The well-dressed women she met seemed to her of small worth compared to her trade-mates. She was proud of her share in the wonderful heroism of the women who went hungry. The memory of her father was the most brilliant of her mental treasures. If she had been brought up by a more practical man, if her father had taught her to consider elegance, or social success, or wealth, or culture of more virtue than loving kindness – as most of us are taught – her verdict would, of course, have been less severe. But she could not feel that the Golden Rule was taken seriously by the Christian women uptown. She doubted if they loved their neighbors as themselves. Certainly their definition of the word did not reach downtown. The diamonds of their useless ornaments threw a cruel light on the misery of her people.
In forming this harsh estimate of the world of luxury she had Mabel beside her as a standard of comparison. Why were the other women different from Mabel? They were no more beautiful, no better educated, no more refined. But Mabel was the "real thing." Yetta was ashamed of her first envy and distrust. Day by day she saw more fully the broad scope of Mabel's activities – of which this vest-makers' strike was only one – and her admiring wonder grew. Mabel gave not only her time, but she was not afraid of what the girls called "dirty work"; she carried a banner in the street on the day of the parade, she did her turn at picketing, her share of addressing and sealing envelopes. And she carried very much more than her share of the heavier responsibilities. Yetta found it hard to understand how other women, who also knew the facts of misery, could act so differently. Yet, day after day she told them the facts, and they were content to give five or ten dollars. No. Yetta did not want to be a "lady."
Almost every day some of the pickets were arrested and sent to the workhouse. But others always volunteered to take their places. There is no surer lesson to be learned from history than that persecution is like oil to the flame of enthusiasm. Instead of breaking, as the bosses – with the fatuousness of Nero – had hoped, the picket became more intense and more effective. The bosses decided that "something decisive must be done." There were several conferences – very quiet and orderly they were – with the expert strike-breakers who had been loaned to them by the Employers' Association. A long statement was prepared, which informed the public that the vest manufacturers, feeling that they were not getting sufficient assistance from the city police, had employed a private detective agency to protect their property and the lives of their faithful employees from the outrages of the strikers. All the English papers published this statement without any inquiry as to whether life and property needed special protection. The more complaisant ones published the stories which the "press agent" of the association furnished on the "outrages." So the impression was spread abroad that the striking vest-makers were smoky-haired furies, who brawled in the streets and tore the clothes off respectable women.
But there was hardly any one who had ever been involved in a strike, employer or employed, hardly a cub-reporter in the city, who did not know what this announcement meant. The bosses had failed to break the strike by "legal" means. The "private detectives" had been called in to do it by intimidation and brutality. Girls began coming into the strike headquarters with bleeding faces, with black and blue bruises from kicks.
No justice of the Supreme Court has handed down a decision on the probability of the public peace being disturbed by the use of thugs, calling themselves "private detectives," in labor disputes.
Mabel, realizing Yetta's special usefulness as a speaker and money-raiser, tried to persuade her that this other work was more important than picketing.
"No," Yetta said. "If I didn't spend the morning with the girls, I would not have anything to say at night."
Mabel did not urge her further; she no longer called her la petite when she spoke of her to Eleanor. Every one who came in contact with her during these weeks knew that she was growing very rapidly into womanhood.
Yetta expected to get arrested. Why should she not? In a way she had started all the trouble. Why should the other girls be knocked about by the ruffian private detectives and she escape? Day after day she took her post before one or another of the vest shops and did her duty as she saw it, as the other women were doing it. There were always two pickets at each post, and it was in these morning watches that Yetta got her deepest insight into the lives of her comrades.
She was having a very easy time of it. She had a pleasant place to sleep. She had her one sure meal a day. There were no children crying to her for food. The other women were faring worse than she. Some were sick, almost all were hungry and insufficiently clad. And while Yetta was often called away to the less fatiguing work of the office, or to some uptown tea, these women, used to sitting all day before a machine, were standing hour after hour before their posts. But it was not the sight of them, pitiful spectacles as many of them were, which hurt Yetta most. It was their stories – unintentionally told for the most part. The words dropped by chance, which called up visions of sick husbands and the hungry babies. Some of the pickets were gray-haired and bent, some were younger than Yetta, and they all seemed to be suffering more for the strike than she. And the hungry babies! Her sleep was troubled at night by dreams of their cries.
That she had been spared by the police and thugs seemed to Yetta the most unjust thing of all the injustice she saw about her. A week on "the Island" would mean little to her; she had no one dependent on her. But always they picked some widow, who had no one to care for her children while she was in prison. Yetta felt herself strong and healthy. Why did the thugs always beat up some old woman or some frail consumptive girl? Although she had escaped trouble so long, she quietly and without excitement expected it. Whenever she met any of the girls who had been in the workhouse, she asked about it – in the same way that we, if we were expecting to winter in Paris, would inquire from friends who had been there about the rents and shops and so forth.
But when at last her turn came, it happened in a manner utterly unexpected.
CHAPTER XIV
ARREST
At headquarters on May Day morning Yetta was detailed to the Crown Vest Company. As she was starting out, she met Mabel, whose mackintosh was glistening with rain.
"Oh, Yetta," she said, "don't go out to-day. The weather's so bad, and if you catch cold you can't speak."
But Yetta only smiled. It seemed to Mabel that she had never looked so beautiful before. Her face had begun to hollow a little from the strain, her olive skin was a shade paler, her eyes seemed to have grown bigger. And her shoulders, which had begun to stoop in the sweat-shop, had straightened up with the month on her feet and the new pride of combat. She was wearing the same skirt and waist she had worn to the dance, for she was to speak uptown that afternoon, and she had a warm shawl over her head and shoulders. The soles of her shoes were worn through, but Mabel could not see that.
"I've only got a few hours of it," she said. "There's that Advisory Council again this afternoon."
And she went out into the rain. The Crown Vest Company was on East Fourth Street, just off Washington Square. As Yetta turned the corner from Broadway she was nearly blown off her feet. All the winds of heaven – the biting, penetrating winds of a late spring storm – were caught in Washington Square as in a funnel, and escaped through the narrow cañon of East Fourth Street. Although Yetta was late, she was surprised to find no other picket before the Crown Vest Company. They were always assigned in couples. Her surprise turned to distress when she recognized the "private detective" in the doorway. His real name nobody knew. He called himself Brennan, but the girls called him "Pick-Axe." He was the one they dreaded more than any other. He thought himself a wit. It was his custom to tilt a chair against the wall by the doorway and, lighting his pipe, amuse himself by trying to make the girls blush. There was no limit to the brutality or nastiness of his tongue.
"Come in out of the rain, Dearie," he said when he saw Yetta. "There's room for two on this chair."
She tried not to hear him and began a sentry-like tread back and forth before the door. At least she was glad it was raining. Sometimes in good weather a crowd of depraved loungers would gather to listen to Pick-Axe's wit.
"It's too bad to have to work on a day like this, Little One," he called as she passed again. "Let's go over to the saloon and have a drink. There are nice warm rooms upstairs."
Yetta felt she would not shiver so hard if it were not for his cold, stinging voice. She decided it would be cowardly to let him drive her out of earshot. That would please him too much. She wondered why the other picket was not there.
"You needn't be so proud" – when she was again opposite him. "The first girl this morning tried to be proud. But she got over it. What's the use? Better come and have a drink, same as she did."
Yetta knew it was a lie. And yet – good God, it was cold! She had had her fill of eggs and hot coffee that morning. She wouldn't be hungry till noon, and she was so near home, she could get a good lunch. Some of the girls were always hungry. Few of them had warm clothes for such weather. How could they stand it? She wished she had asked the name of the other girl detailed to the Crown.
"I felt right sorry for her," Pick-Axe went on. "Gawd! she was hungry. You ought to have seen her eat. Pretty little girl, too. Now she's having a good sleep."
Of course it was a lie. But Yetta felt herself getting colder and colder. Pick-Axe got up and came towards her. She tried not to notice him, but she wanted very much to run.
"Come on," he said. "What's the use of being a fool? Nobody's outdoors. They ain't no scabs coming to-day. Let's go over to the saloon and make friends."
Yetta having reached the end of her beat turned mechanically and started back towards where he stood.
"That's a sensible girl," he said.
But she walked on past him as if he were a lamppost.
"Well," he snarled, "I guess I'll have to go over and wake up your friend. It'll take you about half an hour to wish you'd come instead…"
There is no need of printing all that he said.
He walked across the street. Yetta could not help turning her head to watch him as he entered the swinging door. He caught her glance and waved his hand. Her fright disappeared in anger. Of course she did not believe that he had persuaded one of her union girls to go into the saloon with him. But it was even viler to pretend that he had. Some one ought to kill the brute.
Just then Yetta saw one of the strikers – little Mrs. Muscovitz – hurrying up the street. Yetta rushed to meet her.
"Were you detailed here?" she asked eagerly.
Mrs. Muscovitz was coughing and could only nod her head affirmatively. Yetta wanted to shout with joy. So Pick-Axe's story was after all a lie.
"I'm sorry I'm late," little Mrs. Muscovitz said hoarsely, for she was "bad with bronchitis," "but I got a little money this morning and I had to buy some things for the baby."
One glance told Yetta where the money had come from – Mrs. Muscovitz had pawned her shawl. More than once they had picketed together, and Yetta knew the little woman's story. Three years before she had married a young sign painter. Before the honeymoon was over he had begun to cough. He died before the baby was born. And when Mrs. Muscovitz had been able to get about again, all the furniture of their little home had gone for doctor's bills. Her engagement and wedding rings had brought her enough to establish herself in a garret. She took the baby to a day nursery and went to work. Now, she was coughing. It hurts to cough when one also has the bronchitis. Having no shawl, her thin waist was soaked and plastered to her skin. Yetta could see the muscles of her back work convulsively whenever she coughed.
"Look y'ere, Mrs. Muscovitz," she said authoritatively. "You go home. You ain't got no business out on a day like this. You'll catch your death. There ain't nothing doing to-day. I can hold it down alone."
"It's all right for you to talk, Yetta," Mrs. Muscovitz replied. "You can make speeches and you can work in the office and do lots of things for the Union. There ain't nothing I can do but picket. I couldn't pay rent without the 'strike benefits.' I've got to do something."
Pick-Axe came out of the saloon and seeing them together, knowing that it was less sport trying to torment two women than one, pulled his chair well inside of the doorway and cursed the vile weather.
"I tell you what you can do," Yetta went on arguing with Mrs. Muscovitz. "It'll do more good than standing here. You go over to headquarters and make some coffee. You tell Miss Train I said it was so cold she must send coffee out to the girls. You can borrow some pails and cups and Mrs. Weinstein's boy'll carry it round. Hot coffee'll do the girls good, and it'll make the cops sore to see us getting it. Making coffee'll do more good than standing here. Nobody's out; I can hold down this job all right."
"I hate to leave you alone with that snake."
"Oh," Yetta laughed, more light-heartedly than she felt. "Words don't break no bones. You run along."
While Mrs. Muscovitz was hesitating, she caught sight of a scab. "Look," she whispered. A big-boned young woman of about twenty, poorly clad and apparently much frightened, was standing on the opposite curbstone. She looked up at the sign in the window of the Crown Vest Company advertising the need of workers. And she looked down at the two women before the door. After a few indecisive minutes she started across the street.
"You run along to headquarters and get that coffee started," Yetta said. "I'll talk to her."
"No," said Mrs. Muscovitz. "Let me do it. And then I'll go. I want to do something."
She started towards the woman. Pick-Axe, bundled up in his overcoat, back in the entryway, did not see the scab approaching. She had probably read in the papers lying stories of how the strike breakers were being attacked. She was very much afraid, and when she saw Mrs. Muscovitz coming towards her, she screamed. Pick-Axe, not having seen what was happening, – if one wishes to find excuses for him, – may have really believed that the little Mrs. Muscovitz had assaulted the husky young scab. At the sound of the scream he jumped out of his chair and rushed at Mrs. Muscovitz. She, thinking that he was going to strike her, held out her hand to guard her face. Pick-Axe grabbed it, and with a vicious wrench, twisted her down on her knees.
"You slut! You – ! You – !" he bellowed and swung his heavy-soled boot into her ribs.
Yetta – to use a phrase of melodrama – "saw red." Something happened in her brain. Her rather Platonic conviction of a few minutes before that somebody ought to kill the brute, was changed into a passionate, throbbing desire to do it herself.
Just as his foot found its goal in Mrs. Muscovitz' side, Pick-Axe felt the sudden impact of Yetta's whole weight. It was more of a spring than a rush. As far as she had any idea, she wanted to choke him. The sudden jolt bowled him over – he was standing on one foot – and as he fell his head came down on the stone paving with a sickening thud. If it had not been for his heavy cap, the blow might have cracked his skull. As it was it stunned him. His face turned very white. The scab ran up the street too frightened to look back.
"I hope he's dead," Yetta said with tight-clenched fists.
But Mrs. Muscovitz felt his heart and shook her head.
"Sure?" Yetta asked.
"Yes. His heart's beating. Feel it yourself."
"I wouldn't touch the snake with my foot," Yetta said; "come on."
"Nobody but the scab seen us," Mrs. Muscovitz said.
"Come on," Yetta repeated. "Let's go to headquarters."
Somehow she did not care whether any one had seen her or not. She had tried to kill a man and regretted that she had not succeeded. She had read stories of murderers' remorse. And now she knew they were lies. She would never have been sorry if she had killed that snake.
As they were turning into Broadway, Mrs. Muscovitz, who was always looking back, suddenly gripped Yetta's arm.
"He's getting up," she said. "There's a man helping him."
They both peered back around the corner and saw Pick-Axe, with the aid of the stranger, painfully getting to his feet and rubbing his head in bewilderment.
"Come on," Yetta said. "He'll begin to holler in a minute. I've got a dime. We'll take a car."
They ran to catch a downtown car. They rode in silence, Mrs. Muscovitz nursing her aching arm and the bruise in her side. Yetta, surprised at the calm which had come after the sudden typhoon of passion, kept repeating, "I tried to kill him, I tried to kill him."
At the headquarters they found Isadore Braun, just returned from attending to the morning's batch of arrested pickets in Essex Market Court.
"Come into the committee-room," Yetta said to him quietly. "We've had some trouble."
"What is it?" he asked professionally as he closed the door.
"It's bad," Yetta replied. "Mrs. Muscovitz and I was picketing the Crown. And Pick-Axe – well, he jumped on her and – well – I knocked him senseless."
Braun bounced out of his chair in amazement.
"You? You knocked Pick-Axe senseless? You're joking."
But Yetta shrugged her shoulders affirmatively. And Braun began to laugh. He knew Pick-Axe. Every few days he encountered the bully in court, listened to his cold-blooded perjuries. He knew, from the girls, of his brutality. And he thought he knew Yetta. Her first speech at the Skirt-Finishers' ball had attracted his attention. He had followed her development through the four weeks of the strike with increasing interest. Above all he had been impressed with her quiet, gentle ways. The idea that she had knocked out Pick-Axe was preposterous.
But Mrs. Muscovitz added her affirmation. As he gradually got the details from them he grew more and more serious. It was the first time the enemy had had any real ground to charge them with violence. They would certainly make the most of it.
"Do you think he knows your face?" he asked Yetta.
"Sure."
Braun realized that his question had been foolish. Yetta was the most-advertised, best-known person connected with the strike.
"They'll be after you with a warrant," he said.
Yetta shrugged her shoulders.
"Were there any witnesses?" he asked.
"Only the scab," Mrs. Muscovitz said. "She run away. I guess she's too scared to come back. And the man who helped him get up."
Braun sat for a few minutes, with his chin in his hands, thinking it out.
"We'll have to lie," he said at last. "This is the story. Mrs. Muscovitz was talking to the scab. Pick-Axe twisted her arm and kicked her. That's all true. You tried to separate them. That's true, too, in a way – "
"I tried to kill him," Yetta put in.
"But you mustn't tell the judge that! You tried to separate them, and he slipped on the wet pavement and bumped his head. You two ran away, afraid that he'd attack you. You took a Broadway car and came straight here. Let's see – " he looked at his watch – "You got here about eleven thirty."
"I'd rather tell the truth," Yetta insisted. "Tell the judge just what the snake said to me and why I was mad."
"You can't do that. In the first place the judge would not listen to all of it. And then he would not believe you. They're looking for a chance to say we are using violence. Why did you do it – Oh, well, there's no use asking that. It's done. We've got to lie."
Yetta looked unconvinced.
"It won't only be worse for you," Braun went on. "It'll be worse for all of us, if you tell the truth."
"All right, then," Yetta said reluctantly. "I'll lie."
Just then Mabel rushed in without knocking.
"Pick-Axe and a plain-clothes man are out here with a warrant for Yetta," she cried. "Where can we hide her?"
"We won't hide her," Braun said. "We don't want to seem afraid of this charge."
"What's it all about?" she asked.
"Why, Pick-Axe was getting gay as usual," Braun said. "He slipped on the wet pavement or tripped over something and bumped his head. I guess he's trying to make an assault charge out of it."
"What?" Mabel asked in astonishment. "He's got the face to say that Yetta attacked him?"
Yetta started to say, "I did," but Braun kicked her unobtrusively and she kept still.
"Go out and tell them we will surrender at once," Braun said.
As soon as Mabel had left he hurriedly repeated the story they were to tell.
"Don't tell anybody the truth," he insisted. "Not any one. Not even Miss Train. We've got to bluff. And the more people who believe we are telling the truth, the better the bluff is."
They went out into the main room, and Yetta was formally put under arrest.
"That's the other woman," Pick-Axe said at sight of Mrs. Muscovitz.
"I haven't any warrant for her," the plain-clothes man said. He had no especial affection for the ruffian who pretended to be a detective.
"She is coming to court anyhow as a witness," Braun said.
At that moment he caught sight of Longman and a reporter and a ray of hope. He hurried over to them.
"Longman," he said, "they've arrested Yetta Rayefsky on an utterly absurd charge of attacking that thug, Brennan, whom the girls call Pick-Axe. I wish you'd come over to court. I can use you, I think, in the defence. And" – he turned to the reporter, "it may be worth your while to come, too. I think there'll be a story in it."
So the little procession set out. Yetta walked ahead between Pick-Axe and the detective. Braun and Mrs. Muscovitz and Longman and the reporter trailed behind.
There was hardly anything more sincere about Pick-Axe than his fear and hatred of Braun, so he kept his mouth shut as long as he was in hearing. But when the steel door of Essex Market Prison had clanged shut behind him, as soon as the desk man had entered Yetta's name and age and address on his book, Pick-Axe gave rein to his filthy wrath. They had taken her into the "examination room," and Yetta, following Braun's advice, refused to answer any questions. She crouched in a corner and tried not to hear what he was saying. She had grown up in a community where men are not over-careful in their choice of expletives, but she had never listened to anything like this.
It would have been very hard for Yetta to tell any one – even Mabel – what that quarter of an hour meant to her. She was not exactly afraid. In a way she was prepared for it. She had heard Pick-Axe talk before. The girls had told her that the worst thing they had suffered during their imprisonment was what they had had to listen to, insults and obscenity and the mad ravings of the "drunks."
Although Yetta was not afraid nor surprised, her whole being shuddered under it. Her flesh seemed to contract in an effort to escape the contagion of such loathsomeness. For years she would turn suddenly pale at the barest memory of that torrent of abuse. Once Pick-Axe came close as if he was going to strike her, but the detective pulled him away. Yetta was almost sorry. It would have been a relief if he had struck her with his hand.
And yet it was very little for herself that Yetta suffered. She was being sacrificed for a great host. What they did to her mattered very little, but in her they were striking at all the myriad "people of the process" – the women of her trade, the cloth weavers, the wool-growers, those who grew wheat for their bread, who made beds for them to sleep in. She felt herself a delicate instrument for the transmission of sound. Those stinging, cruel words were going out to the remotest corners of the land, were bringing shame on all the lowly people of the earth, just as his kick, crashing into Mrs. Muscovitz' side, had made them all gasp with pain. Once she looked up, she wanted to ask him what they paid him that made it worth his while to treat her people so. But she knew it was useless to ask – he would not have understood.
Then echoing down the corridor, she heard a warden bawling her name. From the point of view of Braun's intended defence, Yetta's arrest had come at a fortunate time of day. By noon the morning calendar is disposed of, and he could have her arraigned for hearing at once. The least delay meant the possibility of the prosecution finding some witness who had seen Yetta strike Pick-Axe.
Yetta had wanted to tell the judge the truth. It was only because Braun insisted that it would endanger the success of the strike that she had consented to lie. But when she was led into the court-room, her scruples left her.
Telling the truth is like a quarrel – there must be two parties to it. Nicolas Gay, the Russian painter, has a canvas called, "What is Truth?" It portrays Pontius Pilate, putting this question to the Christ. And you realize at once why the Prisoner could not answer. Truth is not the enunciation of certain words. Nothing which the scorned and scourged and thorn-crowned Jesus might have said about His Truth could have penetrated the thick skull of the gross and pride-filled Roman proconsul.
Yetta, in a somewhat similar situation, understood at once that this dingy court-room was not an Abode of Truth. Magistrate Cornett, before whom she was led, although a young man, was quite bald. He sat hunched up in his great chair, and the folds of his heavy black robe made him look deformed. His finger nails were manicured. His skin was carefully groomed, but the flesh under it was flabby. His face and hands were those of a gourmand.
The clerk read the complaint. It charged Yetta with assault in all its degrees in that on that very day she had with felonious intent struck one Michael Brennan on the head with a dangerous weapon, to wit a blackjack.
"Guilty or not guilty?"
"Not guilty," Braun replied.
The plain-clothes man deposed that he knew nothing about the case except that he had served the warrant as directed by the court. He had found the defendant in the strike headquarters of the vest-makers.
The man who had helped Brennan get up was a clerk in a neighboring wholesale house. He had been sent out with a telegram, and in the rain-swept, deserted street he had seen no one but the prostrate detective, who was just regaining consciousness as he came up. He helped the stricken man to his feet, and that was all he knew.
Then Michael Brennan, alias Pick-Axe, took the stand. Ordinarily he made a fairly good appearance in court. He felt himself among friends, felt a reassuring kinship with the policemen, the clerks, and even with the judge. To be sure they all knew he was a perjurer, and very few of them would shake hands with him. But still he was a necessary part in the great machine for preserving social order, by which they all were paid. But this day he was not at his ease. In the first place his head ached horribly. In the second, he was so infuriated that he could scarcely control his tongue. And thirdly, he knew that he was in for a grilling from Braun. And he was more than usually afraid of this ordeal because he was not sure what had happened. He remembered kicking Mrs. Muscovitz, he had a vague conviction that Yetta had rushed at him – and then he remembered coming to and being helped to his feet.
"Yer Honor," he began, "I was in front of the Crown Vest Company this morning doing duty as usual. There wasn't nobody around except this here Rayefsky girl and a woman she's brought as a witness. Well, Yer Honor, I went into the hallway to light my pipe and just at that minute a scab comes along – "
"Your Honor," Braun interrupted, "some of my clients have been sent to prison for using that term. This court has held it to be insulting and abusive."
"It was a slip of my tongue, Yer Honor," Pick-Axe said with confusion.
"Clerk," the Judge instructed, "strike out that word, and you be more careful, Brennan."
"Yes, Yer Honor. I was saying a respectable woman came along looking for work – she wasn't really a woman, just a young girl. I didn't see her because I was in the hallway lighting my pipe, as I told Yer Honor, but I heard her holler and, rushing out, I seen this other woman a-laying into her, beating her up something awful – "
Mrs. Muscovitz tried to protest from the benches, but Longman, at a signal from Braun, hushed her.
"Well, Yer Honor, I runs up and tries to arrest the woman, and the other one – this Rayefsky girl – jumps on me with a blackjack and lays me out, Yer Honor. The first thing I knows I come to, with this gentleman a-helping me up. How long I laid there senseless, Yer Honor, I don't know. I came right over here and got the warrant, and Officer Sheehan and me, we got her at the strike headquarters, like he told Yer Honor."
"Do you wish to question the witness, Mr. Braun?"
"Brennan," he began, "did you see a blackjack in the defendant's hand?"
"No, sir! If I'd a knowed she had a blackjack would I have let her sneak up behind me? No. I'd have run her in before."
"What makes you think it was a blackjack?"
"The bump on my head." He leaned over the bench so the judge could examine it. "She couldn't have made that with her hand, Yer Honor."
"It certainly looks like a blackjack," the judge said.
"Are you sure, Brennan, it wasn't a piece of stone?"
"No. It wasn't no stone – I'd have seen her pick it up. It was a blackjack," he insisted doggedly.
"How do you know it wasn't a piece of gas-pipe?"
"What's the use of such questions?" the judge asked impatiently. "The crime would be no less serious if the blow had been struck with a piece of gas-pipe."
"Your Honor," Braun replied, "it is a serious question. Brennan does not know what hit him and I do. In two more questions I think I can convince the Court that he does not know. Brennan," he turned to the witness, "you say that you had gone into the hallway to light your pipe. When you rushed out to attack the picket, did you see this gentleman coming down the street? Professor Longman, will you please rise? Brennan, did you see this gentleman coming down the street with that cane in his hand?"