CHAPTER 53

Bohdan stood in the bright afternoon sun as the sheriff attached the chain to the train depot roof support. The other end of the chain was attached to an iron brace that was locked around Bohdan’s neck keeping him from running off. The judge had arrived and his train now sat on the tracks refueling and taking on more water for the steam engine. The whole trial would take place outside in the shade of the depot in three hours before the judge had to leave for his next case three hundred miles away in Garden City.

The judge brought along security, a bailiff, a court reporter, a prosecutor and nothing else. Everything else for the trial had to be provided by the local jurisdiction, including a defense attorney, which Seneca didn’t have.

The sheriff set up a makeshift courtroom with a raised platform and bench for the judge and two tables for the prosecution and defense. The rest of the area was patchy grass covered dirt and a group of spectators who came out for the show. With the depot