The Turn of the Balance. Brand Whitlock
by their young attorneys to plead guilty–under assurances that they would thus fare better than they would if they resisted the law by insisting on their rights under it–probably had not the imagination to divine that they might have fared otherwise at the hands of the law if these lawyers had not dreaded the trial as an ordeal almost as great to them as to their appointed clients, or if they had not been so indigent themselves as to desire speedily to draw the fee the State would allow them for their services. Most of the prisoners, indeed, treated these young lawyers with a certain patience, if not forbearance, and now they relied on them for such mercy as the law might find in its heart to bestow. Most of them might have reflected, had they been given to the practice, that on former experiences they had found the breast of the law, as to this divine quality, withered and dry. They sat and glanced about, and now and then whispered, but for the most part they were still and dumb and hopeless. Meanwhile their lawyers discussed and compared them, declaring their faces to be hard and criminal; one of the young men thought a certain face showed particularly the marks of crime, and when his fellows discovered that he meant the face of Danner, they laughed aloud and had a good joke on the young man. The young man became very red, almost as red as Danner himself, whom, he begged, they would not tell of his mistake.
At that moment the door of the judge's chambers opened, and instant silence fell. McWhorter, the judge, appeared. He was a man of middle size, with black curly hair, smooth-shaven face, and black eyes that caught in the swiftest glance the row of prisoners, who now straightened and fixed their eyes on him. McWhorter advanced with a brisk step to the bench, mounted it, and nodding, said:
"You may open court, Mr. Bailiff."
The bailiff let his gavel fall on the marble slab, and then with his head hanging, his eyes roving in a self-conscious, almost silly way, he said:
"Hear ye, hear ye, hear ye, this honorable court is now in session."
The bailiff sat down as in relief, but immediately got up again when the judge said:
"Bring me the criminal docket, Mr. Bailiff."
The bailiff's bent figure tottered out of the court-room. The court-room was very still; the ticking of the clock on the wall could be heard. The judge swung his chair about and glanced out of the windows. Never once did he permit his eyes to rest on the prisoners.
There was silence and waiting, and after a while the bailiff came with the docket. The judge opened the book, put on a pair of gold glasses, and, after a time, reading slowly, said:
"The State versus Patrick Delaney."
The white-haired prisoner patiently held out two hands, marvelously tatooed, and Danner unlocked the handcuffs. At the same moment one of the young lawyers stood forth from the rest, and Lamborn, an assistant prosecutor, rose.
McWhorter was studying the docket. Presently he said:
"Stand up, Delaney."
Delaney rose, kept his eyes on the floor, clasped a hand about his red wrist. Then, for the first time, the judge looked at him.
"Delaney," he said, "have you anything to say why the sentence of this court should not be passed upon you?"
Delaney looked uneasily at the judge and then let his eyes fall.
"No, Judge, yer Honor," he said, "nothing but that I'm an innocent man. I didn't do it, yer Honor."
The remark did not seem to impress the judge, who turned toward the lawyer. This young man, with a venturesome air, stepped a little farther from the sheltering company of his associates and, with a face that was very white and lips that faltered, said in a confused, hurried way:
"Your Honor, we hope your Honor'll be as lenient as possible with this man; we hope your Honor will be as–lenient as possible." The youth's voice died away and he faded back, as it were, into the shelter of his companions. The judge did not seem to be more impressed with what the lawyer had said than he had with what the client had said, and twirling his glasses by their cord, he turned toward the assistant prosecutor.
Lamborn, with an affectation of great ease, with one hand in the pocket of his creased trousers, the other supporting a book of memoranda, advanced and said:
"May it please the Court, this man is an habitual criminal; he has already served a term in the penitentiary for this same offense, and we understand that he is wanted in New York State at this present time. We consider him a dangerous criminal, and the State feels that he should be severely punished."
McWhorter studied the ceiling of the court-room a moment, still swinging his eye-glasses by their cord, and then, fixing them on his nose, looked wisely down at Delaney. Presently he spoke:
"It is always an unpleasant duty to sentence a man to prison, no matter how much he may deserve punishment." McWhorter paused as if to let every one realize his pain in this exigency, and then went on: "But it is our duty, and we can not shirk it. A jury, Delaney, after a fair trial, has found you guilty of burglary. It appears from what the prosecutor says that this is not the first time you have been found guilty of this offense; the experience does not seem to have done you any good. You impress the Court as a man who has abandoned himself to a life of crime, and the Court feels that you should receive a sentence in this instance that will serve as a warning to you and to others. The sentence of the Court is–" McWhorter paused as if to balance the scales of justice with all nicety, and then he looked away. He did not know exactly how many years in prison would expiate Delaney's crime; there was, of course, no way for him to tell. He thought first of the number ten, then of the number five; then, as the saying is, he split the difference, inclined the fraction to the prisoner and said:
"The sentence of the Court is that you be confined in the penitentiary at hard labor for the period of seven years, no part of your sentence to be in solitary confinement, and that you pay the costs of this prosecution."
Delaney sat down without changing expression and held out his hands for the handcuffs. The steel clicked, and the scratch of the judge's pen could be heard as he entered the judgment in the docket.
These proceedings were repeated again and again. McWhorter read the title of the case, Danner unshackled the prisoner, who stood up, gazing dumbly at the floor, his lawyer asked the Court to be lenient, Lamborn asked the Court to be severe, McWhorter twirled his gold glasses, looked out of the window, made his little speech, guessed, and pronounced sentence. The culprit sat down, held out his hands for the manacles, then the click of the steel and the scratch of the judicial pen. It grew monotonous.
But just before the last man was called to book, John Eades, the prosecutor, entered the court-room. At sight of him the young lawyers, the loafers on the benches, even the judge looked up.
Eades's tall figure had not yet lost the grace of youth, though it was giving the first evidence that he had reached that period of life when it would begin to gather weight. He was well dressed in the blue clothes of a business man, and he was young enough at thirty-five to belong to what may not too accurately be called the new school of lawyers, growing up in a day when the law is changing from a profession to a business, in distinction from the passing day of long coats of professional black, of a gravity that frequently concealed a certain profligacy, and, wherever it was successful, of native brilliancy that could ignore application. Eades's dark hair was carefully parted above his smooth brow; he had rather heavy eyebrows, a large nose, and thin, tightly-set lips that gave strength and firmness to a clean-shaven face. He whispered a word to his assistant, and then said:
"May it please the Court, when the case of the State versus Henry C. Graves is reached, I should like to be heard."
"The Court was about to dispose of that case, Mr. Eades," said the judge, looking over his docket and fixing his glasses on his nose.
"Very well," said Eades, glancing at the group of young attorneys. "Mr. Metcalf, I believe, represents the defendant."
The young lawyer thus indicated emerged from the group that seemed to keep so closely together, and said:
"Yes, your Honor, we'd like to be heard also."
"Graves may stand up," said the judge, removing his glasses and tilting back in his chair as if to listen to long arguments.
Danner