"A penalty prescribed by the laws of this State," explained Calvin patiently, "is death for a man convicted of murder. Are you opposed to voting the death penalty for a man found guilty?"
"Not me; I ain't skeary," assured Galaski, comprehending at last. "I'll hang him for you," he promised, gazing at Calvin with full friendliness.
"The State, not an individual, requires the penalty," said Calvin, coldly, repelling the man's offer to do him a personal favor. He would have liked to avoid at this time the speaking of the plain, brutal word for execution. It was too soon and altogether too glib, and Calvin knew that it offended the court-room.
"Have you formed and expressed any opinion as to this case?" he continued.
"Sure I got an opinion. I can read the papers. I said he done it," Galaski replied, heartily; and thereupon, to Calvin's relief, the man was dismissed for cause.
He wanted Americans, true Americans, to try this case; and there ran in his head a sentence from a story which his mother used to tell to him when he was a little boy.
It had to do with a crisis in the Revolutionary War, when General Washington himself was seeing to the outposts before an important engagement, and in order to prevent treachery, he commanded: "Put only Americans on guard to-night!"
Calvin looked at the candidates for jury service, longing to see lean, angular faces of blue-eyed, brown-haired men whom he could trust, longing to read upon the jury lists names like Webster and Bradford and Bancroft.
Instead he encountered "Americans" of swarthy skin and dark eyes, of nomenclature and mentality similar to Galaski. Two came up, one after the other, neither conscientiously opposed to the death penalty nor prejudiced
