The Man with the Wooden Spectacles Read online

  The Judge nodded. “Yes. A member of the old Parson Gang, doubtlessly. Which was known to have been mixed up in that Wah Lee Kidnaping. Its members, you know, all had ecclesiastical costumes. For just such occasions. And—but go ahead.”

  “Well, that concludes the story,” Silas Moffit declared.

  “For Kilgallon immediately notified the squad car, who took the fellow up—found out, in the very car, he had a skull in that box—and, because Kilgallon had intimated that he had inside information that the State’s Attorney was especially interested in some case of a stolen skull—it seems, Judge, Kilgallon’s own son is Vann’s own assistant, and had con­fided things to his father—well, the squad hustled the reddish-haired fellow straight to the State’s Attorney’s special lockup in the City Hall sub-basement. And that,” he finished, “is the whole story, condensed.”

  The Judge shook his head thoughtfully.

  “My God,” he said, “but the defendant is badly involved all right.”

  “Involved, Judge? I’d say he’s sewed fast and tight across the board. And, on that as a postulate—plus the fact that he’s apparently broke, and can’t, for some reason, command money—I think I can predict, to a T, his play tonight. Which play won’t be worth two whoops in—well—in Hades—so far as the ultimate outcome goes.”

  Silas Moffit paused. “My belief is, Judge,” he said slowly, “that he’ll try to involve some other person—in any wild weird way possible—but just so that he involves the person!—so that, in short, if he—yes, the defendant—catches the chair, that person will later put up the hundred dollars or so to habeas corpus him for a pre-execution insanity hearing—just, you see, to clear that individual’s own skirts of even the bare stigma lying in this fellow’s charges. And the fellow will, of course—as in all those pre-execution insanity hearings—lose his plea—but he’ll thus have had his chance of chances—which is all these crooks ever try to get. That, in rough, Judge, I’d say, will be his play tonight. Sewed as he is, fast and tight across the board. And if he doesn’t wind up in the old electric ch—but excuse me, Judge, I keep forgetting that I’m talking to the trial judge in the case himself. And of course—ahem—the rascal hasn’t been tried yet.”

  “Tried he has not been,” declared Penworth, a bit reprovingly. “Though tried he will be—and fairly. Though perchance he won’t consider it so! For they—they never do. Hm? I suppose drastic efforts will be made today—by the underworld—to reach the defendant. To change his story. Or to instruct him in one. Even to—by Jove—to divert his prosecution.”

  “Do—do you think so?” asked Silas Moffit, plainly, for some reason, worried.

  “We-ell,” the Judge qualified, “I rather think Mr. Vann will keep his defendant where the latter will be reached by no one not entitled to get to him! But I do think it possible—yes—that some sort of dodge may be sprung by the underworld—that great heterogeneous world, Mr. Moffit, which encompasses every possible type of anomalous citizens from the safeblowers and confidence men at its top, down to the pansies—ahem—hrmph!—inverts at its bottom—to try to divert Mr. Vann. To—to muddy up his prosecution. Yet, again, from what I know of Vann, he’ll not be caught napping. No! And—but all this speculative hypothesis, Mr. Moffit, please understand—is on the basis that the defendant is guilty. And of the Underworld. For remember, I’ve not heard a word of the trial yet. Nor have you. And which you shall, of course, for that favor which you wanted—well, you may consider it granted.”

  Silas Moffit stroked his chin troubledly.

  “But that—that wasn’t the favor I wanted, Judge! No!

  The favor I want, concerns, in one resp—er—rather several —a relat—”

  “Oh!” And one could see light breaking through Penworth’s brain! “Surely—your son Saul hasn’t been readmitted to the Bar?—and—you want me to appoint him to help Vann tonight as Assistant Pros—”

  “No!” Silas Moffit actually shouted the word. And his eyes blazed. “That dirty goddam—excuse me, Judge—what I meant to say is: that filthy bastar—please, Judge, excuse me again—my—my blood pressure—hrmph—I wouldn’t want you to give that rat a job sweeping out your courtroom. And he hasn’t been re-admitted to the Bar—and never will be. For he’s a damned, lousy, stinking—”

  “Moffit! Calm yourself!”

  “For—forgive me, Judge. When I get on the subject of that rat, I—”

  “Rat? But good heavens, Mr. Moffit, he’s your own blood, and so you’re only calling yours—”

  “Rat he is!” Silas Moffit almost shouted. “A dunghill rat who—”

  “Well, I have heard of eyes blazing, Mr. Moffit,” declared Penworth grimly, “but never have I seen them do it—until this moment. Well—I’m glad that you’re not asking anything for Saul Moffit. Because he’s been—er—washed up here in Chicago for years—I’ve even heard, to be frank, rumors that some woman keeps him; and he’s a classical example of a man who has done an ‘inverse skyrocket’—all the way from the top of life, to the bottom.

  Though I can’t understand why you hold that against him—however—” He shrugged his shoulders helplessly.

  “Family feuds—are bad things! Well—” He paused.

  “—we get back again—to this favor you wanted. Which, you stated, was remotely connected with—but exactly what does the favor directly concern—and directly involve?”

  “Well—ah—er—Judge,” Silas Moffit stammered, “the favor I want concerns the—the defendant—ahem—the defense—and—”

  “Concerns—the defendant?” And the Judge’s face darkened. “Moffit! How dare—but what is that favor? Speak?”

  And in Penworth’s voice came that tone which boded ill—and severe ill—for any human being who should attempt ever to try getting at the robes of the Blind Goddess with the Scales. He gazed at Silas Moffit sternly. Waiting!

  Ever waiting!

  And Silas Moffit wiggled in his chair. As a man on the spot! And licked his lips helplessly with his tongue.

  CHAPTER IV

  Mr. Silas Moffit Drives a Bargain!

  “Well, Judge,” Silas Moffit said, after an embarrassing pause, “Mr. Vann as much as told me that this trial will just be a formality at best—that it’s cut and dried as to its verdict—the fellow being hawgtied, so to speak, at every angle. So hopelessly—as I could see right then—that—as I gathered even then—Mr. Vann considered the fellow a fool not to have confessed—and taken a life sentence, which would automatically bring him parole in 33 years, Now, however, so even Mr. Vann implied—the fellow’s in for the chair, and—but again forgive me, Judge, since all this suggests a decision on your part that hasn’t yet been rendered. And nobody in all Chicago but knows that you make your own decisions—and always have. And that they’re not only 100 per cent just, but 101 per cent so!—and 101 per cent legal to boot!” Silas Moffit saw that stern face relaxing a bit. And hurried on. “Anyway, Judge, to get back to the point between us, the moment Mr. Vann told me of this case, it occurred to me: why—here is exactly the kind of case where my niece ought to get her courtroom baptism.”

  “Your niece? Who is your niece?”

  “Elsa Colby is her name, Judge. She’s a graduate in law—Northwestern U—just finished early last month because of having a final course to take in the summer school. She specialized in criminal law—but has never had a case.”

  “Elsa Colby, eh? Yes—I think I remember that name—on the last docket of the young lawyers newly admitted to the Bar. Well—but specializing—so early in the game?

  That’s rank foolhardyism, isn’t it? It seems to me that—but what does the girl do all day? Twiddle her thumbs—in her office?”

  “Mighty near, Judge. She keeps busy—embroidering a quilt laid out on a rack covering nearly one wall of her office. Which is in the old Ulysses S. Grant Building.

  Though I doubt if she’s g
ot enough money to buy the colored silks to complete the—the northwest corner of the fool quilt. But anyway, Judge, my favor is this: I would like you to appoint Elsa to defend this fellow—this fellow—whom Mr. Vann nabbed; and, Judge, if you’ll do that, I’ll renew the mortgage on this place. And for 5 years, Judge. Which length of time will surely bring your improvement through. That, Judge, is how much I think of Elsa—and how much I want to see her get her baptismal fire, so to speak.”

  “Hm? Well how old is she?”

  “24, Judge.”

  “24, eh? Well—is she a good bright girl?”

  “Well—she won a Phi Beta Kappa key—it’s something you get in college only when—”

  “Yes, I know,” nodded Penworth. “That means she stood over go in all her studies—bar none!”

  “Then, Judge, would you be willing—to give Elsa the appointment—as defender of this fellow?”

  Judge Penworth laughed a bit mirthlessly. Yet appeared to be tremendously relieved. “Good God, Moffit, considering that that’s all you ask—and that it has nothing whatsoever to do with my own rulings and decisions on this fellow tonight—and that I haven’t been able to find a single mortgage company in all Chicago that will look at a renewal here—I’m willing to appoint the devil himself! Particularly since—if you’d gone to Mike Shurely first—he’d have doubtlessly begged me, as a personal favor to him, to appoint her. Yes—sure—I’ll appoint her. I’m waiting a telephonic call-back now from a lawyer whom I had in mind to appoint—but, when he calls, I’ll just say that what I had to say to him was off. Yes. Now what’s this girl’s phone number?”

  “It’s Dearborn 8722,” said Silas Moffit, with great haste.

  “And she’s always there. If by any chance she weren’t, however—well, you have my number, of course—and, at a word from you, I’ll round up her whereabouts for you.”

  “All—right! Dearborn—yes. 8722.” The Judge was enter­ing this data in a tiny notebook which, with fitted pencil, he apparently kept under his pillow. “And the name—Elsa Colby? Yes.” He closed his notebook. “Consider her, then, Mr. Moffit, appointed. Absolutely! And I feel quite free at appointing her, moreover, for the case really does appear to be but an academic formality. For the fellow is—at least from present considerations—mad to go to trial. But that, of course, is his funeral!”

  “Yes,” assented Silas Moffit. “And doubtlessly, his funeral, in this instance, literally as well as figuratively.” He tapped his toe uneasily. “Er—Judge?”

  “Yes? What?”

  “I feel now that I should warn you that poor Elsa—when you 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 the masculine voice of his son-in-law on the other end.