After the denunciation had been read the president asked the prisoner if

he had any questions to put to the witness, and thereupon Bruno cried in

a loud voice: "Of course I have. It is exactly what I've been waiting for."

He had risen to his feet, kicked over a chair which stood in front of

him, and folded his arms across his breast.

"Ask him," said Bruno, "if he sent for me late at night and promised my

pardon if I would denounce David Rossi."

"It was not so," said the Director. "All I did was to advise him not to

observe a useless silence which could only condemn him to further

imprisonment if by speaking the truth he could save himself and serve

the interests of justice."

"Ask him," said Bruno, "if the denunciation he speaks of was not

dictated by himself."

"The prisoner," said the Director, "made the denunciation voluntarily,

and I rose from my bed to receive it at his urgent request."

"Ask him if I said one word to denounce David Rossi."

"The prisoner had made statements to a fellow-prisoner, and these were

embodied in the document he signed."

The advocate Fuselli interposed. "Then the Court is to understand that

the Director who dictated this denunciation knew nothing from the

prisoner himself?"

The Director hesitated, stammered, and finally admitted that it was so.

"I was inspired by a sentiment of justice," he said. "I acted from

duty."

"This man fed me on bread and water," cried Bruno. "He put me in the

punishment cells and tortured me in the strait-waistcoat with pains and

sufferings like Jesus Christ's, and when he had reduced my body and

destroyed my soul he dictated a denunciation of my dearest friend and my

unconscious fingers signed it."

"Don't shout so loud," said the president.

"I'll shout as loud as I like," said Bruno, and everybody turned to look

at him. It was useless to protest. Something seemed to say that no power

on earth could touch a man in a mood like that.

The next witness was the chief warder. He deposed that he was present at

the denunciation, that it was made voluntarily, and that no pressure

whatever was put upon the prisoner.

"Ask him," cried Bruno, "if on Sunday afternoon, when I went into his

cabinet to withdraw the denunciation, he refused to let me."

"It is not true," said the witness.




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