Held to Answer/Chapter 28
As the perturbed minister, hurrying from the train, turned into the short street leading toward his home upon the Bay-side, he was charged upon by Dick and Tayna, both of whom, in the state of their emotion, forgot High School dignity and came rushing upon their uncle with feet thudding like running ostriches. Tayna's cheeks were red as her Titian hair with flaming indignation, and her eyes burned like lights, while her full red lips pouted out: "Isn't it a shame?"
"It's a darn piece of blackmail, that's what it is, and it's actionable, too!"
This oracular verdict, of course, came panting from the lips of Dick, who, over-exerted by his run, stood with arms akimbo, hands holding his sides, and his too heavy head tipping backward on his shoulders, while with scrutinizing eye he studied the face of his uncle.
As for Hampstead, in the devoted loyalty of these fatherless children and the distress of mind which each exhibited, he entirely forgot the sense of hot injustice and wrong burning in his own breast. All the emotion he was then capable of turned itself into sympathy for them and solicitous anticipations as to the effect of the whole wretched business upon his sister Rose. With a sweep of his strong arms, he gathered the two young people to his breast, printing a kiss on Tayna's cheek, which he found burning hot, and squeezing Dick until the stripling gasped and struggled for release as he used to do when a squirming youngster. With his arms still affectionately about the shoulders of the two, Hampstead walked on down the street, palm-studded, with flower-bordered skirts of green on either side and the blue vista of the Bay showing dimly in the growing dusk.
Rose was waiting on the piazza. Her face was very calm, yet to John's keen eye, it bore a look of desperately mustered self-control. With the ready intuition of her sex, she had divined far more completely than her brother how desperate and dangerous was the struggle upon which he was entering, and she was determined to give him every advantage that sympathy, poise, and unwavering loyalty could supply.
"It's all right, Rose, all right," he hastened to assure her, as the steps were mounted. "A mere extravagance of an excited woman that the papers have made into a great sensation. It will melt away like fog. We are helpless for a few days until I can demand and receive a hearing upon preliminary trial. That will show that they have no case at all. Until then, we must simply stand and be strong."
Rose was already in her brother's arms, yet his speech, instead of reassuring her, made the tears flow.
"It is so—so humiliating to think of you defending yourself," she protested, "to hear you talk of their inability to make out a case. It seems so—so lowering, as if you were going to be put on trial just like a criminal."
"Why," replied John, "that's just what it all means. Just like a criminal!"
He said the thing strongly enough, but after it came a choke in the throat. He had not really comprehended this before. He had thought of making his defense from the standpoint of the popular idol that he was. As a matter of fact, he was going to trial like any criminal. His vantage ground was merely that of the prisoner at the bar. This prepared him for what Rose had to say next; for subtly perceiving that her brother had sustained an additional shock, her own self-control revived. Wiping her eyes, she turned to lead the way within.
"They," she said solemnly, "are waiting in the study."
"They?" inquired Hampstead.
"There are four men in there," Rose replied. "They want," and her voice threatened to break, "they want you!"
At this bald putting of the horrible fact, Tayna burst into a wail of woe and flung her arms about her uncle, whom she had followed into the hall.
"There, there, girl, don't cry," urged her uncle soothingly. "There is no occasion for it; this is annoying but not necessarily distressing. It is a mere formality of the law which must be complied with. Run along now, all of you, and wash the tears out of your eyes. I will be with you in five minutes. Let us sit down to a happy, cheerful dinner. I confess I am a little upset myself, but not too disturbed to be hungry," and with a weak attempt at grimacing humor, the big man laid a hand upon the region of his diaphragm.
In his study, as Rose had forewarned him, the minister found four men: Searle, Assistant District Attorney; Wyatt, Deputy Sheriff; and two city detectives.
Searle was a suave, resourceful man and the one assistant in the District Attorney's office whom Hampstead had found himself unable to trust; and that rather because of his personal and political associations than for any overt act of which the minister was cognizant.
Wyatt was a bloated person, amiable in disposition, whose excess of egotism was coupled with a paucity of intelligence, yet wholly incorruptible and with an exaggerated sense of duty that made him a capable officer,—a thing with which his breeding, which was obtrusively low, did not interfere.
Hampstead was able to master his feelings sufficiently to greet the quartet urbanely, if not cordially.
"A disagreeable duty, I assure you," conceded Searle.
"A disagreeable experience," laughed Hampstead, but with no great suggestion of levity.
"I guess I don't need to read this to you, Doc," said the Deputy Sheriff, as he opened to Hampstead a document drawn from his pocket. "It is a warrant for your arrest."
The minister took the document and glanced it through, his eyes hesitating for a moment at the name of the complaining witness.
"Alice Higgins?" he asked, with an inquiring glance.
"The true name of the complaining witness and accuser," replied Searle.
"Oh, I see," assented John.
It had never occurred to him that Marien Dounay was only a stage name. Was there anything at all about this woman that was not false, he wondered.
John returned the warrant to Wyatt and caught the look in that officer's eye. A sense of the horrible indignity of arrest came over the minister, a perception of what it meant: this yielding of one's liberty, of one's body to the possession of another, who might be a coarser and more inferior person than one's self. With a guilty flush, John thought how many times in his crusades against the gamblers and small law-breakers he had procured the swearing out of complaints that led to the arrest of scores of men. He had marveled at the venomous hatred which those men later displayed toward himself, regarding him as the author of a public disgrace put upon them, and not upon them alone but upon their families also. Now he understood.
"The bail is fixed at ten thousand dollars," explained Searle smoothly. "When we got your telephone message that you would be home at seven o'clock, I took the liberty of arranging for Judge Brennan to be in his chambers at nine to-night so that you could be there with your bondsmen and not have to spend the night in jail."
"That was very considerate of you," assented the minister, a huskiness in his tone despite himself.
The night in jail! The very idea. And ten thousand dollars bail! He had expected to be released upon his own recognizance. Again that disagreeable intimation of being treated like a common criminal came crowding in with a suffocating effect upon his spirit. But he rallied, exclaiming with another effort at easy urbanity: "Very well, I acknowledge my arrest, and it will be unnecessary to detain you gentlemen further. I shall be glad to meet you with my bondsmen in the judge's chambers."
The Deputy Sheriff coughed in an embarrassed way, but stood stolidly before his prisoner.
"I am sorry, Doctor Hampstead," explained Searle, "but we shall have to search you. Benson's men here will do that."
"Search me?" exclaimed Hampstead, with a sudden sense of insult. "By the appearance of things," he added, while casting a sarcastic look at the signs of disorder about, "I should think this farce had been carried far enough. You did not find the diamonds here. You do not expect to find them upon my person, do you?"
The speaker's tones witnessed a natural indignation and considerable irritability.
"I got to do my duty," replied Wyatt stubbornly, making a sign to the two detectives, who immediately arose and advanced upon the minister.
For an instant the situation was exceedingly tense. Hampstead was a very strong man, and his resentment at what seemed an insult put upon him with malice, was very hot. But good sense triumphed in the interval of thought which the officers diplomatically allowed.
"Oh, of course," he exclaimed with a gesture of submission, "you men are only cogs. Once the machinery of the law is put in motion, you must turn with the other wheels. Pardon my irritation, gentlemen, but the situation is unusual for me and rather hard. I feel the injustice and indignity of it very keenly."
"We appreciate your situation perfectly," said Assistant District Attorney Searle smoothly. "As you say, we are all of us cogs."
Yet the actual search of his person, once entered on, seemed to Hampstead to proceed rather perfunctorily, although at the same time he got from the faces and manner of all four an impression of something they were holding in reserve.
"What is this?" asked one of the detectives dramatically, holding up a long, narrow key with a red rubber band doubled and looped about the neck, which he had just extracted from the minister's pocket.
"That is the key to my safe deposit box at the Amalgamated National," replied Hampstead, naturally enough.
"Then," said Wyatt bluntly, "we've got to search that box."
The minister was instantly on his guard.
Some play of eyes between the four men, accompanied by a subtle change in the expression of their faces, warned him that they must have been apprised of the existence of this box and that the key was the real object of their personal search. Hampstead resolved hastily to defeat them.
"I decline to permit it," he declared shortly. "There are very private papers in that box, things which have been communicated to me in the utmost confidence, and I would not be justified in permitting you—or any one else—to handle them. Under the rules of the bank, without my consent or an order of court, you could not reach the box."
"I have that order of court here," said Searle, speaking up quickly, but with cold precision of utterance, "in a search warrant directed particularly to your safe deposit box."
Like a flash, Hampstead thought that he understood.
"So that is what you are here for, Searle?" he snapped sarcastically, turning and confronting the Assistant District Attorney. "I never have trusted you. I couldn't understand your presence here or your interest in this silly charge; but now I comprehend fully. You have taken advantage of it to get your eyes on the perjury case I have against your bosom friend, Jack Roche. Well, I warn you! This is where I stop and fight!"
But Searle refused to get angry at this bald impugnment of his integrity and motives. No doubt it was his confidence in an ultimate and complete humiliation of the minister that enabled him to maintain an unruffled demeanor while he suggested blandly:
"Perhaps you ought not to proceed further, Doctor Hampstead, without the advice of a lawyer."
The proposal touched the minister in his pride.
"A lawyer?" he objected scornfully. "Thank you, no! My cause requires no expert advocacy. In my experience of the past four years, I have learned quite enough about court practice to cope with this ridiculous burlesque without professional assistance."
Searle, playing his cards deliberately, took advantage of the minister's assumed acquaintance with legal lore to suggest with alacrity:
"You know then, Doctor, that it is useless to fight a court order of this sort, as you spoke of doing in your excitement a moment ago. I think, with the attorneys of your Civic League, you have gone through a safe deposit box or two upon your own account, by means of just such a search warrant as I now exhibit to you."
Again Hampstead's second thought assured him that he was powerless to resist.
"Yes," he confessed resignedly to Searle's speech, after the necessary interval for consideration, "I suppose I must admit it. When I spoke of fighting, I spoke in heat; partly because I feel the gross injustice and bitter wrong this senseless charge is doing to innocent people other than myself, who am also innocent, and partly because, as I have already told you, I utterly distrust your motive in making the whole of this search. You must be as well aware as I that this charge is the work of a woman who, to speak most charitably, is beside herself with excitement."
But Searle only smiled, and observed with urbanity unruffled.
"I am sorry, Doctor, that you distrust me. You may have the privilege, of course, of being present when we examine the contents of the box."
"Naturally I shall insist upon that," said the minister.
"In that case," Searle added with significant emphasis, "I think your observations will convince you that we are solely concerned in a search for the diamonds."
"As I like to believe well of all men, I shall hope so," countered the minister; and then, since the demeanor of the officers made it clear there was no more searching to be done, he continued, after a glance at his watch: "If I am to meet Judge Brennan and yourself with my bondsmen at nine o'clock, I suggest that we go from there direct to the bank vaults. They are accessible until midnight, as you doubtless know."
"Very good, Doctor," replied Searle in that oily voice which indicated how completely to his satisfaction affairs were progressing.
"And now," suggested the minister, with a nod toward the street door, "as the hour is late, I will ask you gentlemen to excuse me."
Searle darted a look at Wyatt.
"Very sorry, Doc, but I got to stay with you," volunteered the deputy, "and hand you over to the judge."
Once more the flush of offense mounted to the cheek of Hampstead. Hand him over to the judge! How galling such language was when used of him! Again he recalled with compunction how many arrests he had caused without an emotion beyond the satisfaction of an angler when he hooks a fish. But he—John Hampstead—minister, preacher, pastor of All People's; a shining light in a vast metropolitan community! Surely it was something different and infinitely more degrading for him to be arrested than for a mere plasterer, or mayhap a councilman? He had a greater right than they to be wrathful and resentful. Besides, they were guilty. Judges, juries, or their own confessions, had unfailingly so declared. He was innocent, spotlessly innocent of the charge against him. His defenselessness proceeded from relations of comparative intimacy with the actress, and his priestly knowledge of the guilty person. Yet the thought of this helped humor and good sense to triumph again, over his rising choler.
"Oh, very well," he exclaimed, half-jocularly, half-derisively. "Make yourself at home; all of you make yourselves at home. We are accustomed to an unexpected guest or two at the table. Be prepared to come out to dinner. Listen, if you like, while an arrested felon telephones to his friends, seeking bondsmen. You may hear secret codes and signals passing over the wire. You may even wish to put under surveillance the gentlemen with whom I communicate."
"Doctor! Doctor!" protested Searle, with hands uplifted comically. "Your hospitality and your irony both embarrass us. The detectives and I will be on our way. Wyatt will have to do his duty."
"As you please," exclaimed Hampstead, who was fast recovering his poise; "quite as you please."
With this speech he held open the outside door and bade the three departing guests good evening; and then, while the Deputy waited in the room, the clergyman was busy at the telephone until he had the promise of three different gentlemen of his acquaintance to meet him at Judge Brennan's chambers at nine that night and qualify as his bondsmen in the sum of ten thousand dollars.
This much attended to, dinner became the next order; but it was not a very happy affair. There had never been a time when the little family group, bound together by ties that were unusually tender, wished more to be alone at a meal. Now, when the superfluous presence was the official representative of the very thing that had plunged them into gloom, the situation became one of torture. Food stuck to palates. Scraps of conversation were dropped at rare intervals and upon entirely extraneous subjects in which nobody, not even the speakers, had the slightest interest. At times there was no sound save the audible enjoyment of his food by their guest, for the Deputy Sheriff, accustomed to the ruthless thrust of his official self into the personal and sometimes the domestic life of individuals, was quite too crass to sense the embarrassment and positive pain his presence caused and was also exceedingly hungry.
In this general silence, the grating of wheels on the graveled walk outside the study door sounded loudly.
"Mrs. Burbeck!" exclaimed Hampstead in some surprise. "She never came to me at night before. Finish your dinner, Deputy. If you will excuse me, I must receive one of my parishioners in the study."
"Sorry, but I can't excuse you, Doc," replied Wyatt jocularly; "but if you'll excuse me for just a minute, while I get away with this second piece of loganberry pie, I'll be with you."
"Be with me?" asked the minister, color rising. "Do you mean that you will intrude upon the privacy of an interview with a helpless lady in a wheel chair who comes to see me alone?"
Wyatt's fat cheek was bulging, and there were tiny streams of crimson juice at the corners of the lips; but he interrupted himself long enough to reply bluntly: "I ain't agoin' to let you out of my sight. Orders is orders, that's all I got to say."
"But tell me, Wyatt, who gave you such orders?" queried the minister, with no effort to conceal his irritation.
"Searle. And they were give to him," answered the Deputy phlegmatically, his fat-imbedded eyes intent upon the white and crimson segment of pastry on his plate.
"And who gave such orders to him?" persisted Hampstead.
"If you ask me—" began the Deputy, and then exasperatingly blotted out the possibility of further speech by the transfer of the dripping triangle to his mouth.
"Well, I do ask you," declared the minister curtly.
"He got 'em from Miss Dounay."
"And is that woman running the District Attorney's office?" questioned the minister scornfully.
"Search me!" gulped Wyatt, with a shrug of his shoulders. "I had one look at her. She's got eyes like a pair of automatics. You take it from me, Doc," and Wyatt laid his unoccupied hand upon the sleeve of the minister, "if she's got anything on you, compromise and do it quick; if she ain't, fight, and fight like h—." Wyatt stopped and shot an apologetic glance around the table. "'Scuse my French," he blurted, "but you know what I mean."
"Yes," said the minister, holding his head very straight, "I realize that you do not mean to insult me."
"Insult you?" argued the Deputy, overflowing with satisfied amiability. "After coming over here to arrest you, and you givin' me a dinner like this? Pie like this? Well, I guess not. I'm bribed, Doc, that's what I am. I got to go in that room with you when you see the old lady; but I'll hold my thumbs in my ears, and I won't see a d— there I go again." Once more Wyatt's apologetic look swept around the table.
"Mrs. Burbeck is in the study," announced the maid.