The Man with the Wooden Spectacles. Harry Stephen Keeler

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СКАЧАТЬ tell her you’ve appointed her—will fight like a little wildcat—do everything to get out of it—try—”

      “Fight—me?” said the Judge aghast. “Fight—me?” he repeated, and with a trace of irritation in his voice. “Why—that’s no way for a youngster to do—just starting out in law. She—she should be glad—to be appointed—to get the lucrative $100 fee alone. She should be glad, moreover, that the office of Public Defender is now abolished here in Chicago—and that some of the Public Defender’s former at salary is now divided up amongst less fortunate criminal lawyers. She should be glad—”

      “Yes, Judge—but she won’t be! She’ll beg, plead, threaten —try everything on God’s green earth—to make you let her out. And I want to ask you, therefore, if—for her own sake—you’ll tell her frankly that if she refuses to take the case, you will—under the new statutes that permit you to do so—write her disbarment.”

      Bewilderment and displeasure both, plainly, lay on the Judge’s face. But it appeared to be the former that got the upper hand. “But—but why,” he asked, “will she—will she fight me?”

      “Why? Because she’s afraid—to take her first case. Afraid, lest she do some injustice to her client, and—”

      But the Judge laughed quietly. “My goodness! A deaf-and-dumb lawyer couldn’t hurt this fellow’s chances! At least—from what you just read me, and from what Mr. Vann told me. But if she’s like you say, Mr. Moffit, she’ll probably blow up in court, and—”

      “Blow—up—in—court? Don’t you believe it, Judge. It’s just pre-performance stage-fright. I saw her twice—in amateur theatricals—darn near collapse before going on the stage; but when she did go on, she—she was the hit of the show.”

      “Well, that merely demonstrates what I’ve always maintained: The Baptismal Fire—in every field—is its own excuse.”

      “So I think. But now Judge—if she balks—in fact, when she balks!—will you threaten her with disbarment?”

      “Threaten her—with disbarment? I—I will disbar her!”

      The Judge was becoming downright angry, as the hypothetical picture, plainly, grew more objective in his mind.

      “I—I will disbar her. Not only under my absolute rights as Chief Commissioner of the Ethical Practices Subdivision—but also under the new statutes which allow any judge who has been on the bench as long as I have to do exactly that. And just as I would disbar any lawyer who refused to take a kind court’s benevolent appointment. Yes—I’ll give her a 3-month’s disbarment as her very first, and most valuable, lesson in criminal law. I’ll—” He broke off, his wrath—of choleric nature—obviously fading a bit. “But oh, Moffit, the girl will take the case all right—and be glad to.”

      But to this Silas Moffit made no reply. Except to rub his hands together with satisfaction. Then, pulling out a great turnip of a gold watch, he rose hastily. “I’m so glad, Judge. And relieved. I love that girl—my half-brother’s only daughter, you know—and I realize that she must make that plunge sooner or later. Now—with this as a start—everything will be under way for her legal career. I look to see her make good very quickly then—yes.”

      “Well, her chance has arrived,” said the Judge meaningfully. “She’s appointed. The minute you leave.”

      “And one more thing—and I will.” The Judge was attentive. “May I also have the favor granted which all along was one you thought I wanted? In short, Judge, may I come to this trial tonight?”

      “Well, now, Moffit, since you read me off those facts, involving so many persons, I can see plainly that—huge as my drawing room is, downstairs—there’ll be witnesses a-plenty, of necessity, packed in it tonight; and inasmuch as now I’ve consented—”

      “Well, it was just,” interrupted Silas Moffit, “that I would love to see dear Elsa get her baptismal fire, I have no interest in the case itself, rest assured. Only in Elsa. And then, too, it occurred to me at the same time what a nice gesture it would be if, when her name is announced by your clerk in the improvised courtroom as official defender—and she arises to acknowledge herself as defense counsel—I could pass up to you that 5-year renewal on that mortgage. And—”

      “I quite understand,” said Penworth, hastily. “Yes—quite. Well, you may attend, Moffit. In fact—you may be John Q. Public himself! Yes. For the public, in general, will not be in attendance at this trial. The Press, yes—but the public, no. But you shall be the official Public! And the hour, let me say, is 8 p.m. sharp. And I’ll see that your name is put down on whatever list of permitable entrants Mr. Mullins receives from Mr. Vann—for Mr. Mullins, before taking up his official position tonight as my court clerk and bailiff combined, will attend to the admitting of all the proper entrants and their disposition in the courtroom. As for Mr. Vann, I’m sure he will later authorize my having put your name down.”

      “I’m quite sure he will,” declared Silas Moffit quietly.

      And even meaningfully. “And now—I’ll be going.”

      And standing not on the order of so doing, Silas Moffit bowed himself to the doorway—only to be called back by Penworth.

      “Aren’t you forgetting something, Mr. Moffit?”

      Silas Moffit surveyed his person all over, from head to foot. And then a startled look of utter unbelief came over his face: the look of a man who simply can’t believe he has been solicited for a bribe, but who yet has heard—with his very own ears!—no less than—

      “We-ell no, Judge,” he stammered. “I’m not. That is—”

      “Well, how about your bumbershoot yonder?” And a dry amused smile hovered over the jurist’s lips.

      “Good God—yes—of course!” And Silas Moffit hastily retrieved it. “I think I leave my confounded umbrella someplace at least once a day. For—but now, Judge, I note you smiling!—and of course now you’re going to ask me why I carry one—rain or shine! Which practically everybody does ask—sooner or later—and which I’ll wager not less than one person will yet today before the day is out.

      “No, I am not,” Judge Penworth said hastily, though with a pronounced show of dignity. “I quite am not going to ask any question about a purely personal eccent—er—um—predilec­tion. Lest,” he added ruefully, “you show me my place by asking me about one of my own. Such as my deplorable habit of—but I’ve nothing to ask,” he finished, smiling dryly back from the bed.

      “You’re a real gentleman, Judge!” Anyone could see Silas Moffit was in grand fettle. “And it’s a real pleasure to meet up with breeding around this town. Well, I’ll be going now, so that you can tell my niece—the good news!”

      And with a final good-bye, Silas Moffit left the room—this time for good—nodding, after he reached the down stairs front hall, towards Mullins who was now coming up from the basement with two chairs not nearly so fine as the first two he had been carrying.

      Silas Moffit let himself out. And hurried down the soapstone steps. Up the block. And around the corner. And into a drugstore. In which, first buying a slug, he stepped into a single triple-glassed phone booth standing alone and isolated up front.

      His voice was jubilant as he asked for Chocktaw 8888 and even more jubilant when he recognized СКАЧАТЬ