A Deal with the Prosecution

Judge Braxton walked slowly down the courthouse steps and thence across the great shaded yard to the mineral well in the corner. There he filled a tin cup with the strong sulphur water and drank it absently. The air was already crisp with the touch of autumn. The grass was withering and the leaves of the great oak and beech trees were turning brown and twisting up at the edges, but the October breeze was alive with youth and strength.

The Judge was not thinking of the things about him. His mind was still on the scene in the court room; the cringing form of the accused man, and the fierce indictment of Harry Maynard, the rising young attorney for the commonwealth. The prosecutor’s speech had drawn so much applause that the circuit judge was compelled to rap more than once to check it.

Judge Braxton was troubled. He liked Harry Maynard; knew that he was upright, able, and industrious, and felt sure that he would make his mark in life. But it seemed to the Judge, at times, that Harry carried the zeal of prosecution too far; in the heat of attack and the desire to convict, he acquired, for the moment, so the Judge thought, a certain savage fire and energy that bordered upon cruelty.

Judge Braxton shook his head again. He knew that he, himself, was not judicial, despite the old title of “Judge” that clung to him from that far-off term of his youth. He could not prosecute, when the law called for a man’s life, even if he believed the defendant proved guilty. His heart was too tender. But in most cases before the court there was always a doubt, and he held with the certainty of conviction that if one erred at all it was better to err on the side of mercy. It was this feeling of sympathy and pity, always so strong in him, that caused him to volunteer for the defense of the man Goodsell. Goodsell might be innocent, of the grave charge of murder, and he could not endure to see him convicted merely because he was a poor, friendless tramp.

“Good morning, Judge,” said Mr. Ryan, the editor of the Groveton Record, “How is your corn crop this year?”

The Judge and Mr. Ryan were great friends. They had a common bond: each, aside from his regular profession, conducted a farm, and it was known to everybody else except these two that they were the worst farmers in the county. Yet each imagined himself the best, and whenever they met they compared notes.

“Great! great!” replied the Judge smiling. “I think I’ll make at least a barrel more to the acre than you will.”

The editor lifted his chin scornfully.

“More likely to be the other way,” he said. “But that was a great speech Maynard made in the Goodsell case, wasn’t it?”

“A little too good! a little too good!”

“You’ll have a hard time clearing Goodsell,” continued the editor, “Moss was found dead with his skull crushed in; they caught this tramp a half mile away, carrying a big stick, and there were red stains on the end of the stick.”

“He might have been using the stick as a cane. Nearly every tramp has one, and those stains may be pokeberry juice. Most any man strolling a country road, with a stick in his hand, will slash idly at the weeds and grass by the way. You’ve done it yourself more than once, Jim Ryan.”

“Maybe, but I’ve never slashed at anybody’s head.”

While they talked the young prosecutor himself approached. He was under thirty and undeniably handsome, with a strong, clean face. Now that his speech was over he was calm and quiet, with a grave, slightly reserved air that suggested dignity.

“I was just telling the Judge, Harry, how much I thought of your speech,” said the editor, “I’ve heard you make some good ones before, but this seems to me to be the best.”

The prosecutor’s usually pale face flushed a little with pleasure, and the Judge added kindly:

“Yes, son, it was an able speech.”

“And I’ve been telling the Judge that he’d have a hard time stealing Goodsell from Justice,” said the editor in a jocular tone.

The prosecutor laughed.

“The Judge has snatched a good many out of my hands, just when I thought I had ’em fast,” he said, “but I don’t believe he’ll do it this time.”

The Judge smiled amiably, but said nothing. Neither of the other men could tell what was going on deep down in his wise old mind. The editor said something more about the crops, boasted a little over the Judge, and then left them. The Judge and the prosecutor walked together toward their homes, which were on the same street, but they did not allude to the case of Goodsell.

Maynard lived in a neat red brick cottage, set back like all the houses of Groveton in an ample yard, well shaded with many great trees, and his mother, seeing the two men approaching, came down to the gate to meet her son. She nodded pleasantly to the Judge but gave Harry a look of affection and pride. Her son was the greatest man in the world, but she seldom went to the court to hear him speak. In her own youth she had seen too much of crime and misery, and she had been brought into too close contact with them. Her husband had died a drunkard, and her other son, the elder, had gone to the bad. Now, she was a wan and faded woman of nearly sixty, but with a peaceful face.

“Harry thinks that he has me beat this time, Mrs. Maynard.”

“I don’t know, but I’ll let you two fight it out,” said Mrs, Maynard; she liked the Judge. Her own troubles, so long-continued, but now happily over, instead of embittering and hardening her, had made her kinder and more gentle.

“It’s a fight, sure enough,” said the sanguine prosecutor. “But this time I think I’ll win, and I’ll get a little revenge for some of those old cases.”

Judge Braxton laughed, and leaving the two together, walked on. It was yet a half mile to his house, and as he walked his trouble returned to him. A thought was working deep down at the bottom of his wise old mind. He was struggling with a memory, and, before he had gone many yards, he paused and looked back. Maynard and his mother were just going into the house. To the distant view of Judge Braxton the prosecutor’s shoulders looked square and aggressive. He watched the young man until he went into the house, closing the door behind him, and then he shook his head once more.

“It’s not well to be too hard—it’s not well to be too hard, even when one is the attorney for the commonwealth,” he murmured. A slight look of melancholy over-spread his face, but a moment later it was dispelled as he came to the gate of his own home which he loved. He, too, was to have a welcome. His wife was inside the house, busy with the household duties, but his favorite daughter was in a hammock on the lawn, reading a book. She put down the book when she saw him, and went with him to the great front porch, where she took a chair by his side.

“Aren’t you glad to get away from that terrible trial?” she asked.

“I don’t know—I don’t know,” he replied musingly. “Somehow I take a deep interest in it.”

She laughed. He always took a deep interest in his cases; that was why he was such a great lawyer for the defense.

“I suppose that the tramp, Goodsell, appeals to your sympathies,” she said. “I am sure that any tramp would.”

He smiled and patted her tenderly on the head.

“Now, don’t you go to blaming me for having a soft heart, daughter,” he said.

“I don’t,” she replied, “I’m proud of you for several reasons, and for that, not least of all.”

The Judge had little to say during the ample supper, that was equivalent to a dinner in large cities. No one annoyed him. They knew that he was thinking of the case, and around him a stream of talk from his children and grandchildren, nephews and nieces, flowed on, unheard by him.

After dinner he said to his wife:

“I’m going down to the jail to see Goodsell. Don’t wait up for me, as I may have to stay quite a while.”

He walked back into the town, still deep in thought, and went to the jail on the slope of the hill on the southern side of the square. Hurd, the old, one-armed ex-confederate soldier, who was elected to the office of jailer term after term, received him.

“I guess you want to see Goodsell, don’t you, Judge?” was his rather garrulous greeting. “But I doubt if you can get anythin’ out of him. He’s all crushed; same as if a pile driver had hit him square on the head. Don’t look like much of a man, anyway.”

“No, he isn’t much of a man,” repeated the Judge. “I think that’s why I’m defending him. But I want to see him, Hurd. As his counsel, I must have a long talk with him. Will you kindly see that we’re not disturbed?”

“Sure, Judge,” replied the hearty jailer, “Have you et’? Yes! Then you can’t take a bite with me; but you’ve got to do it some other time. I’ve got some mighty fine roastin’ ears.”

He showed the Judge into a cell, and then, putting a candle on the table, went out, leaving him with the prisoner.

Judge Braxton stood for a few moments at his full height—he was six feet two—and gazed intently at the accused man. Goodsell lay on the little iron bedstead that was set in the floor, and Hurd’s definition of him as one “crushed” was correct. The Judge could see neither nobility nor courage in the lax figure of the mean, unkempt face. He was a tramp, a hobo, in every sense of the word, one who was a tramp because he was fitted to be a tramp, and because he was born to be one. But these facts made no difference to the Judge. He had come there for a purpose, and he was resolved to carry it out.

“Brace up, man!” began the Judge, “I’ve something important to say to you.”

The tramp slowly raised his head, when he heard the commanding tones.

“Sit up, I say! Here, be a man, if you can!” The Judge put out the stern words like pistol shots.

The tramp sat up with a jump.

“Now, keep your eyes on mine, and no lies—understand!” continued the judge. “Stop that! Don’t look away, and if you don’t tell the truth—every word you say—I’ll see you hanged myself.”

A frightened look came upon the face of the tramp. He cowered away, and every line of his features showed fear. But the stern eyes of the Judge—eyes that had looked deep into the eyes of many an innocent or guilty man—held him, and would not let him turn his own aside. Slowly, under that penetrating gaze, he steadied himself, until he sat erect, and much of the fear went from him. Then the Judge began to ask him questions, and the tramp made replies that the wise old lawyer, who could look into the hearts of men, knew to be true.

It was more than three hours later when Judge Braxton came from the cell of the accused tramp and his face was very grave. Moreover, the features, usually so full of resolve, expressed doubt and indecision.

“Well, Judge,” said the cheerful jailer, as he let him out, “you and that tramp must surely have had a powerful lot to talk about.”

“We did, Hurd, we did.”

“And powerful interestin’, too?”

“Very interesting.”

Judge Braxton stepped out into the cool night air, and pushed back his soft felt hat from his forehead. The town was asleep—there was little to keep Groveton awake after twelve—except for two or three lights that twinkled here and there. Nothing met eye and ear but the peace of an early autumn night.

“Lord,” muttered Judge Braxton, devoutly quoting as best he could an old text, “thou certainly dost move in a wondrous way thy wonders to perform. Now what shall I do in this most singular case?”

He walked home very slowly, his head bent down and his hands clasped behind him, a favorite attitude, when he was thinking deeply. But before he reached his own house he had decided and his decision was expressed in his own words.

“I shall wait. Pride goeth before a fall and so does hardness.”

All were asleep at his house. His dog came across the lawn to meet him, but did not bark, merely licking the hand that never struck him.

The Judge stroked the woolly head a moment or two, before unlocking the door and going to his own room. The decision taken, his mind was at peace now, and the moment he was in bed he fell asleep.

After the indictment by the grand jury and a preliminary examination, the case was continued, the time for the real trial being set a month later. It was popularly reported, and reported truly, that Harry Maynard was preparing for the effort of his life. He had worked up the case against the tramp to its last and minutest detail, and it was said that his speech would be terrible in its denunciation. But Judge Braxton was singularly silent. He had nothing to say, even to his friend, the editor, and once, when the prosecutor asked him in a jocular way if he thought he had any chance he merely replied:

“Softly, Harry, softly. What was it the old Frenchman said; ‘Not too much zeal?’”

The day of the trial drew near. Chilly November was at hand, and a raw wind whirled the dead leaves about the courthouse yard. The night before, Judge Braxton walked downtown and went directly to the office of Harry Maynard. He knew that the prosecutor would be at work there on the case which he was to argue the next day in court, and when he knocked at the door it was Maynard’s voice that said, “Come in.”

The young man looked up in surprise when he saw the face of his visitor.

“Why—Judge!” he exclaimed.

“Yes, Harry, it is I,” said Judge Braxton, in a singularly gentle and winning tone, “and I have many things to say to you; important things about the case.”

Maynard’s surprise deepened and his face became cold. Judge Braxton read his expression. It said: “This is unprofessional; we are to meet as antagonists in this case tomorrow.”

But the Judge was afraid of no man, least of all when on an errand of mercy. He took a chair uninvited, and sitting down, looked steadily into the eyes of Harry Maynard.

“I said I had things of importance to tell you,” he began quietly, “and they are important, but much more important to you than they are to me.”

The prosecutor’s lip curled a little with irony and unbelief.

Judge Braxton’s voice suddenly became stern and fierce. He spoke to the bold prosecutor as he had spoken a month before to that shivering tramp in the jail.

“I’ve a story to tell to you, Harry Maynard,” he said, “and whether you choose or not you have to hear, because it is for your good as well as that of others. Sit still, man, and listen.”

Maynard moved nervously in his chair, but the Judge put his broad hand on his shoulder, and the prosecutor, feeling not alone the physical but also the mental powers of the man before him, sank back, helpless and overmastered.

“What is it—go on,” he murmured weakly.

“I wanted to tell you,” said the Judge, speaking with quietness and deliberation, “that a long time ago I knew a boy who was weak rather than bad. But weakness may lead to badness and crime. I who have dealt for more than forty years with such men should know—and this boy grew no better as he grew older. He went the other way. He entered manhood a liar, a drunkard, and a thief. He had friends who tried to save him, but in return he merely insulted them. Finally he robbed a man of a large sum of money and was forced to disappear.

The prosecutor stirred uneasily in his chair, but the large hand of the Judge pressed him down.

“It is a pertinent tale that I tell,” said Judge Braxton. He looked deep into the eyes of Maynard, and Maynard shivered.

“The man disappeared, as I said,” the Judge continued in his quiet, even, tones, “and two or three years later news came from Texas that he had been killed there in a brawl. It was a mistaken report. I know it, no matter how I know it, but I know it. Whatever induced the sunken and degraded man to tramp back a thousand miles to the town where he was born no one can tell, not the man himself. But he was under another name, and before he reached the town he was arrested for a murder. He dared not tell his true name, because a robber does not come into court with a good character. Time and the mire had made such changes in him that nobody knew him, nor did he himself in his maudlin and crushed state notice the name of the young prosecutor who worked up the case against him with such terrible industry. And yet, if he had looked more closely at that prosecutor, he might have known him.”

“Good God—Dick my brother!” exclaimed the prosecutor, seeing it all with the terrible eyes of revelation.

“Yes, Dick Maynard. You were only a small boy when he went away, and you could not recognize him in that crushed lump of humanity, sitting before you in the court room. Do you wonder now, Harry, that I said to you ‘Not too much zeal.’”

The prosecutor shivered and covered his face with his hands. The kind eyes of Judge Braxton looked down at him pityingly, and his broad hand pressed his shoulder in sympathy.

“I have promised Dick that he shall be saved,” continued the Judge, “but he is not to tell any one who he is and he is to go away from here forever. We have your mother to think of, Harry. Dick Maynard is past all hope of reform, and, living and known to her, he could bring her only misery.

“But what am I to do?” groaned the prosecutor. “I, too, am ruined. My whole reputation is at stake. I cannot withdraw from the case on the very eve of the trial. What would they say? The public would be sure to learn the reason!”

Judge Braxton’s face grew stern again, and he looked down with rebuke at the bent figure before him.

“You should think of your mother first, Harry,” he said, “and then, if any space for thought is left over, of your own reputation. But you have your speech ready, Go on, make it in the courtroom tomorrow, and I will reply. I do not care to boast, but I know that I can save your mother—and Dick—and you.”

“God bless you, Judge Braxton,” said Harry Maynard, speaking humbly for the first time. “You are a good man.”

The Judge rose, and again his look changed from sternness to pity. Then he went quietly from the room.

The court room was crowded to suffocation the next day when the trial began and everybody noticed the extraordinary pallor of the attorney for the commonwealth.

“Working himself to death,” they said.

Old Judge Braxton, the victor in a thousand legal battles, sat placidly within the bar beside his client. Goodsell wore a suit of cheap but clean clothes and his hair was combed neatly. His eyes, shifty and evasive, rested fearfully, at times, on the attorney for the commonwealth, and then they would turn with a kind of appealing confidence to Judge Braxton. But they would meet nobody’s gaze squarely.

“Looks like a murderer,” the spectators said.

The evidence was finished, and Mr. Maynard rose for the prosecution. He was so pale that his lips were blue and the people wondered. The room was hot and close almost beyond endurance, and the prosecutor reeled slightly, then put his hand on a table for support.

Harry Maynard began to speak with his face to the jury, but he felt that Judge Braxton was looking at him, and he must look back at the Judge. Gradually he shifted around until he met the stern, accusing eyes. He grew, if possible, paler than ever and a million motes danced in the air before him. He strove to collect his thoughts, and go on, but he faltered. He felt that his feet were growing weak and he knew that the people were looking at him in amazement. He began to stammer and the dancing motes fused into a black mass. Then he fell in a faint into the arms of a court officer, who was quick enough to catch him.

“Overwork,” said the people, but Judge Braxton muttered under his breath: “I was sure that he would fail, strong though he is, truly, pride doth go before a fall.”

After a while, when the confusion was over and the prosecutor was revived, Judge Braxton rose for the defense. He was a perfect lion in the path of the prosecution. People said that the old Judge had never been in better form and he used all the numerous and powerful weapons in his arsenal—logic, denunciation, pathos, irony, and appeal. He painted a picture of the tramp, Goodsell, poor, friendless, unknown, and penniless, and he showed him to the jury a martyr, not a criminal. Then he took up the chain of circumstantial evidence and shattered it, link by link.

“Gentlemen,” he said in conclusion to the jury, “I would not convict the mangiest cur in Groveton of stealing a bone on such evidence as this.”

The jury, after half an hour’s retirement, returned a verdict for acquittal, and when the people went out of the courtroom they said to each other, in a tone indicating that they had known it beforehand:

“Judge Braxton wins again.”

An hour later the tramp was speeding on a fast train into the far Southwest from which he would never return.

“Father,” said Judge Braxton’s daughter that night when they sat alone before the fire. “Tell me, in confidence, do you think that man was really innocent?”

“God knows,” replied the Judge slowly. “And in such a case as this, the best that humble mortals like ourselves can do is to give him the benefit of the doubt.”

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