TOPPLETON CONSULTS THE LAW AND FORMS AN OPINION.
AT the conclusion of the exile's story Hopkins glanced at his watch, and
discovered that he had barely time to return to his lodging and dress
for a little dinner he had promised to attend that evening.
"I will look up the law in this case of yours, Chatford," he said,
rising from his chair and putting on his hat and coat, "and in about a
week I rather think we shall be able to decide upon some definite line
of action. It will be difficult, I am afraid, to find any precedent to
guide us in a delicate matter of this sort, but as a lay lawyer, if I
may be allowed the expression, it seems to me that there ought to be
some redress for one who has been made the victim of so many different
kinds of infamy at once as you have. The weak part of our case is that
you were yourself an accessory to every single one of the fiend's
crimes, and in instituting a suit at law we cannot get around the fact
that in a measure you are both plaintiff and defendant. I believe those
are the terms usually employed to designate the two parties to a suit,
except in the case of an appeal, when there is an appellant and a
repellant if my memory serves me."
"It may be as you say," returned the exile, sadly. "I'll have to take
your word for it entirely, since, as I have already told you, all the
law I ever knew I have forgotten, and then, too, my business being
purely one of adjudication, I used to distinguish my clients one from
another--representing, as I did, both sides--by calling them,
respectively, the compromisee and the compromisor."
"Well," Toppleton said, "I'll find out all about it and let you know,
say, by Friday next. We'll first have to decide in what capacity you
shall appear in court, whether as a plaintiff or defendant. I think
under the circumstances you will have to go as a plaintiff, though in a
case in which my father was interested some years ago, I know that it
was really the plaintiff who was put on the defensive as soon as the old
gentleman took him in hand to cross-examine him. It was said by experts
to have been the crossest examination on the calendar that year; and
between you and me, Edward, the plaintiff never forgave his attorneys
for not retaining the governor on his side in the beginning. If you
would rather go as a defendant, I suppose I could arrange to have it so,
but it strikes me as a disadvantageous thing to do in these days,
because in most cases, it is the defendant who has committed the wrong
upon which the suit is based, and a man who starts in as the underdog,
has to combat the prejudices of judge, jury and general public, with
whom it is a time-honoured custom to believe a man guilty until he has
proven his innocence. I think, on the whole, it would be easier for you
to prove Lord Barncastle's guilt than your own innocence."
"I know from the lucid manner in which you talk, Toppleton," said the
exile, with a deep sigh indicating satisfaction, "from the readiness and
extemporaneousness with which you grasp the situation, not losing sight
of side issues, that I have made no mistake in coming to you. Heaven
bless you, sir. You will never regret the assistance you are so nobly
giving to one you have never seen."
"Don't mention it, Sallie--I should say Chatford," said Toppleton. "I am
an American citizen and will ever be found championing the cause of the
oppressed against the oppressor. My ears are ever open to the plaint of
the plaintiff, nor shall I be deaf to the defendant in case you choose
to be the latter. Count on me, Edward, and all will yet be well!"
With these inspiring words, Toppleton lit his cigar and walked jauntily
from the room, and the exile relapsed into silence.
Faithful to his promise, Toppleton applied himself assiduously to the
study of the law as it seemed to him to bear upon the case of his
mysterious client. To be sure, his library was not quite as extensive as
it might have been, and there may have been points in other books than
the ones he had, which would have affected his case materially, but the
young lawyer was more or less self-reliant, and what he had to read he
read intelligently.
"If I were called upon suddenly to rescue a young woman from drowning,
and possessed nothing but an anchor and a capstan bar to do it with, my
duty clearly would be to do the best I could with those tools, however
awkward they might be. I could not ease my conscience after neglecting
to do all that I could with those tools, by saying that I hadn't a
lifeboat and a cork suit handy. Here is a parallel case. I must do the
best I can with the tools I have, and I guess I can find enough law in
Blackstone and that tree calf copy of the sixteenth volume of Abbott's
'Digest' I picked up the other day to cover this case. If I can't, I'll
have to use the sense that Nature gave me, and go ahead anyhow."
To his delight, Hopkins found it utterly unnecessary for him to read the
tree calf sixteenth volume of Abbott's "Digest," he found so much in the
"Comic Blackstone" that applied.
"Why, do you know," he said to the exile when they met, the one to
explain the law, the other to listen, "do you know you have the finest
case in all Christendom, without leaving the very fundamental principles
of the law? It's really extraordinary what a case you have, or rather,
would have, if you could devise some means of appearing in court. That's
the uncrackable nut in the case. How the deuce to have you appear on the
witness stand, I can't see. The court would not tolerate any such
makeshift as the Aunt Sallie scheme you and I have adopted, it would be
so manifestly absurd, and would give the counsel for the defence--for
you must be the plaintiff after all, can't help yourself--it would give
the counsel for the defence the finest chance to annihilate us by the
use of his satirical powers he had ever had, and before a jury that
would simply ruin our cause at the outset."
"I don't see why I can't testify as I am--bodiless as I have been left.
The mere absence of my body and presence of my consciousness would
almost prove my case," said the exile.
"It would seem as if it ought to," said Toppleton. "But you know what
men are. They believe very little that they hear, and not much more than
half that they see. You couldn't expect anyone to believe the points of
a person unseen. If they can't see you they can't see your hardships,
and besides, hearsay evidence unsupported is not worth shucks."
"I don't know what shucks are," returned the exile, "but I see your
point."
"It's a serious point," said Toppleton. "And then there is another most
embarrassing side to it. We can't afford to have our case weakened by
putting ourselves in a position where countercharges can be brought
against us, and I am very much afraid our opponents would charge
vagrancy against you, for the very obvious and irrefutable reason that
you have absolutely no visible means of support. You wouldn't have a leg
to stand on if they did that, and yet it does seem a pity that something
cannot be done to enable you to appear, for as I said a minute ago, you
have otherwise a perfectly magnificent cause of action. Why, Edward,
there isn't a page in the Comic Blackstone that does not contain
something that applies to your case, and that ought to make you a
winner if we could get around this horrible lack of body of yours.
"For instance," continued Toppleton, opening A'Beckett's famous
contribution to legal lore, "in the very first chapter we find that
Blackstone divides rights into rights of _persons_ and rights of things.
Clearly you have a right to your own person, and no judge on a sane
bench would dare deny it. Absolute rights, it says here, belong to man
in a state of nature, which being so, you have been wronged, because in
being deprived of your state of nature you have been robbed of your
absolute rights. Clear as crystal, eh?"
"That's so," said the exile. "You are a marvel at law, Hopkins."
"In section six reference is made to the _habeas corpus_ act of Charles
the Second, and unless I have forgotten my Latin, that is a distinct
reference to a man's right to the possession of his own body. Section
eight, same chapter, announces man's right to personal security, and
asserts his legal claim to the enjoyment of _life, limbs, health and
reputation_. Have you enjoyed your life? No! Have you enjoyed your
limbs? Not for thirty years. Have you enjoyed your health. No!
Barncastle of Burningford has enjoyed that as well as your reputation. I
think on the whole though, we would better not say anything about your
reputation if we get into court, for while it is undoubtedly _yours_,
and has been by no means enjoyed by you, you didn't make it for
yourself. That was his work, and he is entitled to it."
"True," said the exile. "I do not wish to claim anything I am not
entitled to."
"That's the proper spirit," said Toppleton. "You want what belongs to
you and nothing more. You are entitled to your property, for which
section eleven of this same chapter provides, saying that the law will
not allow a man to be deprived of his property except by the law itself.
If a man's own body isn't his, I'd like to know to whom it belongs in a
country that professes to be free!"
Toppleton paused at this point to make a few notes and to reinforce his
own spirit by means of others.
"Now, under the head of real property, Chatford," he said, "I find that
in England property is real or personal. I think that in this case, that
of which you have been deprived comes under both heads. One's body is
certainly real and unquestionably personal, and if a man has a right to
the possession of each, he has a right to the possession of both, and he
who robs him of both is guilty of a crime under each head. Real
property consists of lands, tenements and hereditaments. Lands we must
perforce exclude because you have lost no lands. Tenements may be
alluded to, however, with absolute fairness because the body is the
tenement of the soul. Of hereditaments I am not sure. I don't know what
hereditaments are, and I haven't had time to find out anything about
them except that they are corporeal or incorporeal, which leads me to
infer that you have been wronged under this head also, for I must assume
that a hereditament is something that may or may not have a body
according to circumstances, which is your case exactly.
"Now a man's right to the possession of an estate is called his title,
if I am not mistaken," continued Hopkins, "and it is only reasonable to
suppose that this refers to bodily estate as well as to landed estate.
What we must dispute is Barncastle's title to your bodily estate. Our
case is referred to in section two, chapter nine, part second of this
book, which deals with joint tenancy in which two or more persons have
one and the same interest in an estate, but it must be held by both at
the same time. Now, even granting, as the other side may say, that you
entered into a partnership with the fiend, we could knock him right off
his pins on the sole fact that in declining to admit you to your own
bodily estate, he has not only deprived you of an undoubted right, but
has in reality forfeited his own claim to possession, since he has
violated the only principle of law upon which he could claim entrance to
the estate under any circumstances."
"Superb!" ejaculated the exile.
"Now we come to an apparent difficulty," continued Hopkins. "Possession
is, according to my authority, five points of the law. The fiend has
possession, and in consequence tallies five points; out of how many I do
not know. What the maximum number of points in the law is, the book does
not say, but even assuming that they form a good half, I think we can
bring forward five more with a dozen substitutes for each of the five in
support of our position. Some of these points will evolve themselves
when we come to consider whence Barncastle's title was derived.
"Did he acquire his title by descent? No; unless it was by a descent to
unworthy tricks which, I fear, are outside of the meaning of the law. By
purchase? If so, let him show a receipt. By occupancy? Yes, and by a
forcible occupancy which was as justifiable as his occupation of the
throne would be, an occupancy which can be shown in court to be an
entire subversion of the right of a prior occupant whose title was
acquired by inheritance."
"That's a strong point," said the exile.
"Yes, it is," said Hopkins, "especially in a country where birth means
so much. But that isn't all we have to say on this question of title. A
title can be held by prescription. Barncastle may claim that he got his
this way, but we can meet that by showing that he compounded his own
prescription, and originally got you to swallow it by a trick. He also
has a title by alienation, and there I think we may be weak since you
were a party to the final alienation, though we may be able to pull
through on even that point by showing that you consented only in the
expectation of an early return of the premises. It was an alienation by
deed, an innocent deed on your part, an infamous one on his. It was not
an alienation of record, which weakens his claim, but one of special
custom, which by no means weakens yours.
"And so, Edward, we might go on through the whole subject of the right
of property, and on every point we are strong, and on few can Barncastle
of Burningford put in the semblance of a defence."
"It's simply glorious," said the exile. "I don't believe there ever was
a case like it."
"I don't believe so either," said Toppleton. "And on the whole I'm glad
there never was. I should hate to think that a crime like this could
ever become a common one.
"Now," he said, resuming the discussion of the legal aspect of the
exile's case, "let us see what we can find under the head of 'Private
and Public Wrongs and their Remedies!' I suppose yours would come under
the head of a civil wrong, though your treatment has been very far from
civil. As such your redress lies in the Courts. You are forbidden to
take back what has been taken from you by a force which amounts to a
breach of the peace,--that is, it would not be lawful for you to seize
your own body and shake the life out of it for the purpose of yourself
becoming once more its animating spirit.
"First we must decide, 'What is the wrong that has been put upon you?'
Well, it's almost any crime you can think of. He has dispossessed you of
that which is yours. He has ousted you from your freehold. He has been
guilty of trespass. He has subjected you to a nuisance, that is if it is
a nuisance to be deprived of one's body, and I should think it would so
appear to any sane person. He has been guilty of subtraction. He has
subtracted you from your body and your body from you, leaving apparently
no remainder. He has been guilty of an offence against your religion.
To an extent he has committed an offence against the public health in
that he has haunted citizens of this city and caused you unwittingly to
do the same to the detriment of the sanity of those who have been
haunted. I think we might even charge him with homicide, for if
depriving a man of thirty years of his corporeal existence isn't
depriving him of life, I don't know what is. However this may be, I am
convinced that he is guilty of mayhem, for he certainly has deprived you
of a limb--that is shown by your utter absence of limb. He has been
guilty of an offence against your habitation, corporeal and incorporeal,
and finally he has been guilty of larceny both grand and petty. Grand in
the extent of it, petty in the method. By Jove, Chatford, if we could
bring you into Court as a concrete individual, and not as an abstract
entity, we could get up an indictment against Lord Barncastle of
Burningford that would quash him for ever.
"A body obtained for you, I should carry the case to the Appellate Court
at once, for two reasons. First because it would not be appropriate to
try so uncommon a cause in the Common Pleas, second because a decision
by the Court of Appeals is final, and we should save time by going there
at once; but the point with which we must concern ourselves the most
is, how shall we bring you before the eyes of the court; how shall we
get our plaintiff into shape--visible shape?"
A painful silence followed the conclusion of Toppleton's discussion of
the law in the case of Chatford _v_. Barncastle of Burningford. It was
evident that the exile could think of no means of surmounting the
unfortunate barrier to a successful prosecution of the case. Finally the
exile spoke:
"I perceive the dreadful truth of what you say. Having no physical
being, I have no standing in court."
"That's the unfortunate fact," returned Hopkins. "Can't you get a body
in some way? Can't you borrow one temporarily?"
"Where?" asked the exile. "You are my only material friend. You wouldn't
lend me yours."
"No, I wouldn't," said Toppleton. "If I did, where would your only
material friend be? It's hopeless, Edward; and now that I think of it,
even if you did get a form and should go to court, where are your
witnesses? You could only assert, and Barncastle could always deny.
Strong as your cause is, the courts, under the circumstances, will give
you no redress, because you cannot prove your case. We must seek other
means; this is a case that requires diplomatic action. Strategy will do
more for us than law, and I think I have a scheme."
"Which is?"
"I will go to Lord Barncastle, and by means of a little clever
dissembling will frighten him into doing the right thing by you. I
realize what a tremendous undertaking it is, but failure then would not
mean public disgrace, and failure in the courts would put us, and
particularly myself, under a cloud. In short, we might be suspected of
blackmail, Chatford; Barncastle is so prominent, and liable to just such
attacks at all times."
"But how do you propose to reach him? He has the reputation now of being
the haughtiest and most unapproachable member of the aristocracy."
"Oh, dear!" laughed Hopkins. "You don't understand Americans. Why,
Chatford, we can push ourselves in anywhere. If you were a being like
myself, and had ten pounds to bet, I would wager you that within
forty-eight hours I could have an invitation in autograph from the
Prince of Wales himself to dine with him and Prince Battenburg at
Sandringham, at any hour, and on any day I choose to set. You don't know
what enterprising fellows we Yankees are. I'll know Lord Barncastle
intimately inside of one month, if I once set out to do it."
"Excuse me for saying it, Hopkins," said the exile, sadly, "but I must
say that what I have liked about you in the past has been your freedom
from bluster and brag. To me these statements of yours sound vain and
empty. I would speak less plainly were it not that my whole future is in
your hands, and I do not want you to imperil my chances by rashness.
Tell me how you propose to meet Barncastle, and, having met him, what
you propose to do, if you do not wish me to set this talk down as
foolish braggadocio."
"I'll tell you how I propose to meet him," said Hopkins, slightly
offended, and yet characteristically forgiving; "but what I shall do
after that I shall not tell you, for I may find that he is a politer
person than you are, and it's just possible that I shall like him. If I
do, I may be impelled to desert you and ally myself with him. I don't
like to be called a braggart, Edward."
"Forgive me, Hopkins," said the spirit. "I am so wrought up by my hopes
and fears, by the consciousness of the terrible wrongs I have suffered,
that I hardly know what I am saying."
"Well, never mind," rejoined Hopkins. "Don't worry. The chances of my
deserting you are very slight. But to return to your question. I shall
meet Barncastle in this way; I shall have a sonnet written in his praise
by an intimate friend of mine, a poet of very high standing and little
morality, which I shall sign with my own name, and have printed as
though it were a clipping from some periodical. This clipping I will
send to Lord Barncastle with a note telling him that I am an American
admirer of his genius, the author of the sonnet, and have but one
ambition, which I travelled from America to gratify--to meet him face to
face."
"Aha!" said the spirit. "An appeal to his vanity, eh?"
"Precisely," said Toppleton. "It works every time."
"And when you meet him?"
"We shall see," rejoined Toppleton. "I have given up brag and bluster;
but if Lord Barncastle of Burningford does not take an interest in
Hopkins Toppleton after he has known him fifteen minutes, I'll go back
home to New York, give up my law practice and become--"
"What?" said the spirit as Hopkins hesitated.
"A sister of charity," said Hopkins, gravely.