This time Judge Taylor’s gavel came down with a bang, and as it did the overhead lights went on in the courtroom. Darkness had not come, but the afternoon sun had left the windows. Judge Taylor quickly restored order.
In contrast
to the previous audience response, in which the ‘murmur died down quickly’, the
incredulous white audience is outraged when Tom testifies that it was in fact
Mayella who initiated the contact, that Judge Taylor needs to use the gavel to
restore order in the courtroom. Harper Lee is heightening the sense of
hopelessness as the situation worsens, and the reader can almost feel the
weight of the impending guilty verdict.