Part 19 (1/2)
Captain Clinton guffawed loudly. The idea of ex-Judge Brewster taking the case seemed to amuse him hugely.
”Brewster?” he laughed boisterously. ”You'd never be able to get Brewster. Firstly, he's too expensive. Secondly, he's old man Jeffries'
lawyer. He wouldn't touch your case with a ten-foot pole. Besides,” he added in a tone of contempt, ”Brewster's no good in a case of this kind.
He's a const.i.tution lawyer--one of them international fellers. He don't know nothing----”
”He's the only lawyer I want,” she retorted determinedly. Then she went on: ”Howard's folks must come to his rescue. They must stand by him--they must----”
The captain grinned.
”From what I hear,” he said, ”old man Jeffries won't raise a finger to save his scapegrace son from going to the chair. He's done with him for good and all.”
Chuckling aloud and talking to himself rather than to his vis-a-vis, he muttered:
”That alone will convince the jury. They'll argue that the boy can't be much good if his own go back on him.”
Annie's eyes flashed.
”Precisely!” she exclaimed. ”But his own won't go back on him. I'll see to it that they don't.” Rising and turning toward the door, she asked: ”Have you anything more to say to me, captain?”
”No,” replied the captain hesitatingly. ”You can go. Of course you'll be called later for the trial You can see your husband in the Tombs when you wish.”
No man is so hard that he has not a soft spot somewhere. At heart Captain Clinton was not an unkind man. Long service in the police force and a mistaken notion of the proper method of procedure in treating his prisoners had hardened him and made him brutal. Secretly he felt sorry for this plucky, energetic little woman who had such unbounded faith in her good-for-nothing husband, and was ready to fight all alone in his defense. Eyeing her with renewed interest, he demanded:
”What are you going to do now?”
Annie reached the door, and drawing herself up to her full height, turned and said:
”I'm going to undo all you have done, Captain Clinton. I'm going to free my husband and prove his innocence before the whole world. I don't know how I'm going to do it, but I'll do it. I'll fight you, captain, to the last ditch, and I'll rescue my poor husband from your clutches if it takes everything I possess in the world.”
Quickly she opened the door and disappeared.
CHAPTER XII.
The American dearly loves a sensation, and the bigger and more blood-curdling it is the better. Nothing is more gratifying on arising in the morning and sitting down to partake of a daintily served breakfast than to glance hurriedly over the front page of one's favorite newspaper and see it covered with startling headlines. It matters little what has happened during the night to shock the community, so long as it satisfies one's appet.i.te for sensational news. It can be a fatal conflagration, a fearful railroad wreck, a gigantic bank robbery, a horrible murder, or even a scandalous divorce case. All one asks is that it be something big, with column after column of harrowing details. The newspapers are fully alive to what is expected of them, but it is not always easy to supply the demand. There are times when the metropolis languishes for news of any description. There are no disastrous fires, trains run without mishap, burglars go on a vacation, society leaders act with decorum--in a word the city is deadly dull. Further consideration of the tariff remains the most thrilling topic the newspapers can find to write about.
The murder at the aristocratic Astruria, therefore, was hailed by the editors as a unmixed journalistic blessing, and they proceeded to play it up for all it was worth. All the features of a first-cla.s.s sensation were present. The victim, Robert Underwood, was well known in society and a prominent art connoisseur. The place where the crime was committed was one of the most fas.h.i.+onable of New York's hostelries. The presumed a.s.sa.s.sin was a college man and the son of one of the most wealthy and influential of New York's citizens.
True, this Howard Jeffries, the son, was a black sheep. He had been mixed up in all kinds of scandals before. His own father had turned him out of doors, and he was married to a woman whose father died in prison.
Could a better combination of circ.u.mstances for a newspaper be conceived? The crime was discovered too late for the morning papers to make mention of it, but the afternoon papers fired a broadside that shook the town. All the evening papers had big scare heads stretching across the entire front page, with pictures of the princ.i.p.als involved and long interviews with the coroner and Captain Clinton. There seemed to be no doubt that the police had arrested the right man, and in all quarters of the city there was universal sympathy for Mr. Howard Jeffries, Sr. It was terrible to think that this splendid, upright man, whose whole career was without a single stain, who had served his country gallantly through the civil war, should have such disgrace brought upon him in his old age.
Everything pointed to a speedy trial and quick conviction. Public indignation was aroused almost to a frenzy, and a loud clamor went up against the law's delay. Too many crimes of this nature, screamed the yellow press, had been allowed to sully the good name of the city. A fearful example must be made, no matter what the standing and influence of the prisoner's family. Thus goaded on, the courts acted with promptness. Taken before a magistrate, Howard was at once committed to the Tombs to await trial, and the district attorney set to work impaneling a jury. Justice, he promised, would be swiftly done. One newspaper stated positively that the family would not interfere, but would abandon the scapegrace son to his richly deserved fate. Judge Brewster, the famous lawyer, it was said, had already been approached by the prisoner's wife, but had declined to take the case. Banker Jeffries also was quoted as saying that the man under arrest was no longer a son of his.
As one paper pointed out, it seemed a farce and a waste of money to have any trial at all. The a.s.sa.s.sin had not only been caught red-handed, but had actually confessed. Why waste time over a trial? True, one paper timidly suggested that it might have been a case of suicide. Robert Underwood's financial affairs, it went on to say, were in a critical condition, and the theory of suicide was borne out to some extent by an interview with Dr. Bernstein, professor of psychology at one of the universities, who stated that he was by no means convinced of the prisoner's guilt, and hinted that the alleged confession might have been forced from him by the police, while in a hypnotic state. This theory, belittling as it did their pet sensation, did not suit the policy of the yellow press, so the learned professor at once became the target for editorial attack.
The sensation grew in importance as the day for the trial approached.
All New York was agog with excitement. The handsome Jeffries mansion on Riverside Drive was besieged by callers. The guides on the sight-seeing coaches shouted through their megaphones:
”That's the house where the murderer of Robert Underwood lived.”
The immediate vicinity of the house the day that the crime was made public was thronged with curious people. The blinds of the house were drawn down as if to s.h.i.+eld the inmates from observation, but there were several cabs in front of the main entrance and pa.s.sers by stopped on the sidewalk, pointing at the house. A number of newspaper men stood in a group, gathering fresh material for the next edition. A reporter approached rapidly from Broadway and joined his colleagues.