Ethics -- Fiction; Religion and sociology -- Fiction; Upper class families -- Fiction
"If I can do anything for you, let me know," I told him. He said nothing,
he did not even smile. At this moment he was opportunely joined by a man
who had the appearance of a labour leader, and I walked away. I was
resentful; my mood, in brief, was that of a man who has done something
foolish and is inclined to talk to himself aloud: but the mood was
complicated, made the more irritating by the paradoxical fact that that
last look he had given me seemed to have borne the traces of
affection....
It is perhaps needless to add that the court reversed its former
decision.
XVI.
The Pilot published a series of sensational articles and editorials about
the Galligan matter, a picture of Galligan, an account of the destitute
state of his wife and family. The time had not yet arrived when such
newspapers dared to attack the probity of our courts, but a system of law
that permitted such palpable injustice because of technicalities was
bitterly denounced. What chance had a poor man against such a moloch as
the railroad, even with a lawyer of such ability as had been exhibited by
Hermann Krebs? Krebs was praised, and the attention of Mr. Lawler's
readers was called to the fact that Krebs was the man who, some years
before, had opposed single-handed in the legislature the notorious Bill
No. 709. It was well known in certain circles--the editorial went on to
say--that this legislation had been drawn by Theodore Watling in the
interests of the Boyne Iron Works, etc., etc. Hugh Paret had learned at
the feet of an able master. This first sight of my name thus
opprobriously flung to the multitude gave me an unpleasant shock. I had
seen Mr. Scherer attacked, Mr. Gorse attacked, and Mr. Watling: I had all
along realized, vaguely, that my turn would come, and I thought myself to
have acquired a compensating philosophy. I threw the sheet into the waste
basket, presently picked it out again and reread the sentence containing
my name. Well, there were certain penalties that every career must pay. I
had become, at last, a marked man, and I recognized the fact that this
assault would be the forerunner of many.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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