’ tomfoolery and stand aside! Captain Frisbee, do your duty!”
The captain nodded at the two police cars. Ten troopers climbed down into the road. They shuffled to form a line. Then they came slowly up from the north corner and turned into the church walk, feeling their holsters.
The thin arc of village men and boys began to finger their guns.
Johnny watched, fascinated.
“Stop right there, please!” Judge Shinn’s voice cracked out like a rifle shot. The advancing troopers glanced at their captain; he nodded, and they halted. The Judge turned to his fellow townsmen. “May I say something more? This is the United States of America, neighbors, one of the few places left on earth where men live by just laws, or try to, and where the law is the same for all. I told you only Friday on the green there what some men are trying to do in our country, how they are undermining the legal structure that protects the principle of equal justice for all, what a catastrophe this could be if it isn’t put a stop to. Yet what do I find less than forty-eight hours later? My own neighbors proposing to commit the same criminal folly!
“One of the keystones of our system of law is the protection of the rights of accused persons. We proudly guarantee that every person charged with a crime — no matter who he is, no matter how sickening his offense — that every such person get a fair trial, in a court of competent jurisdiction, before a jury of responsible citizens, with open minds, so that they may weigh the facts of the case without prejudice and arrive at a just decision.
“Now,” said the Judge, “we have a murder case on our hands. Hube, Orville, Burney, Peter, Mert, all of you — can you provide a court of competent jurisdiction? No. The laws of our state specifically designate the Superior Court as the court of jurisdiction in serious criminal cases, with certain exceptions such as the counties having Courts of Common Pleas, of which Cudbury County is not one. True, we have a trial justice, in common with all small communities in our state that lack a town court; and you, Orville Pangman, are the justice of the peace by town election. But if you’ve read the laws regulating your office, Orville, you know that a case as serious as a murder is not within your jurisdiction, that the accused must be bound over to the next term of the Superior Court or, where such courts are provided for, the court of Common Pleas.
“And do you think — Hube, Orville, Burn, Peter, Merton, all of you,” cried the Judge, “that this accused, Josef Kowalczyk, can get a fair trial in Shinn Corners? Is there one man or woman within range of my voice who is without prejudice in this case? Is there one of you who hasn’t already made up his mind that this man Kowalczyk is guilty of the murder of Fanny Adams?”
Johnny thought, You may as well try arguing with the stones in the cemetery there.
“Well?” demanded Judge Shinn. “Answer me!”
And again Hube Hemus spoke out of his gaunt inflexibility. “Fairness works two ways, Judge. He’ll get as fair a trial in Shinn Corners as Joe Gonzoli got in Cudbury. We want justice, too.” He was silent; then, with his first show of defiance, he added, “Maybe we can’t trust nobody but ourselves no more. Maybe that’s it, Judge. Anyway, we voted it that way, and that’s the way it’s goin’ to be.”
Captain Frisbee said instantly, “All right, men.”
Sheriff Mothless hopped aside.
The troopers moved forward in a sort of drift, as if they felt everything was in delicate balance and must not be weighted down on their side by so much as a heavy footfall. The men and boys watched them coming, the boys a little pale but with half-grins, the men’s mouths flattening.
Hube Hemus brought his gun up.
The sun flashed along the whole steel barrier.
The troopers halted.
Captain Frisbee looked astounded. Then his red face went redder. “I ask you people to get out of our way. If you don’t, we’ve got to come through anyway. There’s nothing we can do about it. The choice is yours.”
“Don’t force the issue, Captain.” Hube Hemus’s jaws ground. “We’d have to shoot.”
The guns steadied.
The police officer hesitated. The hands of his troopers hovered over their holsters. They were watching him uneasily.
“Judge, please step out of the way,” said Captain Frisbee in a low voice. “I ask the minister there to do the same.”
Neither Judge Shinn nor Samuel Sheare obeyed. The little minister’s hands fluttered; that was all.
“I not only ask you to step aside,” snapped the officer, “but if there’s anything you can say to get those women and children away from the doorway you’d better say it now. A lot of people are going to get hurt. I call you to witness that I’m not responsible if—”
“Wait,” said the Judge in a gritty voice. “Will you wait? Give me ten minutes, Captain, just ten minutes.”
“For what?” said Captain Frisbee. “These people, Judge, are plain loony. Or they’re bluffing, which is more likely. Either way—”
A nervous trooper jerked out his revolver and lunged.
There was a shot.
Johnny thought, This is one of those dreams.
The revolver flew out of the trooper’s hand and thudded to the grass beside the walk. The trooper cried out and stared at his hand. Blood was welling from a long crease across the web of flesh between his thumb and forefinger.
Smoke snaked out of Hube Hemus’s gun.
“I warned ye. Next time it’s through the heart.”
Judge Shinn jumped up and down like a marionette, waving his arms. “For God’s sake, Captain, ten minutes!” he shouted. “Don’t you realize yet what you’ve stepped into? Do you want a blood bath on your conscience? Women and children victims as well as yourselves and these mules? I want a chance to phone the Governor!”
Captain Frisbee said in a murderous voice, “Grady, take Ames over to the car and fix up that flesh wound. The rest of you stay where you are. Hollister, take over till I get back.” He nodded bitterly to Judge Shinn. “Lead the way.”
Johnny trailed them across the road to the Shinn house. The Judge sat down in the foyer beside the telephone, wiped his face and hands with a handkerchief carefully. Then he picked up the phone.
“Operator, this is an emergency call. I want to speak to Governor Bradley Ford in the state capital. Governor Ford is either at the Executive Mansion or somewhere in the Capitol Building. I must speak to him in person. This is Superior Court Judge Lewis Shinn calling.”
As he waited, the Judge wiped his ear and the earpiece of the receiver. The foyer was cool, quiet. The sun, still in the eastern sky, streamed in through the screen door. A horsefly crawled and buzzed on the screen, black against the light. The red of Captain Frisbee’s face was so deep it was alarming.
Johnny found his pulse throbbing. He made the discovery with some surprise.
“Governor Ford?” said Judge Shinn. Then he said through his teeth, “No, damn it, I want the Governor himself! Put him on!” He wiped his mouth this time.
There was no sound from outdoors at all. Through the screen door Johnny could see the whole tableau before the church. It had not changed. He had the absurd feeling that it would remain fixed that way in time and space, like a photograph.