The Camera Fiend

“Yes! Who's to tell them I didn't do it on purpose, and run away, and then think better of it?”

Baumgartner smiled.

“Surely I am,” said he; but his smile went out with the words. “If only they believe me!” he added as though it was a new idea to him.

It was a terrifying one to Pocket.

“Why shouldn't they?” was his broken exclamation.

“I don't know. I never thought of it before. But what can I swear to, after all? I can swear you shot a man, but I can't swear you shot him in your sleep!”

“You said you saw I did!”

“So I did, my young fellow,” replied the doctor, with a kinder smile; “at least I can swear that you were walking with your eyes shut, and I thought you were walking in your sleep. It's not quite the same thing. It is near it. But we are talking about my evidence on oath in a court of justice.”

“Shall I be tried?” asked the schoolboy in a hoarse whisper.

“Perhaps only by the magistrate,” replied the other, soothingly; “let us hope it will stop at that.”

“But it must, it must!” cried Pocket wildly. “I'm absolutely innocent! You said so yourself a minute ago; you've only to swear it as a doctor? They can't do anything to me – they can't possibly!”

The doctor stood looking into the sunless garden with a troubled face.

“Dr. Baumgartner!”

“Yes, my young fellow?”

“They can't do anything to me, can they?”

Baumgartner returned to the fireside with his foreign shrug.