CHAPTER XXI

A PLEA FOR JUSTICE

Stuart was not surprised to receive notice from Bivens's lawyers that they would demand sentence on Woodman within two days.

The financier was present with two great lawyers who smilingly assured him that he need have no fear as to the result. Yet the little man was uneasy. He fidgeted in his seat and watched Stuart's calm serious face with dread.

"Don't worry," the senior counsel assured him with confidence. "The old Recorder is a terror to every criminal in New York. Stuart's plea can only be a formal request for mercy, which he will not get."

In spite of all assurance, Bivens's nervousness increased as the hour drew near for the case to be called. He looked at his watch, fuming over the fact that Nan was late. He wished her to see Stuart and find out what he had up his sleeve. A woman could do such tricks better than a man. He looked out the window anxiously, and saw the flash of his big French limousine rounding the corner. He hurried to the steps to meet his wife.

"Nan, for heaven's sake see Jim before this case is called and find out what he's going to say to that judge."

"I'll do my best. I'll send my card in and ask him to see me at once."

"Good. When he returns to the court room wait, and I'll come out."

Bivens went back to his seat beside his lawyers and watched the court officer speak to Stuart.

He frowned and hesitated, rose and slowly followed the man through the door.

Nan seized his hand.

"Oh, Jim, I'm so worried. Cal says you are going to make a desperate fight against him this morning in this disgusting affair. Is it so?"

"I'm going to make the usual plea for mercy for an old broken man--my friend."

"But will it be the usual plea?"

"I'm not going to mince words. I'm going to fight for his life as I would for my own."

The woman drew close, so close he could feel her breath on his cheek as she whispered, earnestly:

"Please, don't do or say anything to-day to cause a break. I couldn't endure it. You don't know how much your friendship means to me."

"You can never lose that again, Nan," he answered, simply.

"But I must see you. Your visits are the brightest spots in my life. A break with him now would plunge me into abject misery. What are you going to say? Are you going to attack Cal? You don't have to do that, Jim! Promise me you won't, for my sake, if you care nothing for the brilliant future that is just opening before you. You do care something for me in spite of all the wrong I have done you in the past."

The young lawyer remained silent.

"Promise me," she pleaded tenderly, a tear stealing into her dark eyes.

"I'm going to do my level best for my old friend, Nan," he answered with dogged determination. "You needn't worry about your husband. He has the hide of a rhinoceros and nothing I can say will get under his skin."

"But that's just the trouble, Jim, it will. If any other man said it, no; but from you it will cut deeper than you can realize. You are the one man who can hurt him beyond forgiveness, because you're the one man on earth for whom he really cares."

"It will be all right, Nan. Men know how to give and take hard knocks and still be friends. We challenged each other to this duel when there was no other way."

"I never saw him so bent on any one thing in my life. His hatred of Woodman is a mania."

"I'm sorry--I'm fighting for my old friend's life. He wouldn't live in a prison a year. And I'm fighting for the life of his little girl who loves and believes in him as she believes in the goodness of God. If her father is branded a felon, it will kill her."

Nan tried to speak again and her voice failed. At last she said:

"Well, I'm going to sit where I can look straight into your face and if you say or do one thing that will destroy our friendship or ruin your future I shall scream--I know it!"

Stuart smiled and pressed her hand.

"You've too much good sense and self-control for that. I'll risk it. Now I must hurry. Our case will be called in a few minutes."

He turned abruptly and left her.

In a moment Bivens came out and led his wife to a seat which had been reserved near his.

One of the things which had increased Bivens's nervousness was the fact that the judge ignored his presence in the court room. He had been accustomed to deference from judges. Here was a new thing under the sun--a judge in an insignificant city court who coolly sat on the bench before him for an hour, sentencing criminals, and never even glanced in his direction. Evidently the man didn't know him. It was amazing, this ignorance of the average New Yorker.

The truth, of course, was the old-fashioned Recorder had not been trained as a corporation lawyer. He had fought his own way up in politics from the ranks of the common people. He was a man with red blood in his veins, a man of intense personal likes and dislikes and a fearless dispenser of what he believed to be even-handed justice under the law.

Stuart had based his plan of battle squarely on his knowledge of this judge's character.

As Bivens listened to the sharp ring of his voice pronouncing sentence on evil-doers and saw the officer snap his handcuffs on their wrists his spirits revived. His lawyers were right, after all. Nothing Stuart could say would affect the mind of such a man.

The young lawyer sat in silence beside the bowed form, awaiting his case which the judge, at his request, had placed last. As the moment drew near for the plea his nerve-tension grew intense. Waves of passionate emotion swept his heart. His imagination began to blaze with fires of eloquence that had been his birthright from two generations of great lawyers in the South. Somehow this morning the scene before him stirred his spirit with unusual power. Every crime apparently on the calendar had its origin in the lust for money. Every felon sentenced could have traced his ruin to this curse--thieves, embezzlers, burglars, a man who had killed his partner in a dispute over money, grafters, highwaymen, and last of all, two fallen women who had been amassing a fortune out of the ruin of their sisters.

The figures in the court room grew dim and faded, and out of the mists of the spirit world his excited fancy saw a crooked Red Shape rise over all, stretch forth a long bony hand dripping with blood and filth and begin to throw gold into a black bag. The face was hideous, but a crowd of worshipful admirers followed eagerly in the footsteps of the Red Shape, scrambling and fighting for the coins that slipped through the dripping fingers.

He waked from his day dream with a start, to hear the clerk read in quick tones:

"The People against Henry Woodman."

The judge looked at the dazed prisoner and said:

"What have you to say, Henry Woodman, why sentence should not be imposed upon you for the crime of which you stand convicted by your own plea?"

With a quick movement of his tall figure Stuart was on his feet, every nerve and muscle strung to the highest tension. His long sinewy hands were trembling so violently he could scarcely hold the slip of paper containing the notes he had scrawled for guidance in his address. And yet when he spoke it was with apparent calmness. Only the deep tremulous notes of his voice betrayed his emotion.

"May it please your honour," he slowly began, "I wish to establish to the court before I say anything in behalf of my client, the important fact that he offered to make full restitution of the property taken, that he did this voluntarily before he was even suspected of the crime, and that his offer was refused."

The judge turned to Bivens's lawyers.

"Is this admitted, gentlemen?"

"Without question, your honour," was the instant answer.

The old Recorder lifted his gray eyebrows in surprise, and settled back into his seat with a low grunt.

"I make the fair inference therefore in the beginning," Stuart went on evenly, "that the prosecutor in the case, who appears in this court to-day with an array of distinguished lawyers, whose presence is unnecessary to serve the ends of justice, is here actuated solely by a desire for personal vengeance."

Stuart paused and Bivens moved uneasily in his seat.

"I speak to-day, your honour, in behalf of the man who crouches by my side overwhelmed with shame and grief and conscious dishonour because he took a paltry package of jewellery from a man who has never added one penny to the wealth of the world and yet has somehow gotten possession of one hundred million dollars from those who could not defend themselves from his strength and cunning. This man stands before you now with no shame in his soul, no tears on his cheeks, and with brazen effrontery demands vengeance on a weaker brother.

"Two men are on trial, not one. The majesty of the law has already been vindicated in the tear-stained plea that has been entered. Between these two men the court must decide.

"I am not here to defend the crime of theft. The law of property has long been omnipotent. But I dare to plead with your honour to-day for the beginning of a new, nobler, higher law of humanity--the law that shall place man above his chattel. I shall not ask for the mercy of a light sentence. I am going to appeal to this court for something bigger, more divine. I am going to ask for justice under the higher law of man, whose divine code is yet unwritten, but whose day is surely dawning."

The judge leaned forward with one hand on his cheek, listening intently to the young lawyer's quivering words. Bivens's face had grown livid with excitement, and he sat staring helplessly at the speaker.

"Crime, your honour, is in the heart of man, not in the act he performs. If I shoot at a target, and kill a bystander, the act is not murder. But if I aim at my enemy and kill my friend I have committed murder. Out of the heart are the issues of life. Under the laws of to-day the act of this man is called a crime. Yet who can say that when we shall have slowly emerged from the era of property into the era of man, his act may not be called heroic? Morals are relative things. They are based on the experiences and faith of the generations which express them. Men were once hanged for daring to express an opinion contrary to that held by their parish priest. Such men are to-day the leaders of the world. The proud and cruel silence of ancient Europe has been succeeded by the universal cry for equal justice. And this rising chorus of the world is fast swelling into the deep soul conviction which cries: 'I will not make money out of my brother who is hungry. I refuse to be happy while my sister weeps in shame. I will not caress my own child while that of my neighbour starves!'

"I am not excusing crime. I am crying for the equality of man before the law. The English people beheaded their king because he imposed taxes without the consent of their parliament.

"The millionaire who demands vengeance against this broken man to-day has an income greater than the combined crowned heads of Europe and wields a sceptre mightier than tzar or emperor.

"Why?

"He levies each year millions of taxes without consulting this court, the legislature or any man who walks the earth. He does this by a machine for printing paper-tokens of value called stocks. The essence of theft is to take the property of another without giving a return. A green goods man sells printed paper for money. This mighty man also sells printed paper for money. What is the difference? Neither the green goods, nor the bogus capital called watered stock represents a dollar in real value. Yet we send the green goods man to the penitentiary and bow down before the other as a captain of industry!

"A burglar breaks into a store and robs the safe. A mighty man of money breaks into the management of a corporation which owns an iron mill employing thousands. He shuts down the plant, throws one hundred thousand people into want, passes the dividend, drives the stock down to a few cents on the dollar, buys it for a song from the ruined holders, starts up the mill again and _makes_ five millions! That is to say, he broke into a mill and robbed the safe of five millions. We send the burglar to the penitentiary and hail the manipulator of this stock as a Napoleon of Finance. I am not justifying crime. I demand the enforcement of equal justice among men.

"An enraged Italian stabs his enemy to death. The act is murder. This man corners wheat. Puts up the price of bread a cent a loaf and kills ten thousand children already half-starved from insufficient food. We electrocute the Italian and print pictures of the wheat speculator in our magazines as an example of Success.

"In other words, the theft of five thousand dollars is grand larceny. The theft of five millions, stained with human blood, is a triumph of business genius.

"But one answer is heard, 'am I my brother's keeper?'

"The man who asks that question will always kill his brother if the temptation comes at the right moment.

"A loaf of bread in England costs two and one-half cents. The same loaf here costs five cents. Who voted to levy a tax of one hundred per cent. on every man's loaf of bread? Kings were beheaded for less than this. Why has the cost of living increased to the point of crushing the average consumer? Because the irresponsible rulers of the people have piled their bogus debts of printed paper on their backs. The lowest estimate of this bogus capital of green goods stock is five times the sum of the National debt. And yet not one of these great thieves has ever been punished.

"Our brutal ancestors lived by raiding their neighbours. Their armed bands of hired retainers ravaged, burned, pillaged--the strong against the weak, the shrewd against the simple, the powerful against the defenseless. The power of those savages was purely physical. The power we give to their modern prototype is both physical and moral. They kill the body and poison the souls of the living. The older savage made raids for the necessities of life. We permit the raiders to play their murderous game for the sheer sport of the exercise.

"The man who lives to serve his fellow-man, the artist who creates beauty, the philosopher who inspires the mind, the statesman who adds a new law to our social structure, the inventor who conquers nature, the workingman who incarnates the dreams of thinkers into spiritualized matter--these men all add to the wealth of the world; but this modern marauder whom we have enthroned as our ruler everywhere, from everyone, seizes, tears, and despoils the fruits of toil, and has never added a penny to the wealth of humanity.

"And what do we find him doing? In the midst of poverty that means hunger and nakedness, disease and death, we have the shameless flaunting of insane luxury. And to what purpose? To challenge the envy of the vain and the foolish, to dazzle the minds of the poor and inflame the lusts of the criminal.

"Do we believe that such things are the decrees of a just and loving God who created this world? Slavery, Polygamy, Famine, and Plague were once universal scourges and accepted as the mysterious ways of God. We have outgrown them all and created a new and nobler God. We find that these things are not the results of his law, but the results of the violation of law."

The speaker paused, drew close to the judge and then in low impassioned tones told as if he were talking to a father the story of Woodman's life and the events which drove him to madness on the fatal night of his crime. In flashes of vivid eloquence he described the magnificent ball and drew in sombre heart-breaking contrast the desolation and despair of a proud and sensitive man made desperate by want and ruin, the man who had given his blood to his country and his daily life in an unselfish ministry to the homeless and friendless.

"I do not ask of your honour," he cried in ringing tones, "the repeal of the law against theft--thou shalt not steal! This law, old as the human race, will be as good a thousand years from to-day as it was a thousand years ago. I only ask the suspension of its penalty on this heart-broken man until we can extend it to his oppressors as well, until its thunder shall also echo through the palaces of the rich--_thou_ shalt not steal!

"The prosecution is enforcing the law, I grant. I appeal to this court to-day for more than man's law. I ask for divine justice. I ask for a bigger thing than the law itself--the equality of all men before the law!

"The possession of millions may not constitute true wealth, but it always means power over men. The thing which seems to be wealth may be, 'tis true, 'but the gilded index of far-reaching ruin, a wrecker's handful of coin gleaned from a beach whose false light has beguiled an argosy, a camp follower's bundle of rags from the breast of goodly soldier dead, the purchase price of potter's fields', but it still means the power of life and death over men!

"The man who has fallen was weak and poor. The man who demands his life is rich and powerful. You are the judge between them. The man who fell stood alone grappling Death and Hell, fought and lost his battle once. I appeal, your honour, to the higher law of the soul within you, within me, within this prisoner, within the breast even of his enemy--through struggle alone we triumph at last! I ask for a heartbroken man another chance. I ask this court to suspend all sentence against the poor bruised and bleeding spirit that lies in tears at our feet to-day."

Stuart suddenly sat down amid a silence that was painful. A woman's sob at last broke the stillness.

The judge wheeled in his armchair, cleared his throat and looked out of the window to hide from the crowd a tear that had stolen down his furrowed cheek.

He turned at length to Bivens's lawyers and quietly asked:

"The State insists on the enforcement of sentence without mercy?"

"Absolutely," was the sharp answer.

"This is your desire, Mr. Bivens?" the judge asked with some severity.

"Yes," the financier fiercely replied.

"And yet you say that you are a Christian--well, see to it--your Master says:

"'He that saith I love God and hateth his brother is a liar.' Henry Woodman, stand up!"

"The judgment of this court is that sentence in your case be suspended so long as you obey the law."

A murmur of applause rippled the crowd, and a muttered oath fell from Bivens's livid lips.

"And I may say to you, Henry Woodman, that my faith is profound that you will never appear in this court again. And if you ever need the help of a friend you'll find one if you come to me. You are a free man."

Stuart hurried the doctor out of the crowd. He had important work yet to do. He determined that no story of the scene should ever be printed in a New York paper. He would save Harriet that, too.

As the court adjourned Bivens cursed his lawyers in a paroxysm of helpless rage.

"Why didn't you appeal?" he stormed.

"There is no appeal. The case is ended."

"Ended!" The financier gasped.

"Ended."

Bivens suddenly threw his hand to his forehead, staggered and sank to the floor.

A doctor who was near rushed to his side and lifted his head into his wife's arms.

"What is it? Has he fainted, doctor?" she whispered, glancing toward the door through which Stuart had just passed.

"He has had a stroke of paralysis, Madam, I fear," was the serious answer.

## Book 3--The Flower

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