by Clark Howard
“These people, this kind of person, can to a degree be forgiven their wrongdoing—at least from the medical viewpoint, from the psychological viewpoint—because when examined under the principles of stresses and pressures and irresistible urges and so on that those in my profession must apply, we quickly realize that in the vast majority of cases the wrongdoing, whatever it was, was not responsibly perpetrated.
“In the case of Mr. Keyes, however, I feel that we have an entirely different set of circumstances. We have a situation wherein there is no hostility, no urge to retaliate—for the simple reason that there is no reason for either. Life has been good to J. Walter Keyes; it has given him wealth, prestige, position—all of the things most people strive for but so few attain.
“Instead of being grateful for these gifts, however, Mr. Keyes has seen fit to use his advantages—as we have seen—to the detriment, the great detriment, of others less fortunate than himself. He has devoted himself to, and guided himself along, a course of existence plotted solely in his own base instincts of lust and greed. For this, Mr. Examiner, have I condemned him.”
“Thank you, Mr. Psychologist,” the Examiner said as Dr. Price resumed his seat. He switched his eyes to another panel member. “Mr. Psychiatrist?”
Dr. Damon Fox rose. Small, slight of build, almost aloof in bearing, he stood as if on trial himself: stiffly erect, precise, proper. His voice, when he began speaking, matched his appearance exactly.
“My reasons for condemning this person,” he said, avoiding the mention of Keyes’ name, “are very simple, very basic. I am a psychiatrist; I deal in the health and well-being of human minds. It is my personal belief that the human mind is the single greatest and most valuable attribute of mortal man—and I say this, “he added with a wry smile, “with all due apologies to our esteemed Theologian, whom I am certain would argue that the soul, not the mind, is greatest. However, heathen that I am, I do firmly believe that no other possession of a human being can equal the vast, intricate, powerful organ that is our brain, our mind. I might even go one step farther and say that I have such a deep and reverent feeling toward the mind of man that I consider it almost a holy thing; a facet of mankind that deserves the respect and adulation of any god we humans worship.
“This person,” he said, pointing a stiff, precise finger at the prisoner, “has seen fit to regard the human minds of others as so much pulpy mass within their heads. He has seen fit to treat the minds of others as some unfeeling, unthinking, unsensitive things to be twisted to suit his own ulterior purposes. This attitude, this barbaric attitude, has led him to the wanton, reckless destruction of the mental well-being of other human beings—not the least of which, I’m sure, was Abigail Daniels.
“It is for this, Mr. Examiner,” he said, borrowing the Psychologist’s words, “that I have condemned him.”
Dr. Fox sat down again, as stiffly erect as he had stood, and folded his hands precisely in front of him on the table.
The Examiner nodded and turned to Reverend Abraham O’Hara.
“Mr. Theologian?”
“Yes, thank you.” He stood, a tall, massive man, everything about him forceful, his bearing commanding an attention second only to that of the Examiner.
“I will not,” he began, “go too deeply into the moral aspects of Mr. Keyes’ crimes—and there are many such aspects, I can assure you: his conduct ranks as one of the most totally godless breaches of religious morals that it has ever been my misfortune to encounter. However, I do not believe it to be my purpose on this panel to judge him strictly by religious principles; there are, I realize, a vast multitude of people in the world today, both good and bad, who have no religious principles or beliefs, and therefore cannot fairly be judged by such.
“I think, rather, it is for me to judge him on humane principles; principles which I feel should apply to all men, good or bad, religious or not. I have tried to apply these principles to Mr. Keyes’ instigation of the destruction of the one unborn child about whom we heard evidence during this trial, and to the wholly different but equally terrible destruction of the young woman Abigail Daniels. I believe I have succeeded in doing so in both cases.
“Like our esteemed Psychiatrist—with whom I intend to discuss the mind versus the soul at a later time—but like him, I too place a great value on humanity; and not merely on one facet of it, as he does, but on the whole of it: on life itself. I believe that life—existence—is our most precious earthly gift, because it is existence in this world that gives us the opportunity to prepare for the next. It is existence in this world that allows us to show our God, whomever He may be, whichever form He may have in our eyes, that we are worthy of entering His world, His kingdom. So in that respect, my friends, if for no other, our human lives, life in this temporary world of ours, is precious.
“Mr. Keyes, I suppose, feels about the value of life the same way I do—but with two great differences: he values only his own life, and he arrives at that value not by what he can earn in the next world but what he can gain for himself in this one.”
The Reverend paused and stared down at the table for a brief, silent moment. He was, although no one but himself and his God knew it, thinking a quick prayer both for what he was about to do and for the man against whom he was doing it.
“I condemn this man,” he concluded, “because I must; and I do it because he has committed what to me is the greatest crime of all: he has tampered with and detrimentally altered the course of human lives—both born and unborn.”
Another moment of silence, and then the Examiner’s clear, quiet voice was directed toward the panel’s youngest member.
“Mr. Investigator?”
At the end of the panel table, Todd Holt stood. His young face, which had at times during the hearing shown an almost abject strain, as well as the deep, brooding tension that often marked his personality, now seemed again to be calm and, if not emotionless, at least composed.
“Gentlemen,” he said in an even, clear voice, “all of you, I believe, are familiar with my personal background. It is nothing to boast about, to say the least. I came from undesirable parents; I knew nothing of the love and closeness of a stable home; I grew up on the streets, in the slums. It has only been through the help of others, people who were generous and kind—people very much like yourselves, as a matter of fact—that I have been able to make a constructive life for myself. For this I am deeply grateful, for although no one can say for certain what course my life would have taken without that help, I cannot but believe that it would not have been a life as good as I now have.
“But despite the years that have gone by since my childhood, and all that has passed with those years, my memories of growing up are vivid. Slums, gentlemen, and life in a slum environment, comprise a tragedy within a tragedy. The world as I see it today—the world, mind you, not the people in it—is a great and magnificent place, full of wonders and delights; but it is only by pure chance that I am in a position to even realize that. Had I remained in the slums, under the black cloud of poverty and misery that prevails there, I am certain that this world today would be viewed by me as a virtual cesspool of existence. For this is the only view that is allowed to the majority of slum-bred people.
“For a boy growing up in the wretched, spirit-breaking surroundings of our slums—each day is a challenge; and not a fresh challenge either, not the challenge of purpose and accomplishment; but rather a repetitious challenge, a repeat of the one that he faced the previous day and the day before that—the same old challenge he must face every day of his life that is spent there: the challenge of survival.
“Such a daily challenge of survival would be difficult enough merely standing alone; but when it is compounded by daily doses of fear, feelings of inferiority, maltreatment, hunger, and all the other brutal elements that attack jointly and individually the victims it finds there, then the challenge becomes all but impossible. The growing boy subjected to such an existence learns early the weapons at his disposa
l for combating his enemy: he learns to run, to lie, to cheat, to steal; he learns that other humans fall into only two categories: those who are his friends and are cast from the same anti-social mold as he; and those who are his prey, open targets for any wrong he is able to perpetrate against them.
“If J. Walter Keyes,” he emphasized his words by fixing the prisoner in an unmoving gaze, “had been reared in an environment such as this, and learned from early youth that all not of his own breeding were his enemies and his prey, then I could not find it in my heart to condemn him for any of the black deeds he has committed—because I would know, just as surely as I know my own past, that it was us, our society and our civilization, that led him to those deeds.
“But,” he moved his eyes back to the panel, “such is not the case. He is not one of the slum breed; rather, he is truly one of their enemies. And, even more distressing, he is a contributor to their ranks. He has banished to the slums a young woman—weak, pitiful, disturbed—and her infant son; one the hollow shell of a wealthy actor’s momentary lust, the other a result of that lust. The future awaiting both of them is as sickening to me as the damage done to Abigail Daniels’ mind is to our Psychiatrist. I am repulsed by both deeds, as any decent man should be; but the one, because of my own past, is far more personal to me than the other.
“J. Walter Keyes has terribly tainted the future existence of an innocent child. For this, gentlemen, I cannot forgive him—and for this I now condemn him.”
So, thought the Examiner as he watched Todd Holt sit down, with those words our young friend has become, finally and irrevocably, a man. He nodded briefly to the Investigator, a nod that conveyed both his satisfaction and his pleasure. Then he turned his gaze to the handsome, dark-skinned man next to Todd.
“Mr. Statistician?”
“Thank you, Mr. Examiner,” Barry Chace said formally. He rose and carefully buttoned his elegant blue coat over a perfectly coordinated blue necktie and blue-and-white pinstriped shirt. He stood poised and confident, one hand casually in his pocket, the other relaxed and natural at his side.
“I deal, as you gentlemen know, in figures, numbers. I am, I suppose, something of an accountant, except that my balance sheet is concerned not with cash and other assets but rather with the vital statistics of our modern world. In our ledgers we concentrate not on profit and loss but on life and death—and everything in between.
“Our figures begin with the basics of humanity’s existence: the number of people born in a given period as opposed to the number of people who expired. We group and classify the expired first, then regroup and reclassify them, over and over again, until we can tell the rest of the world, if it troubles to ask, just how old they were, when they died, what color they were, which sex, the color of their eyes and hair, how they died and where, and a host of other informative facts including, if an autopsy was performed, even the size and weight of their internal organs.
“When this is done, we turn to the replacements, the newly born, and we begin grouping and classifying them. We approach this phase of our work always with great hopes and high enthusiasm, with an almost greedy longing for our statistics to show us that humanity is improving instead of deteriorating, moving forward to some shining greatness rather than to its own destruction. To the salvation of the future, we look hopefully to the young.
“As these young grow, however, and we dissect them into more and more categories and classifications, we begin to realize that our hopes are in vain. The great electronic brains that we have developed continue to calculate only deficit figures and bleak forecasts. We check these figures, of course, hoping against hope that they are incorrect; but in the end we find, as always, that our machines are right: the future continues to look worse than the present and the past.
“Day by day we calculate and recalculate, watching with heavy hearts as we see the world—our world, our humanity—continue to progress at an unaltering pace toward its own doom. Day by day we see totals rise that by now mankind should have been able to constantly reduce; and we see totals decline that by now mankind should proudly have found a way to perpetually increase. We see this balance sheet of humanity rapidly going into the red, toward the bankruptcy of mankind.
“What has this to do with J. Walter Keyes?” he asked reflectively. “How is he, a single, lone statistic—so small that he cannot even be seen on the microscopic memory dot of an electronic tape—in any way connected with this path of self-execution that the world is following? The answer to that is quite simple, gentlemen. He is one of those many whose conduct of life is responsible more and more each day for the continued increase in the adverse categories that are strangling civilization: the categories of illegitimate birth, irresponsible parentage, illicit sex, criminal abortions, psychological barriers, mental degeneration, and many, many others. He is one of the many who by choosing to live his life in an uncivilized fashion is, day by day, upsetting the balance of civilization’s vital statistics.
“Do I condemn him for this? Yes, I do. He is helping tilt the most crucial balance of mankind’s existence from the side of humanity to the side of barbarism. Yes, I condemn him; I condemn him heartily.”
The polished, elegantly attired Negro sat down. The Examiner turned to the elderly man occupying the head chair at the panel table.
“Mr. Moderator, sir—”
Frail and slightly stooped, Judge Harold Wilke stood next to his chair, resting one hand on its high back for support. With his other hand he gently held one lapel of his coat, his fingers curling around the material just inches below the buttonhole which held a very wilted carnation. His eyes, narrowed somewhat, appeared just the slightest bit watery but were obviously alert.
“I am a judge,” he said in his aging voice, “and as such I have little time for lengthy commentary filled with flowery phrases. I deal in justice, swiftly and equitably.” He paused and with a gnarled index finger rubbed the side of his slightly oversized nose. “The defendant here,” he summarily jabbed the same finger at Keyes, “has been acussed by this panel of certain crimes, some of which could not be proved against him under our present system of justice, and others of which, namely his planned seduction and subsequent treatment of Abigail Daniels, he could not even be brought to trial for. These are crimes nevertheless and, even though unclassifiable under modern penal codes, should be punishable.
“The evidence in the case has been quite convincing. The testimony of Miss Daniels, heard on the tape machine, was particularly moving. Although I do not fully agree with our eminent Psychiatrist that the girl herself is completely blameless in what happened, this in no way detracts from the gravity of the end result of Mr. Keyes’ conduct. And, of course, the other charges against him, those involving the O’Brien child and his mother, and the affair of the abortion and its consequences, all carry their own weight of seriousness.
“I feel that the evidence presented has been adequate. I feel, as a result of hearing that evidence, that Mr. Keyes is guilty of the crime of Inhumanity, and I therefore condemn him for that crime.”
The aging jurist resumed his seat behind the panel table, sitting back and folding his hands judicially across his stomach.
“Thank you, Mr. Moderator,” the Examiner said. He turned to Keyes. “You have heard the individual verdicts from the panel, Mr. Keyes. Do you have any comment to make at this time?”
Keyes, his weak lips curled in contempt under the thin mustache, glared at the Examiner but said nothing.
“Very well,” the Examiner said after a moment. He directed his attention to the panel again. “It remains then for me to devise a suitable punishment for Mr. Keyes and to present that punishment to you gentlemen for approval. I have already given great thought to the matter and have now only to put it into proper perspective with the purpose and intent of our movement before submitting it to your individual and collective judgments. I shall be prepared to do so at our next meeting.” He pushed his chair back and stood up. “We are adjourned for
the present, gentlemen. Thank you.”
The Examiner left the room, followed quickly by the six panel members. Keyes remained where he was, strapped into his portable chair, waiting for the Oriental to come for him.
Nineteen
Devlin was hunched over the marble table in his living room, sorting notes and drinking coffee, when the bedroom door opened and Jennifer emerged in her slip.
“Hi,” she said sleepily, brushing strands of tousled blood red hair from her face.”
“Hello, sleepyhead.” Devlin looked over at her, his face relaxing at the sight of her completely uninhibited appearance.
“I feel like I’ve been asleep forever. What time is it?”
Devlin glanced at his watch. “A little after six.”
“In the morning?”
“No. Evening.”
“My god! You mean I’ve only been asleep three hours?” she asked incredulously.
“Three plus twenty-four,” he answered, smiling. “You must have been exhausted; you slept around the clock.”
“Brother!” she moaned. “No wonder my stomach feels like an empty house. Do you have any milk?”
“In the refrigerator,” he nodded, “in there.”
He resumed sorting his notes and finished his cup of coffee while she was rummaging around the tiny kitchen. Presently she returned, nibbling on a folded slice of cold cheese. She walked up behind the couch and bent over, slipping her arms around his neck.
“I like your bed,” she purred. “It smells like you.”
Devlin put down his notes and rested his head back against her heavy, nylon covered breasts.
“Did you sleep with me?” she wanted to know.
“I slept on the couch,” he told her. “I didn’t want to disturb you.”
She bent forward and brushed her lips along the scar next to his eye.
“Did it hurt terribly when that door hit your face?” she asked.
“Not really. I fainted almost immediately.”