JUDGE

We beg your attention, please, ladies and gentlemen! Colonel Brady has some remarks to make which I am sure will interest us all!

(A few of the faithful fall dutifully silent. But the milling about and the slopping of lemonade continues. Two kids chase each other in and out among the spectators, annoying the perspiring RADIO MAN. BRADY stretches out his arms, in the great attention-getting gesture.)

BRADY

My dear friends…! Your attention, please! (The bugle voice reduces the noise somewhat further. But it is not the eager, anticipatory hush of olden days. Attention is given him, not as the inevitable due of a mighty monarch, but grudgingly and resentfully) Fellow citizens, and friends of the unseen audience. From the hallowed hills of sacred Sinai, in the days of remote antiquity, came the law which has been our bulwark and our shield. Age upon age, men have looked to the law as they would look to the mountains, whence cometh our strength. And here, here in this—

(The RADIO MAN approaches BRADY nervously.)

RADIO MAN

Excuse me, Mr.—uh, Colonel Brady; would you…uh…point more in the direction of the enunciator…?

(The RADIO MAN pushes BRADY bodily toward the microphone. As the orator is maneuvered into position, he seems almost to be an inanimate object, like a huge ornate vase which must be precisely centered on a mantel. In this momentary lull, the audience has slipped away from him again. There’s a backwash of restless shifting and murmuring. BRADY’S vanity and cussedness won’t let him give up, even though he realizes this is a sputtering anticlimax. By God, he’ll make them listen!)

BRADY

(Red-faced, his larynx taut, roaring stridently)

As they would look to the mountains whence cometh our strength. And here, here in this courtroom, we have seen vindicated—(A few people leave. He watches them desperately, out of the comer of his eye) We have seen vindicated—

RADIO MAN

(After an off-stage signal)

Ladies and gentlemen, our program director in Chicago advises us that our time here is completed. Harry Y. Esterbrook speaking. We return you now to our studios and “Matinee Musicale.”

(He takes the microphone and goes off. This is the final indignity to BRADY; he realizes that a great portion of his audience has left him as he watches it go. BRADY brandishes his speech, as if it were Excalibur. His eyes start from his head, the voice is a tight, frantic rasp.)

BRADY

From the hallowed hills of sacred Sinai…

(He freezes. His lips move, but nothing comes out. Paradoxically, his silence brings silence. The orator can hold his audience only by not speaking.)

STOREKEEPER

Look at him!

MRS. BRADY

(With terror)

Matt—

(There seems to be some violent, volcanic upheaval within him. His lower lip quivers, his eyes stare. Very slowly, he seems to be leaning toward the audience. Then, like a figure in a waxworks, toppling from its pedestal, he falls stiffly, face forward. MEEKER and DAVENPORT spring forward, catch BRADY by the shoulders and break his fall. The sheaf of manuscript, clutched in his raised hand, scatters in mid air. The great words flutter innocuously to the courtroom floor. There is a burst of reaction. MRS. BRADY screams.)