The Boss, and How He Came to Rule New York. Lewis Alfred Henry

Чтение книги онлайн.

СКАЧАТЬ marked by soiled linen, frayed elbows, greasy collars, and an evident carelessness as to the state of their hands and faces. There were boys to wait on these folk of law, a boy to each I should say. None of these urchins was older than was I, and some no more than twelve. They carried baize bags, chatted gravely while waiting the call of their masters, and gave themselves strutting airs and brows of consequence. These engaging children, in a spirit of loyalty, doubtless, showed themselves as untainted of water as were their betters.

      While I rehearse these sordid appearances as developed in the dim lights which through the grimy windows fell across the scene, you are not to suppose the notice of them preyed upon me. I was, in that hour, neither so squeamish nor so observant as to make particular note of them, nor was I to that degree the slave of soap in my own roving person, as to justify the risk of strictures which might provoke retort. Besides, I was thinking dolefully on that trip to Blackwell’s Island whereof the future seemed so full, and my eyes scanned the judge on the bench rather than lesser folk who were not so important in my affairs.

      While in the mills of great misery, still I was steady enough. I turned my gaze upon the magistrate, and sought in his looks and words, as he went about the sorry destinies of other delinquents, some slant of what I might look forward to for myself. The dignitary in question showed lean and sallow and bald, with a sly face and an eye whereof the great expression was one of sleepless self-interest. He did not come upon you as either brave or good, but he had nothing brutal or vindictive, and his timid mealy voice was shaken by a quaver that seemed a perpetual apology for what judgments he from time to time would pass. His sentences were invariably light, except in instances where some strong influence from the outside, generally a politician or the agent of a big company, arose to demand severity.

      While within the railed pen with those other unfortunates whom the dragnets of the police had brought to these mean shores, and in an interval when my fascinated eyes were off the magistrate, I caught sight of Anne and my father. They had seats inside the fence. The latter’s face was clouded with simple trouble; he wore his Sunday coat, and his hands, hard and showing the stains of his forge, roved in uneasy alternation from his pockets to his lapels and back again. Anne’s young eyes were worn and tired, for she had slept as little as had I and wept much more the night before. I could not discover Apple Cheek, although I looked about the room for her more than once. I had it in my hopes that they had given Apple Cheek her freedom, and the thought was a half-relief. Nothing of such decent sort had come to pass, however; Apple Cheek was waiting with two or three harridans, her comrades of the cells, in an adjoining room.

      When my name was called, an officer of the court opened a gate in the prisoner’s pen and motioned me to come forth.

      “Hurry up!” said the officer, who was for expedition. “W’at’s the trouble with your heels? You aint got no ball an’ chain on yet, you know.”

      Then he gave me a chair in front of the magistrate, where the man of power might run me up and down with his shifty deprecatory eye.

      “There was a girl brought in with him, your honor,” remarked the officer at the gate.

      “Have her out, then,” said the magistrate; whereupon Apple Cheek, a bit disheveled and cheeks redder than ever with the tears she had shed, was produced and given a seat by my side.

      “Who complains of these defendants?” asked the magistrate in a mild non-committal voice, glancing about the room.

      “I do, your honor.”

      It was Sheeny Joe who came pushing to the fore from a far corner. His head had received the benefit of several bandages, and it gave me a dullish joy to think it was I to furnish the reason of them.

      The magistrate appeared to know Sheeny Joe, and to hold him in regard at that. The moment my enemy declared himself as the complainant, and no one springing up to take my part, the magistrate bent upon me a stony glance that spoke plainly of those six months concerning which the turnkey told. I gave up everything, myself and Apple Cheek, as surely lost.

      “Tell your story,” said the magistrate to Sheeny Joe. His manner was full of commiseration for that unworthy. “What did he assault you with?”

      “With a blackjack, your honor, or a piece of lead pipe,” replied Sheeny Joe. “He struck me when I wasn’t lookin’. I’m busy trying to tell the girl there w’at hotel she wants. He gives it to me over the head from behind; then as I wheels, he smashes me across the nose. I couldn’t see with w’at, but it was a bar of some kind, mebby iron, mebby lead. As I goes down, I hears the sketch – the girl, I mean – sing out, ‘Kill him!’ The girl was eggin’ him on, your honor.”

      Sheeny Joe unwound this string of lies without hitch or pause, and withal so rapidly it fair stole my breath away. I felt the eyes of the magistrate upon me; I knew my danger and yet could come by no words for my own defense. I make no doubt, had it not been for a diversion as unlooked-for as it was welcome, I would have been marked for prison where I stood.

      “I demand to be heard,” came suddenly, in a high angry voice. “What that rogue has just uttered is all a pack of lies together!”

      It was the reputable old gentleman of the evening before who thus threw himself in the way of events. Being escorted through the press of onlookers by an officer, the reputable old gentleman stood squarely in front of the magistrate.

      “I demand justice for that boy,” fumed the reputable old gentleman, glaring at the magistrate, and growing crimson in the face; “I demand a jury. As for the girl, she wasn’t ten minutes off the boat; her only part in the offense would seem to be that this scoundrel,” pointing to Sheeny Joe, “was striving to lure her to a low resort.”

      “The Dead Rabbit a low resort!” cried Sheeny

      Joe indignantly. “The place is as straight as a gun.”

      “Will you please tell me who you are?” asked the magistrate of the reputable old gentleman. He had resumed his non-committal look. The confident vigor of the reputable old gentleman disconcerted him and made him wary.

      “I am a taxpayer,” said the reputable old gentleman; “yes,” donning an air as though the thunders and lightnings of politics dwelt in the word, “yes, your honor, a taxpayer. I do not know this boy, but here are his father and sister to speak for him.” Then, as he caught sight of the captain who had ordered him out of the station: “There is a man, your honor, who by the hands of his minions drove me from a public police office – me, a taxpayer!”

      The captain grinned easily to find himself thus distinguished. The grin irritated the reputable old gentleman, who was even more peppery than reputable.

      “Smile, sir!” cried the reputable old gentleman, shaking his wrathful finger at the captain. “I shall have you before your superiors on charges before I’m done!”

      “That’s what they all say,” remarked the captain, stifling a yawn.

      “One thing at a time, sir,” said the magistrate to the reputable old gentleman. His attitude was wheedling and propitiatory. “Did I understand you to say that the gentleman and the lady at your back are the father and sister of this boy?”

      My father and Anne had taken their stations to the rear of the reputable old gentleman. The latter, looking around as if to identify them, replied:

      “If the court please, I’m told so.”

      “Your honor,” broke in Sheeny Joe with a front of injury, “w’at’s that got to do with his sandbaggin’ me? Am I to be murdered w’en peacefully about me business, just ‘cause a guy’s got a father?”

СКАЧАТЬ