Part 4 (2/2)
Alicia turned to greet a new arrival and the lawyer continued chatting with his host.
”I suppose you'll take a rest now, after your splendid victory,” said the banker.
Judge Brewster shook his head dubiously.
”No, sir, we lawyers never rest. We can't. No sooner is one case disposed of than another crops up to claim our attention. The trouble with this country is that we have too much law. If I were to be guilty of an epigram I would say that the country has so much law that it is practically lawless.”
”So you're preparing another case, eh?” said Mr. Jeffries, interested.
”What is it--a secret?”
”Oh, no!” answered the lawyer, ”the newspapers will be full of it in a day or two. We are going to bring suit against the city. It's really a test case that should interest every citizen; a protest against the high-handed actions of the police.”
The banker elevated his eyebrows.
”Indeed,” he exclaimed. ”What have the police been doing now?”
The lawyer looked at his client in surprise.
”Why, my dear sir, you must have seen by the papers what's been going on in our city of late. The papers have been full of it. Police brutality, illegal arrests, a.s.saults in station houses, star-chamber methods that would disgrace the middle ages. A state of affairs exists to-day in the city of New York which is inconceivable. Here we are living in a civilized country, every man's liberty is guaranteed by the Const.i.tution, yet citizens, as they walk our streets, are in greater peril than the inhabitants of terror-stricken Russia. Take a police official of Captain Clinton's type. His only notion of the law is brute force and the night stick. A bully by nature, a man of the coa.r.s.est instincts and enormous physical strength, he loves to play the tyrant.
In his precinct he poses as a kind of czar and fondly imagines he has the power to administer the law itself. By his brow-beating tactics, intolerable under Anglo-Saxon government, he is turning our police force into a gang of ruffians who have the city terror-stricken. In order to further his political ambitions he stops at nothing. He lets the guilty escape when influence he can't resist is brought to bear, but in order to keep up his record with the department he makes arrests without the slightest justification. To secure convictions he manufactures, with the aid of his detectives, all kinds of perjured evidence. To paraphrase a well-known saying, his motto is: 'Convict--honestly, if you can--but convict.'”
”It is outrageous,” said Mr. Jeffries. ”No one can approve such methods.
Of course, in dealing with the criminal population of a great city, they cannot wear kid gloves, but Captain Clinton certainly goes too far. What is the specific complaint on which the suit is based?”
”Captain Clinton,” replied the judge, ”made the mistake of persecuting a young woman who happened to be the daughter of a wealthy client of mine.
One of his detectives arrested her on a charge of shoplifting. The girl, mind you, is of excellent family and irreproachable character. My client and his lawyer tried to show Captain Clinton that he had made a serious blunder, but he brazened it out, claiming on the stand that the girl was an old offender. Of course, he was forced at last to admit his mistake and the girl went free, but think of the humiliation and mental anguish she underwent! It was simply a repet.i.tion of his old tactics. A conviction, no matter at what cost.”
”What do you hope to bring about by this suit?”
”Arouse public indignation, and if possible get Captain Clinton dismissed from the force. His record is none too savory. Charges of graft have been made against him time and time again, but so far nothing has been proved. To-day he is a man of wealth on a comparatively small salary. Do you suppose his money could have come to him honestly?”
In another corner of the salon stood Dr. Bernstein, the celebrated psychologist, the centre of an excited crowd of enthusiastic admirers.
Alicia approached a group of chattering women. Each was more elaborately dressed than her neighbor, and loaded down with rare gems. They at once stopped talking as their hostess came up.
”It was so good of you to come!” said Alicia effusively to a fat woman with impossible blond hair and a rouged face. ”I want to introduce Dr.
Bernstein to you.”
”Oh, I shall be delighted,” smiled the blonde. Gus.h.i.+ngly she added: ”How perfectly exquisite you look to-night, my dear.”
”Do you think so?” said Alicia, pleased at the clumsy flattery.
”Your dress is stunning and your tiara simply gorgeous,” raved another.
”Your musicales are always so delightful,” exclaimed a third.
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