Both he
and Ralph expected that a verdict would be rendered for the defendant,
in accordance with Ralph's testimony, and neither of them were
surprised, therefore, when Andy Gilgallon came up from the city after
supper and informed them that the jury had so found. That settled the
matter, at any rate. It was a relief to Ralph to know that it was at
an end; that he was through with courts and lawyers and judges and
juries, and that there need be no further effort on his part to escape
from unmerited fortune. The tumult that had raged in his mind through
many hours was at last stilled, and that night he slept. He wanted
to go back the next morning to his work at the breaker, but Bachelor
Billy would not allow him to do so. He still looked very pale and
weak, and the anxious man resolved to come home at noon again that day
to see to the lad's health.
Indeed, as the morning wore on, Ralph acknowledged to himself that he
did not feel so well. His head was very heavy, and there was a bruised
feeling over the entire surface of his body. It was a dull day, too;
it rained a little now and then, and was cloudy all the morning. He
sat indoors the most of the time, reading a little, sleeping a little,
and thinking a great deal. The sense of his loss was coming back upon
him very strongly. It was not so much the loss of wealth, or of name,
or of the power to do other and better things than he had ever done
before that grieved him now. But it was that the dear and gentle lady
who was to have been his mother, who had verily been a mother to him
for one sweet day, was a mother to him no longer.
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