We Can't Have Everything Part 103

"S'tained!" the judge growled.

"Let us get back to the night when you and Mrs. Cheever went a-motoring." Beattie smiled. "There was a beautiful moon on that occasion, I believe."

The jury grinned. The word "moon" meant foolishness. Beattie took Jim through the story of that ride and that sojourn at the tavern, and every question he asked condemned Jim to a choice of answers, either alternative making him out ridiculously virtuous or criminal.

Beattie rehea.r.s.ed the undenied facts, but subst.i.tuted for the glamour of innocence in bad luck the sickly glare of cynicism. He asked Jim if he had ever heard of the expression, "The time, the place, and the girl."

He had the jury snickering at the thought of a big rich youth like Jim being such a ninny, such a milksop and mollycoddle, as to defy an opportunity so perfect.

The public mind has its dirt as well as its grandeurs; the pool that mirrors the sky is easily roiled and muddied. It was possible for the same people to abhor Jim and Charity for being guilty and to feel that if they were not guilty with such an occasion they were still more contemptible.

Thus ridicule, which shakes down the ancient wrongs and the tyrants'

pretenses, shakes down also the ancient virtues and the struggling ideals.

Finally Beattie said, "You say you left the fair corespondent alone in the hotel parlor?"

"I did."

"All alone?"

"Yes."

"And you went out into the night, as the saying is?"

"Yes."

"But you testified that it was raining."

"It was."

"You went out into the rain?"

"Yes."

"To cool your fevered brow?"

Silence from Jim; shrieks of laughter from the silly spectators. The jury was shattered with amus.e.m.e.nt; the judge wiped a grin from his lips.

Beattie resumed:

"Where did you sleep?"

"In the office chair."

"You paid for the parlor! You registered! And you slept in the chair!"

[Gales of laughter. His Honor threatens to clear the court.] "Who saw you asleep in the chair?"

"I don't know--I was asleep."

"Are you sure that you did not just dream about the chair?"

"I am sure."

"That's all."

Jim stepped down, feeling idiotic.

There is a dignity that survives and is illumined by flames of martyrdom, but there is no dignity that is improved by a bladder-buffeting. Jim slunk back to his place and cowered, while the attorneys made their harangues.

McNiven spoke with pa.s.sion and he had the truth on his side, but it lacked the convincing look. Beattie rocked the jury-box with laughter and showed a gift for parodying seriousness that would carry him far on his career. Then he switched to an ardent defense of the purity of the American home, and enn.o.bled the jury to a knighthood of chivalry and of democracy. As he pointed out, the well-known vices of the rich make every household unsafe unless they are sternly checked by the dread hand of the law.

He called upon the jury to inflict on the Lothario a verdict that would not only insure comfort to the poor little woman whose home had been destroyed, but would also be severe enough to make even a multimillionaire realize and remember that the despoiler of the American home cannot continue on his nefarious path with impunity.

The judge gave a long and solemn charge to the jury. It was fair according to the law and the evidence, but the evidence had been juggled by the fates.

The jury retired and remained a hideous while.

CHAPTER XIV

It was only a pleasant clubby discussion of the problem of Jim's and Charity's innocence that delayed the jury's verdict. One or two of the twelve had a sneaking suspicion that they had told the truth, but these were laughed out of their wits by the wiser majority who were not such fools as to believe in fairy-stories.

As one of the ten put it: "That Dyckman guy may have gone out into the rain, but, believe me, he knew enough to come in out of the wet."

A very benevolent old gentleman who sympathized with everybody concerned made a little speech:

"It seems to me, gentlemen, that when a man and wife have quarreled as bitterly as those two and have taken their troubles to court, there is no use trying to force them together again. If we give a verdict of not guilty, that will leave Mr. and Mrs. Dyckman married. But they must hate each other by now and that would mean lifelong misery and sin for both.

So I think we will save valuable time and satisfy everybody best by giving a verdict of guilty. It won't hurt Dyckman any."

"What about Mrs. Cheever?"

"Oh, she's gotta lotta money."

None of the jury had ever had so much as that and it was equivalent to a good time and the answer to all prayers, so they did not fret about Charity's future. On the first ballot, after a proper reminiscence of the amusing incidents of the trial they proceeded to a decision. The verdict was unanimous that Jim was guilty as charged. Charity was not to get her forty dollars nor her good name.

When the jurors filed back into the box the court came to attention and listened to the verdict.

Jim and Charity were dazed as if some footpad had struck them over the head with a slingshot. Kedzie was hysterical with relief. She had suffered, too, throughout the trial. And now she had been vindicated.

She went to the jury and she shook hands with each member and thanked him.

"You know I accept the verdict as just one big beautiful birthday present." It was not her birthday, but it sounded well, and she added, "I shall always remember your kindly faces. Never can I forget one of you."

Two days later she met one of the unforgetable jurors on the street and did not recognize him. He had been one-twelfth of her knightly champions, but she cut him dead as an impertinent stranger when he tried to speak to her. She cut Skip Magruder still deader when he tried to ride home with her.

He came to call and showed an inclination to settle down as a member of Kedzie's intimate circle. He had speedily recovered from his first awe at the sight of her splendor. Finding himself necessary to her, he grew odiously presumptuous. She had not dared to rebuke him. Now she thought she would have to buy him off. Skip had had his witness fees and his expenses, and nothing else for his pains. Then Beattie warned Kedzie that it would look bad to pay Skip any money; it might cast suspicion on his testimony. Kedzie would not have done that for worlds. Besides, when she learned what Mr. Beattie's fee was to be, she felt too poor to pay anybody anything.

The only thing she could do, therefore, was to remind Skip of the beautiful old song, "Lovers once, but strangers now."