Sacramento daily record-union. [volume] (Sacramento [Calif.]) 1875-1891, 1890-05-10
1 ROMANCE or POLICE PROTECTION.

The Right Honorable Mr.. Justice Moore
had been for years the leading practitioner
and ablest lawyer at the Irish bar. But to
neither OF these facts, nor to his general
suitability for the place, did he owe his
elevation to the bench. In ireland such
things weigh nothing against political
services, and Moore had vigorously avoided
politics all his life. He was out of the
running for promotion, but that chance in
tervened. A vacancy occurred on the
Irish bench at the same time with one
in the Tape Office. The Lord Chancellor
at the time happened to have peculiarly
incompetent relative, for whom he wished
to provide. With the keen sight of an
official in high place, he saw and seized
upon the opportunity for job Moore,
to the satisfaction but amazement of the
public was raised to the bench. Under
cover of the popular appointment, the in
competent relative slipped unnoticed into
the Tape Office and e900 year. The
only grumbling came from the castle"
men and place-hunters, whose faith in pre-
cedent and Castle tradition was rudely
shaken by the elevation to the Irish bench
of one who had been neither politician nor
partisan.
This political colorlessness made the new
Judge of SO little account in the eyes of
the Government officials that it was not
thought necessary to supply him with the
police protection given at that time to all
the other Judges. The matter troubled
Judge Moore not at all he had the scepti-
cism of common sense on the subject of
assassination societies The Judge, how
ever, was married man-very much SO,
his friends said-and his views on police
protection were not shared in by Mrs.
Moore. She felt its absence keen indig-
nity-in fact, an insult to the Judges off
ciai Importance. As if he alone of all the
Judges was not important enough to be
assassinated. The idea was intolerable
Mrs. Moore's vigorous and persistent al
tempts TO arouse her husband on the sub
ject were vain. Usually yielding, he was
on this point frmness itself, and treated
with contempt the thought of any associa-
ton or any one of his countrymen thirsting
for his blood.
Mrs. Moore was woman of undaunted
spirit Failure in one direction only made
her seek success in another. All through
the summer she meditated schemes for
awaking the authorities to a sense of the
fitness of things. No fear that she could
forget the matter, when, each week, she
saw the Chief Justices escort fielding the
balls at his wife's tennis parties.
In the winter it was even worse. The
Castle season brought the climax. Judge
Moore's was the only high official carriage
not followed in going to and from the
Castle by police escort on car. The
indignity, thus heightened thousandfold
by being made patent to the public, drove
Mrs. Moore to desperation. Even family
trouble pressing on her at the time could
not distract her thoughts. And yet it was
no light trouble.
Her daughter Nora, on returning from
long country visit, little before Christ
mas, announced that she had engaged her.
self to Mr.. Jack Lawless, the impecunious
son of impecunious, if well-born, parents.
Nora had been the recognized belle of the
last Castle season; and the ambitious
mother founded great hopes of brilliant
alliance on the attentions her daughter
had received from the gilded youth in
general, and from a certain rich baronet,
Sir Jasper Norton, in particular. She was
furious at an engagement to an obscure
youth, unknown to either husband or her
self If the easy-going Judge, moved by
the tears and pleading of his pretty daugh-
ter, would have made it a question of
time, his wife carried the day with per-
emptory breaking off of the engagement,
and Lawless was forbidden the house and
all communication with Nora.
Mrs. Moore had been greatly harassed
by the affair, still, as has been said, not to
the extent of distracting her mind from
the burning question of police protection.
The beginning of the Castle season,
which drove her to desperation, suddenly,
however, brought her unexpected relief.
Much to her surprise she gained an ally
and sympathizer in the schemes for procur-
Ing police protection, which occupied her
brain from morning till night, in none
other than Nora To her intense satisfac-
ton, the girl seemed in the surrounding
gayety to forget all about her discharged
lover, and, Frightening up, threw herself
enthusiastically into her mothers cause
Together they devised plots and plans for
the object both had at heart, and the prov
erb that two heads are better than one
soon received further illustration.
As the result of the scheme concocted by
the two ladies, Mrs Moore wrote secret
letter to the Castle, which Nora managed
to have conveyed to its destination. A
few days of anxious expectation brought
the answer The plot had been COM
plete success. Mrs. Moore was officially
informed that policeman in plain clothes
would at once proceed on protection duty
with Judge Moore.
Mother and daughter were in intense
delight-Mrs Moore at having the desire
of her heart at length gratifed, and Nora,
no doubt, at having pleased her mother,
and atoned thereby for past delinquencies.
Mrs. Moore pressed her daughters arm
alphabetically and gratefully as they
were getting into the carriage that evening
to drive to Castle bah, for on the pat h.
way by the ratings opposite the house in
Merton square stood a tall, soldier-like
figure in the dim light, with car drawn
up in attendance close by.
The drive TO the Castle, in the supreme
consciousness of the escort following her
carriage, was a real triumphal progress to
Mrs. Moore. The Inconsistencies of the
Judge, who sat beside her, troubled her
not at all Neither did she allow the task
that lay before her, of breaking the news
to him, and at the same time keeping the
part played by the ladies in the matter alb
ruptly secret, to weigh upon her spirits
Nora's composure was not equal to her
mothers. Her manner, in fact, betrayed
not little trepidation--it is SO much less
a matter OF course to deceive father than
a husband.
Next day, however, her mother treasured
her. Your father will not dream of sus.
pecting US. Don't be uneasy. You acted
like dutiful daughter in helping me- II
is your fathers own fault that we had &c
act secretly. We shall let him find out
for himself that he is being protected. He
won't trouble any more about the protec
ton, when he recognizes it to be an accom-