By Advice of Counsel

Now, as Delany was wont to say for years thereafter, that damn Mathusek case just went bad on him. He had believed that in the comparative secrecy of the inquisitorial chamber he could easily pretend that he had originally made an honest mistake and was no longer positive of the defendant's identity, in which case when the grand jury threw out the case nobody would ever know the reason and no chickens would come home to roost on him.

But when the cop visited the office of Deputy Assistant District Attorney Caput Magnus the next morning, to inform him that this here window-breaking case was a Messina, he found Mr. Nathan Asche already solidly there present, engaged in advising Mr. Magnus most emphatically to the exact contrary. Indeed the attorney was rhetorical in his insistence that this destruction of the property of law-abiding taxpayers must stop.

Mr. Asche was not a party to be trifled with. He was a rectangular person whom nothing could budge, and his very rectangularity bespoke his stubborn rectitude. His shoulders were massive and square, his chin and mouth were square, his burnsides were square cut, and he had a square head and wore a square-topped derby. He looked like the family portrait of Uncle Amos Hardscrabble. When he sat down he remained until he had said his say. It was a misfortunate meeting for Delany, for Asche nailed him upon the spot and made him repeat to Caput Magnus the story of how he had seen Tony throw the brick and then, for some fool reason, not being satisfied to let it go at that, he insisted on calling in a stenographer and having Delany swear to the yarn in affidavit form! This entirely spoiled any chance the policeman might otherwise have had of changing his testimony. He now had no choice but to go on and swear the case through before the grand jury—which he did.

Even so, that distinguished body of twenty-three representative citizens was not disposed to take the matter very seriously. Having heard what Delany had to say—and he made it good and strong under the circumstances—several of them remarked disgustedly that they did not understand why the district attorney saw fit to waste their valuable time with trivial cases of that sort. Boys would play ball and boys would throw balls round; if not balls, then stones. They were about to dismiss by an almost unanimous vote, when the case went bad again. The foreman, a distinguished person in braided broadcloth, rose and announced that he was very much interested to learn their views upon this subject as he was the president of a casualty company, and he wished them to understand that thousands—if not hundreds of thousands—of dollars' worth of plate-glass windows were wantonly broken by young toughs, every year, for which his and other insurance companies had to recoup the owners. In fact, he alleged heatedly, window breaking was a sign of peculiar viciousness. Incipient criminals usually started their infamous careers that way; you could read that in any book on penology. An example ought to be made. He'd bet this feller who threw the brick was a gangster.

So his twenty-two fellow grand jurymen politely permitted him to recall Officer Delany and ask him: "Say, officer, isn't it a fact—just tell us frankly now—if this feller Mathusek isn't a gangster?"

"Sure, he's a gangster. He was blowin' about it to me after I arrested him," swore Delany without hesitation.

The foreman swept the circle with a triumphant eye.

"What'd I tell you?" he demanded. "All in favor of indicting said Tony Mathusek for malicious destruction of property signify in the usual manner. Cont'riminded? It's a vote. Ring the bell, Simmons, and bring on the next case."

So Tony was indicted by the People of the State of New York for a felony, and a learned judge of the General Sessions set his bail at fifteen hundred dollars; and Hogan had his victim where he wanted him and where he could keep him until he had bled his mother white of all she had or might ever hope to have in this world.

Everybody was satisfied—Hogan, Simpkins, Asche, McGurk, even Delany, because the fleas upon his back were satisfied and he was planning ultimately to get rid of the whole damn tangle by having the indictment quietly dismissed when nobody was looking, by his friend O'Brien, to whom the case had been sent for trial. And everything being as it should be, and Tony being locked safely up in a cell, Mr. Joey Simpkins set himself to the task of extorting three hundred and fifty dollars more from Mrs. Mathusek upon the plea that the great Mr. Hogan could not possibly conduct the case before a jury for less.

Now the relations of Mr. Assistant District Attorney O'Brien and the Hon. Raphael B. Hogan were distinctly friendly. At any rate, whenever Mr. Hogan asked for an adjournment in Mr. O'Brien's court he usually got it without conspicuous difficulty, and that is what occurred on the five several occasions that the case of The People versus Antonio Mathusek came up on the trial calendar during the month following Tony's incarceration, on each of which Mr. Hogan with unctuous suavity rose and humbly requested that the case be put over at his client's earnest request in order that counsel might have adequate time in which to subpoena witnesses and prepare for a defense.

And each day Simpkins, who now assumed a threatening and fearsome demeanor toward Mrs. Mathusek, visited the heartsick woman in her flat and told her that Tony could and would rot in the Tombs until such time as she procured three hundred and fifty dollars. The first week she assigned her life-insurance money; the second she pawned the furniture; until at last she owed Hogan only sixty-five dollars. At intervals Hogan told Tony that he was trying to force the district attorney to try the case, but that the latter was insisting on delay.

In point of fact, O'Brien had never looked at the papers, much less made any effort to prepare the case; if he had he would have found that there was no case at all. And Delany's mind became at peace because he perceived that at the proper psychological moment he could go to O'Brien and whisper: "Say, Mr. O'Brien, that Mathusek case. It's a turn-out! Better recommend it for dismissal," and O'Brien would do so for the simple reason that he never did any more work than he was actually compelled to do.

But as chance would have it, three times out of the five, Mr. Ephraim Tutt happened to be in court when Mr. Hogan rose and made his request for an adjournment; and he remembered it because the offense charged was such an odd one—breaking a window.

Delany's simple plan was again defeated by Nemesis, who pursued him in the shape of the rectangular Mr. Asche, and who shouldered himself into O'Brien's office during the fifth week of Tony's imprisonment and wanted to know why in hell he didn't try that Mathusek case and get rid of it. The assistant district attorney had just been called down by his official boss and being still sore was glad of a chance to take it out on someone else.

"D'you think I've nothin' better to do than try your damned old window-busting cases?" he sneered. "Who ever had the idea of indicting a boy for that sort of thing, anyhow?"

"That is no way to talk," answered Mr. Asche with firmness. "You're paid to prosecute whatever cases are sent to you. This is one of 'em. There's been too much delay. Our president will be annoyed."

"Oh, he will, will he?" retorted O'Brien, nevertheless, coming to the instant decision that he had best find some other excuse than mere disinclination. "If he gets too shirty I'll tell him the case came in here without any preparation and being in the nature of a private prosecution we've been waiting for you to earn your fee. How'll you like that, eh?"

Mr. Asche became discolored.

"H'm!" he replied softly. "So that is it, is it? You won't have that excuse very long, even if you could get away with it now. I'll have a trial brief and affidavits from all the witnesses ready for you in forty-eight hours."

"All right, old top!" nodded O'Brien carelessly. "We always strive to please!"

So Mr. Asche got busy, while the very same day Mr. Hogan asked for and obtained another adjournment.

Some people resemble animals; others have a geometrical aspect. In each class the similarity tends to indicate character. The fox-faced man is apt to be sly, the triangular man is likely to be a lump. So Mr. Asche, being rectilinear, was on the square; just as Mr. Hogan, being soft and round, was slippery and hard to hold. Three days passed, during which Mrs. Mathusek grew haggard and desperate. She was saving at the rate of two dollars a day, and at that rate she would be able to buy Tony a trial in five weeks more. She had exhausted her possibilities as a borrower. The indictment slept in O'Brien's tin file. Nobody but Tony, his mother and Hogan remembered that there was any such case, except Mr. Asche, who one afternoon appeared unexpectedly in the offices of Tutt & Tutt, the senior partner of which celebrated law firm happened to be advisory counsel to the Tornado Casualty Company.

"I just want you to look at these papers, Mr. Tutt," Mr. Asche said, and his jaw looked squarer than ever.

Mr. Tutt was reclining as usual in his swivel chair, his feet crossed upon the top of his ancient mahogany desk.

"Take a stog!" he remarked without getting up, and indicating with the toe of one Congress-booted foot the box which lay open adjacent to the Code of Criminal Procedure. "What's your misery?"

"Hell's at work!" returned Mr. Asche, solemnly handing over a sheaf of affidavits. "I never smoke."

Mr. Tutt somewhat reluctantly altered his position from the horizontal to the vertical and reached for a fresh stogy. Then his eye caught the name of Raphael B. Hogan.

"What the devil is this?" he cried.

"It's the devil himself!" answered Mr. Asche with sudden vehemence.

"Tutt, Tutt! Come in here!" shouted the head of the firm. "Mine enemy hath been delivered into mine hands!"

"Hey? What?" inquired Tutt, popping across the threshold. "Who—I mean—"

"Raphael B. Hogan!"

"The devil!" ejaculated Tutt.

"You've said it!" declared Mr. Asche devoutly.

That evening under cover of darkness Mr. Ephraim Tutt descended from a dilapidated taxi at the corner adjacent to Froelich's butcher shop, and several hours later was whisked uptown again to the brownstone dwelling occupied by the Hon. Simeon Watkins, the venerable white-haired judge then presiding in Part I of the General Sessions, where he remained until what may be described either as a very late or a very early hour, and where during the final period of his intercourse he and that distinguished member of the judiciary emptied an ancient bottle containing a sparkling rose-colored liquid of great artistic beauty.

Then Mr. Tutt returned to his own library at the house on Twenty-third Street and paced up and down before the antiquated open grate, inhaling quantities of what Mr. Bonnie Doon irreverently called "hay smoke," and pondering deeply upon the evils that men do to one another, until the dawn peered through the windows and he bethought him of the all-night lunch stand round the corner on Tenth Avenue, and there sought refreshment.

"Salvatore," he remarked to the smiling son of the olive groves who tended that bar of innocence, "the worst crook in the world is the man who does evil for mere money."

"Si, Signor Tutti," answered Salvatore with Latin perspicacity. "You gotta one, eh? You giva him hell?"

"Si! Si!" replied Mr. Tutt cheerily. "Even so! And of a truth, moreover! Give me another hot dog and a cup of bilge water!"

"People versus Mathusek?" inquired Judge Watkins some hours later on the call of the calendar, looking quite vaguely as if he had never heard of the case before, round Part I, which was as usual crowded, hot, stuffy and smelling of unwashed linen and prisoners' lunch. "People versus Mathusek? What do you want done with this case, Mr. O'Brien?"

"Ready!" chanted the red-headed O'Brien, and, just as he had expected, the Hon. Raphael Hogan limbered up in his slow, genial way and said: "If Your Honor please, the defendant would like a few days longer to get his witnesses. Will Your Honor kindly adjourn the case for one week?"

He did not notice that the stenographer was taking down everything that he said.

"I observe," remarked Judge Watkins with apparent amiability, "that you have had five adjournments already. If The People's witnesses are here I am inclined to direct you to proceed. The defendant has been under indictment for six weeks. That ought to be long enough to prepare your defense."

"But, Your Honor," returned Hogan with pathos, "the witnesses are very hard to find. They are working people. I have spent whole evenings chasing after them. Moreover, the defendant is perfectly satisfied to have the case go over. He is anxious for an adjournment!"

"When did you last see him?"

"Yesterday afternoon."

The judge unfolded the papers and appeared to be reading them for the first time. He wasn't such a bad old actor himself, for he had already learned from Mr. Tutt that Hogan had not been near Tony for three weeks.

"Um—um! Did you represent the defendant in the police court?"

"Yes, Your Honor."