The
Unhallowed
Harvest
The
Unhallowed
Harvest
By
HOMER GREENE
_Author of “The Lincoln Conscript,”
“Pickett’s Gap,” etc._
[Illustration]
PHILADELPHIA
GEORGE W. JACOBS & COMPANY
PUBLISHERS
Copyright, 1917, by
GEORGE W. JACOBS & COMPANY
_Published March, 1917_
_All rights reserved_
Printed in U. S. A.
Contents
I. AN ENFORCED VERDICT 7
II. AN ACT OF CHARITY 25
III. IN THE PRESENCE OF DEATH 41
IV. THE NEW MOON 58
V. AN UNUSUAL SERMON 72
VI. THE VESTRY OBJECTS 86
VII. THE RECTOR’S WIFE 99
VIII. A SIGNIFICANT DINNER PARTY 119
IX. THE SPIRIT OF REVENGE 142
X. A MINISTERIAL CRISIS 162
XI. A ROMANTIC EPISODE 177
XII. THE FIRST CALAMITY 198
XIII. A CASE OF MISTAKEN IDENTITY 220
XIV. THE BISHOP’S DILEMMA 230
XV. LOVE VERSUS LAW 254
XVI. “THE DARKNESS DEEPENS” 276
XVII. A HOPELESS QUEST 295
XVIII. A CRUEL SURPRISE 314
XIX. THE STORM BREAKS 330
XX. “BLACK AS THE PIT” 346
XXI. THE FINAL TRAGEDY 366
XXII. AN EPISCOPAL BENEDICTION 374
XXIII. REHABILITATION 383
The Unhallowed Harvest
CHAPTER I
AN ENFORCED VERDICT
The Reverend Robert Bruce Farrar entered the Common Pleas court-room
and made his way down the center aisle to the railing that enclosed the
space allotted to members of the bar. Had he been an ordinary citizen
he would have stopped there. But he was not an ordinary citizen.
Therefore he passed on into the railed enclosure to find his seat. He
was rector of Christ Church; the oldest, wealthiest and most prominent
religious organization in the city. Yet that fact alone would not
have given him the distinction he enjoyed in this community. He was
also an eloquent preacher, a profound scholar, a man of attractive
and vigorous personality. Apparently he was not lacking in any of the
qualities that make for success in the administration of the affairs
of a large city parish. He had been rector of Christ Church for two
years, and his worth and ability had been, during that time, abundantly
proven. Moreover, by reason of his genial and sympathetic nature, he
had endeared himself to the people of the parish, especially to the
more humble members of his flock. He had, as the saying is, “a passion
for humanity.” To those who toiled, who were in trouble or affliction,
his heart went out in unaffected sympathy. He gave of his best to
encourage, comfort and relieve them. Indeed, the only criticism made
concerning him――and that was a suggestion rather than a criticism――was
that possibly he neglected the souls of the rich to care for the bodies
of the poor. He was deeply interested in problems of social ethics
and economy, in fact in all problems having to do with the general
welfare. He was a student of human character in all of its phases and
manifestations. This it was, doubtless, that led him into becoming a
frequenter of the courts. It was for this reason that the trial of
causes had for him a strong and unfailing attraction. He was fond of
looking on at the visible working of the machinery of the law. For
there are few public places where human motives, as disclosed by human
conduct, are brought more frequently and startlingly to the surface
than in the court-room. It was a place, therefore, where the reverend
gentleman was not only a frequent, but also a welcome visitor. He had
a standing invitation to enter the bar enclosure, and to occupy a
chair among his friends the lawyers. There had been occasions, indeed,
occasions of great public interest, when the presiding judge, who
chanced to be his senior warden, had had his rector up to sit beside
him on the bench. But the case on trial this day was not an unusual
one. It had attracted no particular attention, either among lawyers or
laymen. Yet the rector of Christ Church was deeply interested in it. He
had attended, so far as he had been able to do so, the sessions of the
court in which it was being heard. It was what is known among lawyers
as a negligence case. A workman, employed by a large manufacturing
concern, had been seriously and permanently injured while engaged in
the performance of the duties of his employment. An elevator on which
he was riding, while making his way from one part of the factory to
another, had suddenly gone wrong, and had plunged down through five
stories, to become a heap of wreckage at the bottom of the shaft. And
out from among the mass of splintered wood and broken and twisted
iron and steel, he had been drawn, scarcely less broken and twisted
and crushed than the inanimate things among which he had lain. An
action had been brought, in his name, against the employing company, to
compel it to compensate him for his injuries. This was the second day
of the trial. It was late in the afternoon, and the case was drawing
to a close. When the rector of Christ Church entered the court-room,
Philip Westgate, for the defense, was making his closing argument to
the jury. With relentless logic he was tearing down the structure which
the experienced and skillful attorney for the plaintiff had built
up. Although one of the younger members of a brilliant bar, it was
freely predicted that the day was not far distant when he would be its
leader. This thought lay distinctly in the mind of Richard Malleson,
president of the defendant company, as he sat at the counsel’s table,
and followed, with keen interest and satisfaction, the course of the
argument.
He was not so witless as to believe that the jury would find in
favor of his company, in view of the strong human appeal that had
been made to them, and still would be made to them, on behalf of the
plaintiff; yet his countenance expressed no anxiety, for his lawyer
had assured him that, regardless of any adverse verdict, the case fell
within a rule of law that would prevent a recovery. So, fair type
of the prosperous business man, portly, well-dressed, shrewd-eyed,
square-jawed, he sat contentedly and listened while Westgate whittled
away his opponent’s case.
The plaintiff also was in court, sitting near by. But whether or not he
understood what the learned counsel for the defense was saying, whether
or not he heard his voice at all, no one, looking into his face, would
have been able to discover. He sat there in a wheel-chair, a plaid robe
covering his palsied and misshapen legs, his chin resting heavily on
the broad scarf that covered his breast, his dull, gray face showing
neither anxiety nor interest as Westgate made havoc of the evidence on
which his case was built. To all outward appearance, though his whole
economic future was at stake, he neither knew nor cared what was going
on about him. For two days the rector of Christ Church had watched him
as he sat there, listless, motionless, looking neither to the right nor
left, apparently as unconcerned as though it were a stranger’s fate
with which learned counsel were playing battledore and shuttlecock
across the traverse jury box.
But if the plaintiff was indifferent, his wife, who sat by him, was
not. She at least was alive and alert. Nothing escaped her observation
and consideration; no point presented by counsel, no ruling made by
the court, no statement given by witnesses, no expression on the
faces of jurors, as evidence and argument fell upon their ears and
sank into their presumably plastic minds. She was, apparently, still
in her early thirties. She was neatly and cheaply clad, as became a
workingman’s wife. Her figure was well-proportioned and supple, and
her oval face, lighted with expressive and intelligent dark eyes,
was strikingly handsome. She was following Westgate’s argument with
intense but scornful interest. That she appreciated its strength and
its brilliance was apparent; but it was also apparent that she was not
in the least dismayed. To the clergyman, student of human character
and emotions, her countenance presented a greater attraction than the
attraction offered by eloquent counsel. He looked at her, wondered at
her, sympathized with her.
Nor was the rector the only person in the room whose attention had
been drawn to the woman’s face rather than to the eloquence of the
speaking lawyer. At the clergyman’s side sat Barry Malleson, son of
the president of the defendant company. He, also, had been in constant
attendance at the trial. Not that his presence was necessary there;
but, holding a nominally important, if not vitally necessary, position
with the defendant company, he felt, as he expressed it, that he
should be present to hearten up counsel in the case, and to give moral
encouragement and protection to his father on whom a heavy verdict
might fall with peculiar severity. With one hand ungloved, toying with
his cane, he had sat and listened, with apparently deep interest, to
Westgate’s speech. But whether the lawyer’s eloquence or the face of
the plaintiff’s wife was the greater attraction, it would have been
difficult to discover. For, while his ears appeared to be attuned to
the one, his eyes were certainly fixed upon the other, and his gaze was
one of distinct admiration.
When Westgate concluded his address and took his seat, Barry turned to
the rector and whispered:
“Great speech, that of Phil’s, wasn’t it?”
“Yes,” replied the rector. “From the standpoint of clear logic it was
faultless.”
“Too bad he couldn’t have had twelve men with brains and education to
take it in. Trying a case before an ordinary jury is more or less of
a farce. Really, you know, the law ought to be so changed that only
men of unusual intelligence, men with property interests of their own,
could sit on a jury.”
The rector smiled. He was well aware of Barry’s undemocratic tendencies,
and he knew just as well that to argue the point with him would be quite
futile. Nevertheless, he said:
“Oh, I don’t know! It seems to me that heart and conscience should
count for something in the jury box.”
“Ah,” replied Barry, “there’s your mistake. Cases should be decided
according to law and logic, not according to sentiment. Take this
case, now. Here’s a devilish――I beg your pardon!――an extraordinarily
handsome woman, of the same general social class as most of the jurors.
Plaintiff’s wife, you know. She goes to the stand and tells a moving
tale of hardship and suffering. Sits there and turns eloquent eyes
from counsel to witness and from witness to jury. Beauty in distress!
Stalwart manhood in ruins! How are brains and logic going to win
out against such a combination, before a jury made up of clerks and
workingmen?”
“So far as my observation has gone,” replied the rector, “I’m inclined
to think the ordinary jury deals out pretty even-handed justice.”
“Not when there’s a handsome woman in the case. Look at her now! By
Jupiter! she’s a beauty!”
Barry’s enthusiasm was not unfounded, the plaintiff’s wife was in
animated conversation with her lawyer during the brief interval
preceding his address. Evidently she was pointing out to him some
mistake in Westgate’s declarations, or fallacy in his logic. The
jurors, the lawyers, the spectators in the court-room, were watching
her, no less than were Barry Malleson and the Reverend Mr. Farrar. She
was worth watching.
“Crude and uncultured, of course,” added Barry. “But, take such a face
and figure as that, plus clothes and social training――she is already
reputed to have brains,――and you would have a social queen. Gad!”
He turned his eyes away, as if to rest them for a moment on some less
fascinating object. The clergyman did not seem to consider that his
companion’s remarks called for any reply from him. People who knew
Barry as well as Mr. Farrar did seldom took him very seriously.
The attorney for the plaintiff rose to make the concluding address to
the jury. He had not the logical grasp of the case that his opponent
had displayed, but he was more plausibly eloquent. He appealed more
to the sympathies of the jurors than to their reason. He grew fierce
in his denunciation of the greed and heartlessness of corporations in
general, and of this corporation in particular. He became dramatic
in his vivid description of the accident, and tearfully pathetic in
depicting the future that lay before this man with the crushed body
and the clouded mind. He called upon the jurors, as men of intelligence
and conscience, to look to it that domineering wealth should not escape
its just obligations to one whom it had carelessly crippled and cast
aside; on whose home rested to-day the dark shadows of unspeakable pain
and distressing poverty.
At the conclusion of his address many men in the court-room, including
some of the jurors, wiped furtive tears from their eyes, and all of the
women were openly weeping; all save one, the wife of the plaintiff. She
did not weep. Her glowing dark eyes were tearless and triumphant. She
looked into the sympathetic faces of the jurors and read their verdict
there before they, themselves, had considered it. She knew that her
long fight for justice on behalf of her crippled husband and herself
was approaching its victorious end. Why should she weep?
Then Judge Bosworth began his charge to the jury. He gave a brief
history of the case. He dwelt upon some of its more important phases
as revealed by the evidence. He laid down the general rules of law
governing this class of cases. He passed upon the requests of counsel
for instruction to the jury. He said finally:
“Counsel for the defendant company has asked us to charge you that
‘under all the evidence in the case the verdict of the jury must be for
the defendant.’ This is correct, and we so charge you; and, in doing
so, we say that, except in the case of a common carrier, the uniform
rule is that when recovery is sought on the ground of negligence of the
defendant, the burden of proof is on the plaintiff, and in an action
against an employer some specific act of negligence must be shown.
No defect of any kind was shown in the elevator, nor was there any
evidence which would justify a finding that it was unsafe for employees
to use. Its falling was not shown to have been due to the breach of any
duty owed by the employer to his employees. With the friction brake
on it the engineer could have controlled it, and the only rational
conclusion is that, instead of doing so, he carelessly let it drop with
resultant consequences to this plaintiff which are not to be visited on
the employer. This is one of those regrettable industrial accidents for
which, in the present state of our laws, there appears to be no remedy
in the way of compensation for injuries received.
“While the plaintiff is not charged with any contributory negligence,
and while he has our undoubted sympathy, we cannot permit him to
recover against a party that clearly has not been at fault. You
will, therefore, in the case of John Bradley against the Malleson
Manufacturing Company, render a verdict in favor of the defendant. It
will not be necessary for you to leave the box. Mr. Gaylord,” to the
prothonotary of the court, “you will please take the verdict of the
jury.”
But before the prothonotary could get to his feet, Juror No. 7, sitting
first in the front row, arose and addressed the court.
“Do I understand your Honor to say,” he inquired, “that the jury has no
right to decide whether or not Mr. Bradley is entitled to damages?”
“No right whatever,” replied the judge. “In this case the law governs
that question, and the law is exclusively for the court.”
“But,” persisted the juror, “it seems to me that the jury ought to
decide, as a matter of fact, whether this company is responsible for
Mr. Bradley’s injuries.”
The judge responded somewhat tartly:
“We have already explained to you that, in our opinion, the plaintiff
has not made out a prima facie case. If we are in error he has his
remedy by appeal.” And he gathered up the papers lying in front of him
as though he had made an end of the matter.
But Juror No. 7 was not yet satisfied.
“It takes time and costs money to appeal,” he said. “If we could give
the plaintiff a reasonable verdict now it would probably settle the
case for good.”
If Judge Bosworth was impatient before, he was plainly vexed now, and
he replied with some warmth:
“We cannot argue the matter with you nor permit you to argue it with
us. We have considered the case carefully, and have directed a verdict
for the defendant. We will not accept any other verdict. Our decision
must stand until it is reversed by a higher court.”
“I meant no disrespect to your Honor,” said Juror No. 7, resuming his
seat, “and I will of course obey the direction of the court; but, in my
opinion, great injustice is being done.”
Some of the jurors nodded as if in affirmance of that opinion. All
of them sat, with flushed faces, amazed at the temerity of their
fellow-juror, wondering what the court would do or say next. The
court-room was so still that the dropping of the proverbial pin could
have been heard. But Judge Bosworth did not deign to reply. He turned
again, sharply, to the prothonotary:
“Mr. Gaylord,” he said, “take the verdict.”
The prothonotary did as he was bidden:
“Gentlemen of the jury, hearken unto your verdict as the court has
it recorded. In the case wherein John Bradley is plaintiff, and
the Malleson Manufacturing Company is defendant, you find for the
defendant. And so say you all?”
The jurors nodded their heads. The Bradley case was at an end.
“Mr. Duncan,” said the judge to the court crier, “you may adjourn court
until ten o’clock to-morrow morning.”
The aged crier arose and droned out:
“Hear ye! Hear ye! Hear ye! The several courts are now adjourned till
to-morrow morning at ten o’clock.”
It was not until then that Barry Malleson fairly recovered his breath.
He and the rector had both arisen. “Did you ever hear of each a
thing?” he asked. “The impertinence of the fellow! To stand there and
criticize the honorable judge to his face! Why, he should have been
fined for contempt of court, and imprisoned as well, without benefit of
clergy too――no pun intended.”
“And none charged,” replied the rector. “I’m not sure, though, but that
the man was more than half right.”
“Why, Mr. Farrar!” exclaimed Barry; “my dear sir! If juries were
permitted to take the law into their own hands, what would become of
our republican institutions? Where would be our guarantees of law
and order? The next step in advancing civilization, sir, will be the
complete abolition of the entire jury system.”
“Along with the obsolete form of democratic government, I suppose,”
laughed the rector.
“I am not prepared at this moment,” replied Barry, “to go to that
extreme; but incidents of unblushing presumption, such as we have
just witnessed, make one feel that some kind of a curb must be put on
the lower and less intelligent classes, or they will become actually
tyrannical.”
In the meantime the judge had left the bench. The court-room audience
was shuffling noisily out. The jurors, who had just rendered their
enforced verdict, found their hats, and all except No. 7 strolled
down the aisle by twos and threes discussing the sudden ending of the
case. The lawyer for the plaintiff gathered up his books and papers,
thrust them into his green bag, and then stopped to consult with the
plaintiff’s wife. Westgate and his client strolled across the bar
enclosure to where Barry and the rector were standing.
“Congratulations, old boy!” said Barry to the lawyer. “You did a fine
piece of work!”
“Oh,” replied Westgate carelessly, “the case was easy. The law was all
on our side.” He turned to the rector. “We are always glad to see you
in court, Mr. Farrar.”
“The court-room is an extremely interesting place,” replied the
clergyman.
“More interesting than profitable, if one is a litigant,” remarked Mr.
Malleson. “I suppose, when the millennium comes, there will be no more
litigation, Mr. Farrar?”
“No,” replied the clergyman. “The voice of the lawyer will no longer be
heard in the land, and we shall have a thousand years of peace.”
Barry laughed, but the others only smiled.
“That’s one on me,” said Westgate. “Are you going our way, Mr. Farrar?
Will you come along with us?”
“No,” replied the clergyman, “thank you! I want to stop and speak to
Mrs. Bradley. A little consolation might not come amiss. She must be
suffering severely from disappointment.”
“Good idea!” broke in Barry. “The woman is certainly to be pitied. No
doubt she’s the victim of bad advice. I’ve a great mind to stop and
talk to her myself, and explain the law to her, and the attitude of
our company in the matter. It may be that she’s entirely ignorant and
innocent.”
“Don’t fool yourself, Barry,” said Westgate. “She’s no weakling. I
know. She may possibly accept condolence from Mr. Farrar, but I’m
mighty certain she won’t accept it from you.”
“There’s no harm in trying, is there?” persisted Barry. “It would be
extremely interesting and informing to hear the woman talk.”
Mr. Malleson turned to his son.
“You let Mrs. Bradley alone,” he said. “When she comes to her senses
about this thing, and dismisses her shyster lawyer, we may do something
for her; not as a matter of right, but as a matter of grace.”
“Certainly!” replied Barry, “as a matter of grace. That’s the only
ground on which any of these people are entitled to help from any of
us.”
In obedience to his father’s injunction he refrained from approaching
Mrs. Bradley. Nevertheless he cast a longing eye in her direction and
then, with apparent reluctance, followed his father and Westgate from
the court-room.
But the rector of Christ Church remained. This tragedy in law had
stirred him deeply. From his broad, humanitarian point of view, while
the letter of the law had doubtless been upheld, justice, at the same
time, had been mocked. He had not said so to defendant’s counsel, nor
to the president of the defendant company. He had not cared to get
into a controversy with them. But he realized, as perhaps no other
spectator in the court-room had realized, how sharply and bitterly this
unexpected termination of her year’s struggle for justice had fallen on
the soul of the woman who had borne the burden of the fight. His quick
sympathy went out to her. The desire to comfort her if possible, to
help her if he could, was strong within him.
Not that her disappointment was especially manifest. She did not
shrink, nor grow pale, nor weep, when she heard the charge of the court
which virtually sentenced her to a life of unrelieved poverty and toil.
She did not, even now, as she stood talking quietly with counsel, look
like one who had just toppled from the pinnacle of hope to the pit of
despair. Yet that she had done so there could be no doubt.
As her lawyer turned away, both the rector and Juror No. 7 approached
her. She turned her back on the rector, and held out her hand to the
juror, smiling on him as she did so.
“I don’t know you by name,” she said, “but I want to thank you for
having the courage of your convictions. I’m told it’s not often a juror
dares do what you’ve done to-day.”
The man was a little abashed as he replied:
“Oh, that’s all right! I don’t mind saying what I think to anybody. I
wish I could have done something for you, though. I wish the jury could
have got a chance at that case.”
“So do I. But the judge couldn’t afford to let you get a chance at
it. He knew what you’d do with it. His rich friends would have been
displeased. It was their money that elected him, wasn’t it?”
“Well, I don’t know about that. I guess he was elected fair enough.
But, to my way of thinking, when it comes to doing justice, as between
man and man, or man and corporation, twelve men are better able to
decide than one, and if the law’s different from that, then the law
ought to be changed.”
“Oh,” she said, “it doesn’t matter much about the law, nor about what
anybody’s idea of justice is; the important thing is that the rich
must stay rich, and the poor must stay poor. It’s the business of the
lawyers and the judges to see that it’s done. That’s what they’re paid
for. It would have set a bad example to the poor for my husband to have
won his case. Some other poverty-stricken wretch might have tried by
law to get a little of the justice that’s due him. They’ve won their
point, but maybe they’ve made a mistake, after all. Maybe Richard
Malleson has sowed the wind. I believe he has. Not that John Bradley
will ever be able to resent what’s been done to him, but I will, and,
as God lives, I’ll do it!”
The clergyman, standing near by, could not see her face; but her
words came distinctly to his ears. Her voice rose slightly toward the
end, but it was not so much its pitch as its expression of fierce
determination that moved and startled him. The juror, too, seemed to
be somewhat awed by the woman’s intensity, and waited a moment before
answering her. Finally he said:
“I ain’t so sure as you seem to be that the rich, and those in power,
are trying to keep the rest of us under their heels; but I am sure that
justice hasn’t been done in your case, and if things like this keep on
happening in our courts, something is going to drop in this country
some day.”
“I believe you,” she replied; “and when it does drop, I pray that the
first man it hits will be the one who is responsible for――this.”
She turned, with a slight gesture, toward the unobserving and apparently
unthinking clod in the wheel-chair. Her face, visible now to the rector,
with its flowing eyes and parted lips, was a picture of subdued but
vindictive anger.
Apparently the juror thought it time to bring the conversation to an
end, for he said:
“Well, I must be going. I just stopped to say I was sorry for you, and
to say if I could help you any way I’d be glad to. My name is Samuel
Major. I’m a wagon-maker. My shop is around on Mill Street.”
He held out his hand to her and she took it.
“Thank you,” she said, “for your sympathy and kindness, and for your
interference in our behalf. It didn’t amount to anything, of course;
it couldn’t. But it showed where you stood, and that’s what we want,
nowadays, men who think, and who are not afraid to say what they think.
Good-bye!”
“Good-bye!”
He hurried away, but turned back again to ask:
“Are you going to take the case up to a higher court? or haven’t you
decided about that yet?”
“I have decided,” she replied. “I shall not take it up. I’m done
with law and lawyers, and trying to get justice through the courts.
Hereafter I’ll get it in my own way.”
It was not until the juror mentioned his name that the clergyman
recognized him as an occasional attendant on the services at Christ
Church. He had no pew nor sitting; but his children went to the
Sunday-school, and the rector had called once or twice at the house,
finding only the mother at home. So, as the man started toward the
aisle, the clergyman intercepted him and shook hands with him.
“I, also,” he said, “want to thank you for your conscientious courage,
and for your sympathy with these disappointed people. I’ve been waiting
to condole with Mrs. Bradley myself, although I am a stranger to her.”
“You’ll find her pretty bitter.”
“So much the more need for sympathy.”
“Yes, it won’t come amiss. She’s been hard hit, and it isn’t right.”
“I believe you. That’s one of the problems that you and I, together
with the rest of the American people, have got to thresh out sooner or
later: how to right social wrongs without creating social calamities.”
“Well, I think you’re giving us some pretty good advice along that
line. I’ve been once or twice to hear you preach lately, and it seems
to me you’re on the right track.”
“I hope so. Come again.”
“Thank you! I intend to.”
The man went on down the aisle, and the rector walked back toward Mrs.
Bradley. She had, in the meantime, been busying herself about her
husband, buttoning his coat, putting his hat on his head, making him
ready for the desolate journey home. The clergyman approached her.
“I am Mr. Farrar,” he said, “rector of Christ Church.”
“Yes,” she replied quietly, “I know who you are.”
“I have been deeply stirred by this case of yours. I want to give you
my sympathy, and to talk with you about your husband and yourself.”
“Thank you! I have no time to talk now. I must hurry home.”
“Pardon me! I’ll not keep you. But I’ll call on you, if I may, at your
leisure.”
“I shall have no leisure.”
“Then at your convenience.”
“It will not be convenient.”
It was strange that the woman who had so eloquently poured her grievance
into the ears of the friendly juror should have become so suddenly
taciturn and unapproachable. The clergyman could not understand it. But
it was his business, as a servant of Christ, to break down barriers that
separated him from human hearts, so he persisted.
“Surely,” he said, “you will not refuse to see me. I understand your
disappointment. I realize your suffering. I may be able to comfort you,
possibly to help you. Give me the opportunity to try.”
She straightened up then, and faced him.
“I don’t want to be rude to you,” she replied. “I have nothing against
you. I’ve heard that you are well-intentioned toward men and women who
work. But I have little use for preachers. They are hired by the rich,
they associate with the rich, they are under the control of the rich.
They have nothing in common with the class to which I belong, therefore
they cannot help us. I am sure you can do no good, either to my husband
or to me. I’d rather you wouldn’t come.”
She turned again to her husband and began to tuck in the plaid robe
that covered his lap. The clergyman stood, startled and speechless.
This was the first time in his life that he had been arraigned in this
manner. After a moment, however, he gathered his thoughts sufficiently
to say:
“I think you misjudge us, Mrs. Bradley. I know you misjudge me. It is
my effort to do the Master’s will among all His people, rich or poor,
humble or exalted.”
“Yes, that’s what they all say. But they do discriminate, and I don’t
see how they can help it, and hold their jobs. No, I’d rather you
wouldn’t come. I don’t want to see you.”
“I hope this is not your final answer.”
“It is my final answer.”
But the tone of her voice was not unkind as she said it, and in her
eyes there was no look of hostility.
“Nevertheless,” he replied, “I shall not lose sight of you. I shall
keep you in mind, and――I shall pray for you.”
She laughed a little at that.
“You’d only waste your breath,” she said. “John Bradley knows little
about prayers, and I care less. If you want to be really kind to us you
will simply let us alone and forget us.”
“I want to be really kind to you, Mrs. Bradley; therefore I cannot
forget you; but I will respect your wish and will not trouble you,
unless Providence should put it in my way to render you a Service which
you will not resent.”
She took his proffered hand, but said nothing more to him. And when he
had bidden good-bye to the unresponsive paralytic in the wheel-chair,
he turned and left the court-room.
A tipstaff came up to help get John Bradley to the street. Through all
the excitement of the closing hours of the trial the position of his
body had not changed, nor had the expressionless stare of his eyes.
There had been no indication in his face that he realized, in any
degree, the importance of the litigation of which he was the center,
nor its sudden and disastrous termination. Speechless, emotionless,
unheeding and unlovely, he had sat the case through from the beginning
with apparently no conception of its meaning or its outcome.
The tipstaff rolled the wheel-chair, with its human freight, down the
aisle and into the hall, followed by Mary Bradley.
A janitor came into the room to sweep up the litter on the floor, and,
as he swept, he hummed a plaintive ditty that had long been favored of
him:
“John Jifkins, he to court would go;
Listen to the tale I tell!
His story it was full of woe;
His lawers fought, but the judge said no,
That Jifkins hadn’t a ghost of a show,
And it ended there. Ah well!
Heigh-ho!
Jingle the court-house bell.”
The janitor finished his song and his task and departed. Silence fell
on the big room, and the shadows of the waning day crept in and took,
each one, its accustomed place. Darkness came, and, under its cover,
ghosts of old and unnumbered tragedies, enacted through the years
within the confines of the four gray walls, came out to stride back and
forth across the wide spaces, up and down the enclosure for the bar,
and in and out among the vacant chairs of the jury box; to ascend even
to the sacred precinct of the bench, and stand grimly behind the chair
from which white-robed Justice, with her bandaged eyes and well-poised
scales, was supposed to listen to the cry of all who sought her aid.