The necessity of the passage of the University bill was now imperative.
The Court waited, for, some time, but the jury gave no signs of coming in. Mr. Braham said it was extraordinary. The Court then took a recess for a couple of hours. Upon again coming in, word was brought that the jury had not yet agreed.
But the, jury, had a question. The point upon which, they wanted instruction was this. They wanted to know if Col. Sellers was related to the Hawkins famiry. The court then adjourned till morning.
Mr. Braham, who was in something of a pet, remarked to Mr. O'Toole that they must have been deceived, that juryman with the broken nose could read!
CHAPTER LVII.
The momentous day was at hand--a day that promised to make or mar the fortunes of Hawkins family for all time. Washington Hawkins and Col. Sellers were both up early, for neither of them could sleep. Congress was expiring, and was passing bill after bill as if they were gasps and each likely to be its last. The University was on file for its third reading this day, and to-morrow Washington would be a millionaire and Sellers no longer, impecunious but this day, also, or at farthest the next, the jury in Laura's Case would come to a decision of some kind or other--they would find her guilty, Washington secretly feared, and then the care and the trouble would all come back again, and these would be wearing months of besieging judges for new trials; on this day, also, the re-election of Mr. Dilworthy to the Senate would take place. So Washington's mind was in a state of turmoil; there were more interests at stake than it could handle with serenity. He exulted when he thought of his millions; he was filled with dread when he thought of Laura. But Sellers was excited and happy. He said:
"Everything is going right, everything's going perfectly right. Pretty soon the telegrams will begin to rattle in, and then you'll see, my boy. Let the jury do what they please; what difference is it going to make? To-morrow we can send a million to New York and set the lawyers at work on the judges; bless your heart they will go before judge after judge and exhort and beseech and pray and shed tears. They always do; and they always win, too. And they will win this time. They will get a writ of habeas corpus, and a stay of proceedings, and a supersedeas, and a new trial and a nolle prosequi, and there you are! That's the routine, and it's no trick at all to a New York lawyer. That's the regular routine --everything's red tape and routine in the law, you see; it's all Greek to you, of course, but to a man who is acquainted with those things it's mere--I'll explain it to you sometime. Everything's going to glide right along easy and comfortable now. You'll see, Washington, you'll see how it will be. And then, let me think ..... Dilwortby will be elected to-day, and by day, after to-morrow night be will be in New York ready to put in his shovel--and you haven't lived in Washington all this time not to know that the people who walk right by a Senator whose term is up without hardly seeing him will be down at the deepo to say 'Welcome back and God bless you; Senator, I'm glad to see yon, sir!' when he comes along back re-elected, you know. Well, you see, his influence was naturally running low when he left here, but now he has got a new six- years' start, and his suggestions will simply just weigh a couple of tons a-piece day after tomorrow. Lord bless you he could rattle through that habeas corpus and supersedeas and all those things for Laura all by himself if he wanted to, when he gets back."
"I hadn't thought of that," said Washington, brightening, but it is so. A newly-elected Senator is a power, I know that."
"Yes indeed he is.--Why it, is just human nature. Look at me. When we first carne here, I was Mr. Sellers, and Major Sellers, Captain Sellers, but nobody could ever get it right, somehow; but the minute our bill went, through the House, I was Col. Sellers every time. And nobody could do enough for me, and whatever I said was wonderful, Sir, it was always wonderful; I never seemed to say any flat things at all.