Explore "Ghosts" by Arthur Gask on Textopian. Read with annotations and highlights.
It was the ending of the fourth day of the 'Hylden versus Hylden and Carnarvon' divorce case, and excitement was running high. Not, indeed, that there had been any excitement in the court itself for His Honor, Judge Bevan-Royal, was a stern martinet, and emotion was given no rein when he was presiding on the Bench.
Fifty-five years of age, he had been admitted to the practice of the law in the Old Country some 30 years previously. Migrating, however, to South Australia, he had soon made his mark, and at 45 had been elevated to the Bench. Of an austere morality, and with a well-known distaste for dealing with cases of matrimonial infidelity, it was nevertheless generally conceded he was by far the best divorce judge in the State. Devoid of sentiment and cold as ice where a pretty face was concerned, it was agreed on all sides that in any case he was handling he would hold the scales of justice to the balance of the finest gossamer of a spider's web.