Arthur Train

“ These are predestined; if a man love the labor of any trade, apart from any question of success or fame, the gods have called him."
Had anybody told Danny Lowry that the gods had called him he would have stigmatized his informant as a liar—yet they had. For apart from any question of success or fame he had loved horses from the day when as a baby he had first sprawled in the straw of his Uncle Mike Aherne's livery and hitching stable in Dublin City. He had grown up to the scrape and whiffle of the currycomb, breathing ammonia, cracking the skin of his infantile knuckles with harness soap. ”

“ If they had any reasonable doubt—and such a doubt might of course be raised by evidence of previous good character—they would of course give it to the defendant and acquit him, but such a doubt must be no mere whim, guess or conjecture that the defendant might not after all be guilty even if the evidence seemed so to demonstrate; it must be a substantial doubt based on the evidence and such a one as would influence them in the important matters of their own daily, domestic and business lives. ”

“ Tutt to hurry off to the Tombs and bail out old Danny Lowry, a self-confessed lawbreaker, giving his own bond and the house on Twenty-third Street as security. Still more so, as more unblushingly ostentatious, was his taking the criminal over to Pont's and giving him the very best dinner that Signor Faccini, proprietor of that celebrated hostelry, could purvey.
Hard cases are said to make bad law; I wonder if they make bad people. If "conscience makes cowards of us all" does human sympathy play ducks and drakes with conscience? ”

“ And I'll tell you something, Peckham—which is that the human heart is a damn sight bigger than the human conscience."
Danny Lowry had lived for years in fear of the blow which had so suddenly struck him down, for there had never been any blinking of the obvious fact that in acting as an unlicensed veterinary he was brazenly violating the law. On the other hand, not being able to read or write, and having no technical knowledge of medicine, all his experience, all his skill, all his love of animals could avail him nothing so far as securing a license was concerned. ”

“ The tragedy of the horse is the tragedy of all who loved them. Danny was one of these tragedies, but he still picked up a precarious living by doing odd jobs at Mulqueen's and acting as a veterinary when called upon, and he could generally be found either loafing in the smelly little office or smoking his T D pipe on the steps outside.
He and Mr. Ephraim Tutt, the lawyer, who lived in the rickety old house with the tall windows and piazzas protected by railings of open ironwork round which twisted the stems of extinct wistarias, had long been friends. ”

“ Nowadays—whatever may have been the case two generations ago—each side briefly states its claims and tries to win on points.
People were apt to wonder why each succeeding administration inevitably retained stuffy old Tom Hingman at seventy-five hundred dollars a year to handle the calendar in Part Five. Yet those on the inside knew why very well. It was because Tom long ago, in his prehistoric youth, had learned that the way to secure verdicts was to appear not to care a tinker's dam whether the jury found the defendant guilty or not. ”

“ All the previous cases in which he had sat had been for murder or arson, robbery or theft, burglary, blackmail or some other outrageous offense against common morals or decency. But here was a man who had never done anything but good in his life, and was at the bar of justice charged with crime merely because some cold-blooded mercenaries thought he was interfering with their business! Bently was in a recalcitrant and indignant frame of mind against the prosecution long before the defense began. ”

“ So they sat down by the stove and the doctor took Danny's pulse and put a thermometer under his tongue, chatting amicably meanwhile, and when he had completed his examination he wrote something on a piece of paper.
"How long have you been practicing veterinary medicine?" he inquired.
"All my life," answered Danny truthfully. "But I don't get near so much to do as I used. These be hard times for those as have to do with horses." ”

“ And if he lied to Lowry he may have been lying to us here to-day. I say that there is a reasonable doubt right there as to whether Brown is really a doctor or not. Such a doubt belongs to the defendant. He is entitled to it and it is our duty to acquit him!"
"Hear! Hear!" "That's so!" "Bully for you!" "What yer got to say now, eh?" "Take a vote!" "Pass the box!" resounded through the transom amid a tremendous scuffling of feet and scraping of chairs.
"Phelan!" gasped Mr. Tutt. "Who shall ever again have the temerity to suggest that the jury system is not the greatest of our institutions?" ”

“ He's the man we're trying! The other one is the complainant!"
"The only one that had any complaint was the horse", protested the tall man. "But I understand now—we're tryin' the defendant. I've never served on a jury before. Now, what's the question?"
"Did the defendant—ant—claim to be a licensed veterinary—when he wasn't?"
"Now wait a second," objected the tall man again. "I want to get this straight. Is it the point that if this old man pretended he was a horse doctor when he wasn't he has to go to jail?" ”

“ Hingman would have to claim that Danny Lowry was a criminal; whereas, thank heaven! they all of them—every man of them—knew he was nothing of the kind! Criminal—that old man? Mr. Tutt raised his eyes and his arms to heaven in protest. Why, one look at him would create a reasonable doubt! But the case against him failed absolutely for the following reasons:
Daniel Lowry had not practised veterinary medicine without a license in taking care of Brown's sick horse, because he had not claimed to be a veterinary ”

“ But I can't; there isn't room. I can only dwell upon the tactics of Mr. Tutt long enough to state that at the conclusion of the case against Daniel Lowry, wherein it was clearly, definitely and convincingly established that Danny had been practising veterinary medicine for a long time without the faintest legal right, the lawyer rose and declared emphatically to the jury that his client was absolutely, totally and unquestionably innocent, as they would see by giving proper attention to the evidence he would produce—so that he would not take up any more of their valuable time in talk. ”

“ And you will recall, gentlemen, that the testimony is merely that he said to the detective in reference to the card: 'That is my name.' He did not say anything to him about being a veterinary."
This somewhat disingenuous argument created a profound impression.
"Say, now you've said something!" declared the salesman. "You'd oughta been a lawyer yourself. Let's take another vote."
Curiously enough Bently's argument seemed to have had a revolutionary effect, for the jury now stood ten to two for acquittal. He began to feel encouraged. ”

“ It is obvious that any juryman who allows his mind to be influenced by the mere fact that one of the witnesses for the defense is a pretty woman—even if she recalls to him his wife or sweet-heart—is a poor weakling, a silly ass. ”

“ I'd be violating my oath if I voted for acquittal after that testimony. I ain't going to commit perjury for nobody! I'd like to oblige you gentlemen, too, and vote your way, but I just can't with that evidence stickin' in my crop. If it wasn't for that—"
"He could 'a' treated the horse without doing it as a veterinary, just as Mr. Tutt said!" interjected the tall man.
"Good for you!" said the salesman, fully restored to equanimity. "You're gettin' intelligent. Serve on a few more juries—"
"But he said he was a veterinary," insisted Brown's friend. ”

“ They should consider the business card which the defendant had given to the complaining witness and in which he held himself out as a veterinary. The testimony of the complainant stood uncontradicted. The complainant was not an accomplice and his testimony did not have to be corroborated. A decoy wasn't an accomplice. That was the law. Neither was what had passed between the complainant and defendant privileged as a confidential communication, because the complainant was not a physician. ”

“ Some day a story must be written called The Hitching Post, about those thousands of little cast-iron negro boys who stand so patiently on the green grass strips along village streets waiting to hold long-forgotten bridle reins. ”

“ Do two and two make four in human polity as in mathematics? Sometimes it would not seem so.
Certainly you would have picked Mr. Bently Gibson, of The Gibson Woolen Mills, as a model juror. One look at him as a prospective talesman in a murder case and you would have unhesitatingly murmured, "The defense challenges peremptorily!" ”

“ None of them apparently ever had, so the stout brother told all about how—ha, ha!—the mule coughed first.
"I remember that story now," remarked one of the jury reminiscently while the fat man glared at him. "If I had my way all these veterinaries would be in jail! They're a dangerous lot. I had a second cousin once who'd paid a hundred dollars—a hundred dollars!—for a horse and it got the colic. So he called in a veterinary and it died." ”

“ Well, if you're a veterinary I leave him in your care. My name's Simon—Dr. Joseph R. Simon, of Hempstead, Long Island."
Danny worked all the morning over the horse, doing his best to make it comfortable. Indeed, before he had concluded his treatment the animal was probably more comfortable than he, for the night in the cold stall had given him a chill and when he left the stable to go home for lunch he was in a high fever. Doctor Simon was outside on the sidewalk talking to Mulqueen. ”

“ Even the actors were familiar friends—the pink-faced judge with his snow-white whiskers, who at times suggested to Bently an octogenarian angel, and, at others, a certain ancient baboon once observed in the Primates cage at the Bronz Zoo; the harried, anxious little clerk with his paradoxically grandiloquent intonation; the comedy assistant district attorney with his wheezy voice emanating from a Falstaffian body, who suffered from a soporific malady and was accustomed to open a case and then let it take care of itself while he slumbered audibly beneath the dais ”

“ Brown at all. He is doubtless a very honest and efficient officer. But surely the good character of this defendant may well create a reasonable doubt—and the rest of us feel that it does."
"Sure! 'Course it does!" came from all sides. Mr. Brown's red-faced friend having escaped the salesman's wrath began to show somewhat less aggressiveness.
"I don't care a damn about Brown!" he assured them. "He can go to hell for all of me! But I don't see how you can acquit this feller when the evidence is uncontradicted that he told Brown he was a veterinary and treated his horse. ”

“ It is not a very serious offense, and you and I have no great interest in the case, but of course the public has got to be protected from charlatans, and the only way to do it is to brand as guilty those who pretend they are duly licensed to practise medicine when they are not. ”

“ Of those brought to the bar for trial few escape; for modern talesmen, being hard-headed men, regard the whole thing as a matter of business and try to get through with it as quickly and as efficiently as possible. ”

“ Tutt returned home that evening after attending one of the weekly sessions at the Colophon Club, where he had reluctantly contributed the sum of fifty-seven dollars to relieve the immediate needs of certain impecunious persons gathered there about a green-baize-covered table in a remote corner of the card room, he perceived by the light of an adjacent street lamp that someone was sitting upon the top of the steps leading to his front door.
"Are you Mr. Tutt?" inquired Katie Lowry, getting up and making a timid curtsy. "The great lawyer?" ”

“ Look here, Tutt, of course I hope you get your man off and all that, but if I personally threw the case out I'd have all the vets in the city on my neck. You see the motors have pretty nearly put 'em all out of business. There aren't enough sick horses to go round, so they've been conducting a sort of crusade. ”