He looked at Charles and his voice steadied at last. "So there's your answer, judge. There's exactly what he means to do. And God help me. I'm too tired of being afraid of him to keep quiet about it any longer."
The room exploded, and Charles Whitaker rose slowly from his chair, his smooth composure cracking. At last, his face white with a fury he could no longer hide. And Eleanor understood in that instant that the careful trap he'd spent 30 days building had just begun in front of the whole county to close on the man who'd said it. Judge Puit hammered the gavel until the room finally quieted. But the thing that mattered had already happened, and everyone in the hall knew it.
Ezra Henderson stood in the silence. He'd made, still turning his hat in his hands, a man who had just set fire to his own future, and was waiting to see how badly he'd burn. Charles Whitaker stared at him across the room with a look that promised ruin, and Henderson met it pale but unbroken, and did not sit down. "Mr. Henderson," Judge Puit said, "you understand you've made a grave accusation under oath, if I ask it of you.
Are you prepared to swear to what you just said? That Charles Whitaker told you in your own home that he intended to charge this valley for water. It now drinks free. I'll swear to it on my mother's grave, judge. Henderson's voice didn't waver.
He sat at my table. He drank my coffee. And he told me the water was as good as his and that I'd best get used to paying for it. I've carried it two months too scared to say a word because he holds my note and he could put my family out on the road tomorrow. He looked at Charles.
But I watched that woman stand up today and answer every ugly thing they threw at her without once lying about it. And I'll be honest, I couldn't sit there being a coward while she was braver than any man in this room. So yes, judge, I'll swear to it. I'll um Charles's lawyer shot to his feet. Your honor, this is an ambush.
This man's testimony has no bearing on the marriage. He's clearly been put up to it. Sit down, counselor. Judge Puit's tired voice had gone flat and hard. I asked the question, he answered it, and I'll decide what has bearing in my own courtroom.
He turned back to the room. Mr. Henderson says Mr. Whitaker made his intentions plain in a private kitchen. I'd like to know if that kitchen was the only one.