MRS. BRADY

(Taking his hand)

Matt—

(BRADY looks about to see if everyone has left the courtroom, before he speaks.)

BRADY

Mother. They’re laughing at me, Mother!

MRS. BRADY

(Unconvincingly)

No, Matt. No, they’re not!

BRADY

I can’t stand it when they laugh at me!

(MRS. BRADY steps up onto the raised level of the witness chair. She stands beside and behind her husband, putting her arms around the massive shoulders and cradling his head against her breast.)

MRS. BRADY

(Soothing)

It’s all right, baby. It’s all right. (MRS. BRADY sways gently back and forth, as if rocking her husband to sleep) Baby…Baby…!

The curtain falls

ACT THREE

ACT THREE

The courtroom, the following day. The lighting is low, somber. A spot burns down on the defense table, where DRUMMOND and CATES sit, waiting for the jury to return. DRUMMOND leans back in a meditative mood, feet propped on a chair. CATES, the focus of the furor, is resting his head on his arms. The courtroom is almost empty. Two spectators doze in their chairs. In comparative shadow, BRADY sits, eating a box lunch. He is drowning his troubles with food, as an alcoholic escapes from reality with a straight shot. HORNBECK enters, bows low to BRADY.

HORNBECK

Afternoon, Colonel. Having high tea, I see.

(BRADY ignores him)

Is the jury still out? Swatting flies

And wrestling with justice—in that order?

(HORNBECK crosses to DRUMMOND. CATES lifts his head)

I’ll hate to see the jury filing in;

Won’t you, Colonel? I’ll miss Hillsboro—

Especially this courthouse:

A melange of Moorish and Methodist;

It must have been designed by a congressman!

(HORNBECK smirks at his own joke, then sits in the shadows and pores over a newspaper. Neither CATES nor DRUMMOND have paid the slightest attention to him.)

CATES

(Staring straight ahead)

Mr. Drummond. What’s going to happen?

DRUMMOND

What do you think is going to happen, Bert?

CATES

Do you think they’ll send me to prison?

DRUMMOND

They could.

CATES

They don’t ever let you see anybody from the outside, do they? I mean—you can just talk to a visitor—through a window—the way they show it in the movies?

DRUMMOND

Oh, it’s not as bad as all that. (Turning toward the town) When they started this fire here, they never figured it would light up the whole sky. A lot of people’s shoes are getting hot. But you can’t be too sure.

(At the other side of the stage, BRADY rises majestically from his debris of paper napkins and banana peels, and goes off.)

CATES

(Watching BRADY go off)

He seems so sure. He seems to know what the verdict’s going to be.

DRUMMOND

Nobody knows. (He tugs on one ear) I’ve got a pretty good idea. When you’ve been a lawyer as long as I have—a thousand years more or less—you get so you can smell the way a jury’s thinking.

CATES

What are they thinking right now?

DRUMMOND

(Sighing)

Someday I’m going to get me an easy case. An open-and-shut case. I’ve got a friend up in Chicago. Big lawyer. Lord how the money rolls in! You know why? He never takes a case unless it’s a sure thing. Like a jockey who won’t go in a race unless he can ride the favorite.