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He could see her eyeing the soaring ceiling, surmounted by L’Enfant’s grand glass cupola, which bathed the lobby in light—the light of truth, Cadwallader thought poetically.

He took Mrs. Ring by the arm as he maneuvered them around the crowd. “Try not to be overawed by the grandeur of your surroundings. The jurors will be good citizens like yourselves.”

Elias Ring glowered at him from under his broad hat. “And why should we be overawed? Awe we owe only to the Lord, not the children of Mammon.”

If he was going to take that sort of tack, he wasn’t going to make a good impression on the stand. Ring appeared determined to be displeased and displeasing. Cadwallader reassured himself that Elias Ring could be hustled on and off the stand as quickly as possible. He was only a side character in this drama.

“Pardon—excuse me—” Cadwallader employed his elbows to clear a path into the courtroom, almost unrecognizable for the press of bodies. Every inch of space was jammed with people, shoved together on the benches, hanging from the balconies, pressing forward nearly to the bench itself, where Chief Justice Lansing, Mayor Varick, and Richard Harison, recorder of the court, sat clothed in majesty and their robes of office.

“Hear ye, hear ye!” bellowed the clerk of the court. “All manner of persons that have business to do at this court of oyer and terminer, held in and for the county of New York, let them draw near and give their attendance and they shall be heard! If they can,” he added, sotto voce.

Chief Justice Lansing banged his gavel. “Bailiff! Clear the court of unnecessary persons!”

Cadwallader shepherded his little group closer to the front of the room as the bailiff pushed people out the door, some putting up more protest than others.

“Ah, Colden, there you are!” called Brockholst Livingston, from the table where the defense sat, all looking annoyingly unruffled. “Thought you’d changed your mind!”

“I was delayed by the people raising their voice in Elma’s cause.”

“The mob, you mean,” said General Hamilton. He raised his voice so all could hear. “When once you let the mob have their voice, there is no hope of justice.”

Was that to be their tack? Well, they had to have something, and the evidence was all quite firmly on Cadwallader’s side. On Elma’s side, he meant.

With the room cleared, the prisoner was called to the bar, taking his place in the dock. Someone—Burr, perhaps? Or Brockholst?—had made sure Levi had been given a clean coat and that his hair was brushed and neatly tied. The only signs of his weekend in the Bridewell were the circles beneath his eyes and a faint smattering of bug bites.

The clerk, Coleman, called forward the panel of jurors. “Levi Weeks, prisoner at the bar”—his sonorous voice turned the rote invocation into grand theater—“hold up your right hand and harken to what is said to you. These good men who have been last called and who do now appear are those who are to pass between the people of the state of New York and you upon your trial of life and death.”

A delightful shiver went through those who had been permitted to remain. Cadwallader spotted Maria in one of the galleries, in her new paisley shawl, sitting by Josiah. He resisted the urge to wave.

“Gentlemen of the jury.” Coleman faced the jurors. “The prisoner at the bar stands indicted in the words following, that Levi Weeks, laborer, not having the fear of God before his eyes, but being moved and seduced by the instigation of the devil, in and upon one Gulielma Sands, feloniously, willfully, and of his malice aforethought did cast, throw, and push the said Gulielma Sands into a certain well. . . .”

Cadwallader had to stop himself from mouthing the words along with the clerk. He had crafted this indictment, chosen the charges, alleging two counts: first that Levi Weeks had pushed Elma into the well, causing her to drown; second that Levi Weeks had assaulted Elma Sands.

“Upon this indictment, the prisoner at the bar hath been arraigned, and on his arraignment hath pleaded not guilty.”

Levi Weeks stood stony-faced at the bar.

“He is now to be tried by his country, which country you are, so that your charge is, gentlemen, to inquire whether the prisoner at the bar is guilty of the felony whereof he stands indicted, or is not guilty, so sit together and hear your evidence.”

Catherine Ring clasped her hands in her lap. Elias Ring slouched down so he was all but invisible beneath the brim of his hat. Maria’s paisley shawl was a splash of color in the gallery.

“Mr. Colden?” Cadwallader started as the chief justice pronounced his name. “I believe you may wish to open your case.”

Cadwallader lurched to his feet, sending his copy of State Trials tumbling to the floor, and the pages he’d marked with it. He hastily scooped it back up.

“Yes, Your Honor, as it please Your Honor. Gentlemen of the jury . . .”

Cadwallader fumbled in his pocket for the closely scribbled pages on which he had written his opening statement. Thank goodness it was still there. He knew that neither Hamilton nor Burr would read—no, nor Brockholst Livingston—but he had thought hard about it and decided there was no point in pretending he was their equal as a rhetorician. The whole point was that he wasn’t their equal as a rhetorician. He was just a simple man, a journeyman lawyer, with truth as his standard.

Cadwallader settled himself firmly on his feet and faced the jury, twelve men who knew they were participating in the most momentous trial of a generation, all looking to him. It was just as he’d told Mrs. Ring two weeks ago. All he needed to do to win was tell the truth, because the truth would hang Levi Weeks.

“Gentlemen of the jury, in a cause which appears to have so greatly excited the public mind, in which the prisoner has thought it necessary for his defense to employ so many advocates distinguished for their eloquence and abilities, so vastly my superiors in learning, experience, and professional rank”—Cadwallader bowed to the trio of eminent attorneys clustered at the defense table—“it is not wonderful that I should rise to address you under the weight of embarrassments which such circumstances excite.”

There was a decidedly sardonic expression on Brockholst Livingston’s face. As always, it was impossible to tell what Colonel Burr was thinking. General Hamilton, however, seemed to genuinely enjoy the praise.

Cadwallader hastily addressed himself to his paper. “But, gentlemen, although the abilities enlisted on the respective sides of this cause are very unequal, I find some consolation in the reflection that our tasks are so also. While to my opponents it belongs as their duty to exert all their powerful talents in favor of the prisoner, as a public prosecutor, I think I ought to do no more than offer you in its proper order, all the testimony the case affords, draw from the witnesses which may be produced on either side all that they know, the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth.”

He lifted his head, making sure to look all around the room: at the spectators in the gallery, Weeks in the dock, the jury in their box. No tricks, no legal feints. Only the truth. This was what he pledged them.