There was a very positive disagreement concerning the meal they were
about to partake of. The foreman spoke of it as dinner and was
openly sneered at by eleven gentlemen who had never called it
anything but supper. The little clockmaker, having been overruled by
the judge, was in a nasty temper. He accused the foreman of being a
republican. He said no democrat ever called it dinner. It wasn't
democratic.
Upon their return to the jury room after a meal on which there was
complete agreement and which brought out considerable talk about the
penuriousness of the County of New York, they settled down to a
prolonged and profound discussion of their differences. It soon
developed that all but two of the jurors had been favorably inclined
toward the defendant up to the time the State introduced the
unexpected wives. They had regarded him as a poor unfortunate,
driven to crime by adversity, and after a fashion the victim of an
arrogant and soulless police system, aided and abetted by the
District Attorney's minions, a contemptible robber in the person of
a dealer in women's hats, and a bejeweled snob who insulted their
intelligence by trying to convince them that her confidence had been
misplaced. But the two wives settled it. Smilk was a rascal. He
ought to be hung.
"But," argued No. 9, "how the devil do we know that them women ARE
his wives. Their evidence ain't supported, is it?"
"Didn't they have certificates?" demanded another hotly.
"Sure. But that don't prove that he was the man, does it?"
"And didn't the prisoner jump up and yell: 'My God, it's all off!
You've got me cold! You've got me dead to rights,'" cried another.
"Oh, there's no use arguin' with you guys," roared No. 9,
disgustedly.
Later on they returned to the court room to have certain parts of
Mr. Yollop's testimony read to them. After this a ballot was taken,
and the only man for acquittal was the clock-maker. At twenty
minutes to eleven he succumbed, not to argument or persuasion or
reason but to a chill February draft that blew in through the open
window above his head. He couldn't get away from it. The others
wouldn't let him. They got him up in a corner and he couldn't break
through. He told them he was getting pneumonia, that the draft would
be the death of him, that he'd take back what he said about the
smoke almost suffocating him,--still they surrounded him, and argued
with him, and called him things he didn't feel physically able to
call them, and at last he voted guilty.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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