High upon that uttermost pinnacle there brooded a ghostly figure. It was the enormous statue of William Penn, set there to bless the children of his city, with outstretched, benevolent hand.
"Are you taking us to City Hall?" queried Drayton, turning to the officer on his left.
The man nodded. "Your offense is too serious, of course, for a branch temple."
"A-what?"
"A branch," said the man impatiently. "Headquarters will want to handle this; eh, sergeant?"
"They will, but no more conversation, please. Everything you say, my man, will be used against you."
"One would think we were murderers," reflected Drayton bitterly. Of what real offense could they have been guilty? Beneath surface absurdity he had begun to sense something secret and dangerous; something upon which his mind could as yet lay no hold, but which might be revealed to them at City Hall.
The night was fine; the hour eight-thirty by the clock in City Hall tower; the streets well filled. Most of the stores seemed to be open, and innumerable "movie" theaters, saloons and shooting galleries each drew in and expelled its quota of people, like so many lungs breathing prosperity for the owners.
There was a New York Bowery touch to the amusements and the crowds which Drayton did not remember as characteristic of Market Street. The thought, however, was passing and only half-formed.
The patrol clanged its way over the smooth pavement, attracting the usual number of stares and fortunately unheard comments, and presently swung off Market Street into Juniper. They had approached City Hall from the east. Since the patrol entrance was on the western side, it was necessary for them to pass half around the great building to reach it.
As they passed the Broad Street entrance, Drayton chanced to glance upward. Above the arch hung an emblem done in colored lights. It seemed to be a sword crossing a bell. Above the emblem itself glowed a number, consisting of four figures done in glowing red, white and blue-2118.
The bell, thought Drayton, might represent the old Liberty Bell, Philadelphia's most cherished possession; the numerals, however, conveyed to him no more significance than had those on the yellow buttons about which these police were so concerned.
Again turning, the patrol reached Market Street on the western side. Shortly afterward it rolled beneath the portico of City Hall.
The Public Buildings, to use the more ancient name for Philadelphia's proud edifice of administration and justice, are built in the form of an irregular hollow square. The larger inner court may be entered by means of any one of four short tunnels, placed at the four cardinal points of the compass, and passing beneath the walls of the building proper.
As the three prisoners recalled it, that inner court was squarish in shape, paved with gray concrete, and of no very beautiful or imposing appearance. Several old cannon, relics of past wars, adorned the corners and stood at either side of the northward entrance. In the northeast corner there was a sort of pavilion, where various free civic exhibits were perennially on view.
As the center of the place was actually the intersection of those two main arteries of the city, Broad Street and Market, two continuous streams of pedestrians passed through there all day long.
Such was the interior of City Hall as the three prisoners remembered it and into which they now expected to be carried.
While yet in the short, dark entrance tunnel, however, the patrol halted. Rising from their seats, the officers hustled their prisoners from the wagon. A moment later and they all stood together, halted just within the rim of the inner arch.
And there the three received another of those wildly disturbing shocks, of which they had suffered so many in the past few hours.
Instead of a bare gray courtyard, open to the sky, there stood revealed an interior which might have been lifted bodily from an Arabian Nights entertainment.
Above, rounding to a level with the top of the fourth story, curved the golden hollow of a shallow but glorious dome. It seemed to have been carved from the yellow metal itself. The entire under surface was without a seam or trace of ornament, and was polished to almost blinding brilliance.
Striking upward upon it from invisible sources at the sides, light was reflected downward in a diffused glow, yellow as sunshine and giving a curious, almost shadowless appearance to the great chamber below. From the center of the dome, swung at the end of a twenty-foot chain, depended a huge bell. This bell had either been enameled smoothly, or was cast of some strange metal.
The color of it was a brilliant scarlet, so that it hung like an enormous exotic blossom. Some change or repairs to the thing seemed to be in progress for out to it from the southern wall extended narrow suspension bridge of rough planking, that terminated in a partial scaffolding about one side of the bell. No tongue or clapper was within the bell, nor was there any visible means of ringing it.
As for the floor beneath, it was of common gray concrete no longer. An exquisite pavement gleamed there, made of white porcelain or some similar substance, seamless and polished. In it the blood-red bell and certain colored panels of the golden walls were reflected as in a pool of milk. Near the northern wall a design appeared in this floor, set in as a mosaic of varicolored marbles.
Where had been the southern and eastern entrances, short flights of green marble stairs led up to carved golden doors, Gothic in style and all closed. The windowless walls, also of gold, were carved in heavy bas-relief. At regular intervals appeared panels, done in bright enamels, representing various weird figures resembling Chinese gods and heroes. The entire color scheme of red, gold, green and white had a peculiarly barbaric effect, itself entirely out of keeping with the formerly staid and dignified old Public Buildings.
Trenmore, as he gazed, forgot even his anger, and stared open-mouthed. They all had time to stare, for the sergeant, having pressed an electric buzzer near the door, stood at ease, obviously waiting for something or some one to answer the summons.
"And is this the place they have for a courthouse?" Trenmore murmured. "I've seen the Taj Mahal, and I've seen the inside of Westminster Abbey and St. Pauls, but never, never-"
"I can't understand it!" broke in Drayton desperately. Amazement had given place to distress, as the enormity of the change came home to him. "Why, but this is incredible; it's preposterous! I-"
"Here, here!" broke in the sergeant's brusque voice. "None of that. What were you muttering there? Never mind. Be silent. Here comes a gentleman who will dispose of your case in quick order."
At the south, a golden door had opened and a man was seen descending the short flight of green marble steps before it. Even at a distance, he seemed an impressive figure. Over a largely checked vest he wore an exquisitely cut frock coat. His trousers were of a delicate pearl-gray hue, and a pair of white spats surmounted immaculate patent-leather pumps. On his head gleamed a shining silk hat.
Had the gentleman but carried a flag, or Roman candle, he might creditably have adorned a political parade. A large bouquet would have completed his costume for a Bowery wedding. Amid the barbaric splendor which actually surrounded him, he seemed out of place, but happily unconscious of that fact.
Slowly and with dignity he advanced, while in the gleaming porcelain beneath an inverted, silk-hatted replica of him followed every step. At last his majestic progress ceased. He had halted some six paces from the group of prisoners and policemen. Without speaking, he surveyed them with a slow, long, insolent gaze.
He was a small man, handsome in a weak, dissipated way; old with the age of self-indulgence rather than years. His greenish-hazel eyes were close-set and cunning. He possessed a little, pointed mustache, and, in the opinion of the prisoners, an unjustifiably impertinent manner.
Out of the corner of his eye Drayton saw that his Irish friend was bristling anew. Well, if the outbreak had to come, he wished it would burst now and annihilate this silk-hatted monstrosity. No man could eye Viola in just the manner of this stranger and deserve continued life!
The high-hatted
one deigned to speak.
"Well, Fifty-three," he drawled languidly, addressing the sergeant, "and why have you brought them here? The chief is in attendance on His Supremity, and there's no one else about who cares to be bothered. I myself came over to warn you that Penn Service is tired of having these trivial cases brought to the Temple. Lately you police chaps seem to consider the Temple a sort of petty court for pickpockets!"
Trenmore passed the sergeant in one stride.
"You miserable, insolent, little whippersnapper!" he thundered in a voice that was amazingly re-echoed from the golden dome above.
Instantly, as if sprung by a single trigger, the six policemen had hurled themselves upon him. High-hat skipped back nimbly out of the way. Drayton, seeing no alternative with honor, flung himself into the combat, and was promptly knocked out by the blow of a policeman's club.
CHAPTER 8: LEGAL PROCEDURE EXPEDITED
WHEN his senses returned, Drayton found himself sitting on the polished white floor, his back propped against a golden pillar. He became aware that his head ached horribly; that his wrists were handcuffed behind him; and that his tempestuous Irish ally was no better off than himself. Trenmore, in fact, lay stretched at full length close by. Tears streaming down her face, Viola was wiping ineffectively at his bloody countenance with her pathetic mite of a handkerchief.
Two of the six policemen stood looking on with no evident sympathy. The other four lay or sat about in attitudes of either profound repose or extreme discomfort. Though Terence Trenmore had gone down, he had taken his wounded with him.
"Get an ambulance, one of you chaps!" It was the voice of silk-hatted authority. "You think we want the Temple cluttered up like an accident ward? And bring those crazy prisoners of yours to the Court of Common Pleas. Mr. Virtue is there now, and one court will do as well as another for this sort. Look sharp, now!"
Saluting reverently, the two uninjured officers proceeded to execute high-hat's various behests as best they could. They were forced, however, to leave the wounded while they bore Trenmore across to the southern door. Viola started to follow, then looked back anxiously toward Drayton. High-hat, following her glance, beckoned imperatively.
With some difficulty, Drayton gained his feet and staggered toward the girl. He felt anything but fit, and he was keenly disappointed. All that shindy had been wasted! The insufferable one yet lived-had not even suffered the knocking off of his intolerable hat!
"Lean on me, Mr. Drayton," he heard Viola's voice, curiously far away and indistinct. The absurdity of such a request moved him to a wry smile; but he certainly did lean on some one, or he could never have crossed that heaving, rocking, slippery floor without falling a dozen times.
Presently blackness descended again, and he knew no more till the strong taste and odor of brandy half-strangled and thoroughly aroused him.
A policeman was holding a tumbler to Drayton's lips, and seemed bent on pouring the entire contents down his throat. Twisting his head away the prisoner sat up. The officer eyed him wonderingly, then drained the glass himself and set it down.
"Feel better?" he queried.
"A little," muttered Drayton. He was seated on a leather-covered couch in a small room, and his only companion was the policeman. "I suppose," he added disconsolately, "that Trenmore was badly hurt. Where are they now?"
The officer laughed. "If Trenmore is your big friend, he came around sooner than you did. Lord, I wish't we had that guy on the force! Can you walk yet?"
Drayton rose unsteadily. "I guess so. Have you put the others in cells?"
"Hardly!" The officers stared at him. "They don't keep a case like this waiting. Your friend won't go in no cell, nor you either. And as for the girl-" He broke off, with a shrug.
"And the girl?" Drayton repeated sharply.
"I dunno. Mr. Mercy was looking her over. I doubt he'll let that beauty go to the Pit. But come along, or we'll keep Mr. Virtue waiting."
"Mr. Virtue!" What a very odd name, thought Drayton, as he walked to the door, leaning heavily on his jailer. And Mr. Mercy, too. Had he fallen into a chapter of Pilgrim's Progress? Had the whole world gone mad while they wandered in Ulithia? And what of this amazing "Temple" that had usurped the interior of City Hall?
On the streets outside, everything had appeared normal-except for those infernal buttons. Surely this was Philadelphia that they had returned to. Who that had ever visited the city could doubt its identity? It was as distinctive as New York, though in a different way. And all the familiar details-the Market Street Ferry, the outer architecture of City Hall, Broad Street-oh, and above all that benevolent, unforgettable statue of William Penn-
The door opened upon a long, low-ceilinged, windowless room, illuminated by hidden lights behind the cornice. The ceiling was a delicate rose-pink, and, like the golden dome, shed its color downward upon a scene of Oriental splendor. Unlike the white-paved court, however, this chamber was far from bare.
The dark, polished floor was strewn with silken rugs of extravagant value and beauty. The many chairs and small tables scattered here and there were of ebony carved in the Chinese fashion, their cushions and covers of rose-pink velvet and silks gleaming richly against the dark austerity of black wood.
Here and there the prevailing rosy tinge was relieved by a touch of dull blue, or by a bit of carved yellow ivory. Several excellent paintings, uniformly framed in dull black, showed well against the unpatterned matte-gold of the walls.
Rather than a courtroom, indeed, this might have been the drawing-room of some wealthy woman with a penchant for the outre in decorative effects. At the chamber's upper end, however, was a sort of dais or platform. There, enthroned on a wonderfully carved ivory chair, a man was seated.
He wore a black gown and a huge white wig, like that of an English justice. He was hawk-nosed, fat-jowled, coarse-featured and repellant. If this was-and Drayton assumed it must be-Mr. Virtue, then his appearance singularly belied his name.
Before the dais were gathered a group consisting of Drayton's fellow-prisoners, a single policeman, and also the little man in the silk hat and frock coat. From above them, Mr. Virtue stared down with an insolent disdain beside which the high-hatted one's languid contempt seemed almost courtesy.
"Come!" whispered Drayton's guardian. "Walk up there and bow to his honor. They've begun the trial."
"The trial!" thought Drayton. There were present neither witnesses, jury nor counsel.
Having no alternative, however, he obeyed, ranging himself beside Viola and bowing as gracefully as his manacled condition would permit. As a lawyer, though disbarred, he still respected the forms of law, however strangely administered. His own demeanor should be beyond reproach.
Glancing at Trenmore, he saw that the Irishman had suffered no great damage in the recent unpleasantness, and also that he was eying the enthroned judge in anything but a penitent spirit.
As for Viola, she stood with hands folded, eyes meekly downcast, an ideal picture of maidenhood in distress. Drayton, however, caught a sidelong blue flash from beneath her long lashes which hinted that the Trenmores were yet one in spirit.
There was a further moment of awe-inspiring silence. Then the judge, or magistrate, or whatever he might be, cleared his throat portentously.
"Mr. Mercy," he said, "I believe there need be no delay here. From your account and that of Sergeant Fifty-three-by the way, where is Fifty-three?"
"In the hospital, your honor, having his wrist set."
"I see. He should have waited until conclusion of trial. His presence, however, is not essential. As I was saying, from his account and yours there can be no question of either verdict or sentence. In view of the prisoners' conduct within these sacred precincts, there will be no need to appoint counsel or investigate the case further.
"To conform, however, to the letter as well as spirit of the law, and in the interests of purely abstract justice, I now ask you, Mr. Mercy, as sole responsible witness of the worser outrage, if you can bring forw
ard any extenuating circumstances tending to mitigate their obvious culpability and modify the severity of their sentence?"
Drayton wondered if the policeman's billy had addled what sense Ulithia had left him. Had he really understood that speech? He seemed to catch a phrase here and there, stamped with the true legal verbosity. As a whole the speech was incomprehensible. And now Mr. Mercy was replying.
"Your Honor, in the case of the male prisoners, I know of no excuse. Not only have they appeared in public buttonless, but beneath the very Dome of Justice, with their eyes, so to speak, fixed on the scarlet Threat of Penn, they have assaulted and wounded the emissaries of sacred Penn Service. For the third criminal, however-for this mere girl-child-I do desire the mercy for which I am named! Separate her from her evil companions, and who knows? She may become as innocent in fact as in appearance?"
Mr. Mercy uttered this plea solemnly enough; but at the conclusion he deliberately and languidly winked at the judge, and smiled upon the girl prisoner in a way which made Drayton's blood surge to his wounded head.
Were these proceedings in any degree serious? Or was this all part of some elaborate and vicious joke? One hypothesis seemed as impossible as the other. Once more Drayton bowed.
"Your Honor," he said, "surely, even at this preliminary hearing you will permit us-"
But the judge interrupted him. "Preliminary hearing?" he repeated scornfully. "No man within the jurisdiction of Penn Service can be so ignorant of law as your words would indicate. Were there any shadow of doubts as to your guilt, we, in our perfect justice, might grant you a public trial. We might even permit you an appeal to Mr. Justice Supreme himself. But in so obvious and flagrant a case of law-breaking as yours, the Servants of Penn must decline to be further troubled!
"I now, therefore, condemn you, sir, and you, the big fellow there-my soul, Mercy, did you ever see such an enormous brute? I condemn you both to be immediately dropped into the Pit of the Past. And may Penn have mercy on your probably worthless souls!"
The Heads of Cerberus Page 7