The morning call., 1891-05-31
A MAGISTRATES
CONSCIENCE.
Jules Mary, Author Of Roger Id
HOntG," Tells a Remarkable Story.
How One on the Bench Had Crime Of His
Youth Brought Back to Him-Robbing al
Employer to Meet Gambling Debt.
Written for THE SUNDAY CALL.


but his father. small country magistrate,
was without fortune, having preferreda
marriage for love to espousing a dowrg.
Georges mother had been dead long
while, and the Count de Chaverny, when he
saw that his last hour had come, summoned
his son to his bedside and said to him:
81 leave you no debts-thats all my for
tune. Your preliminary studies are fin
ished. Go to Paris and present this letter
to Maitre Lance, the lawyer. He is friend,
and will take you into his Office. In that
way you will make your living. Finish
your legal education. and when, in yorr
turn, you are magistrate, do not forget
that your father died with tranquil mini
because he always obeyed only his con-
science"
He had turned toward Georges, his face
yell0Wed by illness and emaciated by suffer-
ing
kiss me for the last time"
Georges kissed the cold forehead upon
which death had set its seal. The old maa
lost consciousness. An hour later he seeme3i
to awake and murmured twice:
II am gOing-I am going"
Then looking at his son with a strange ex-
preston, he added:
"Conscience!'
And he died.
A month afterWard Georges was Maitra
Lance's secretary.
The lawyer was rigid man, who regained
BY his silence in his study the flood of word.
which had flowed from him in the Palaces
of Justice. Very learned, quite eloquent,
witty and sometimes dangerous, he was
much feared and not at all beloved.
Georges de Chaverny earned in his office
500 francs per month. This was certainly q
great deal more than he required in order t.
live moderately and pay for his books an0
court inscriptions; but he was weak Gifted
with pleasing physi0gnOmy, tall and hand
some, he failed TO resist the tenn tatons OF
every kind offered him by fashionable life ir
Paris. lie played, won and lost running.
in proportion to his winnings and losses, the
gamut of all the violent emotions which ac1
company gambling.
At the club, money is chip; the game ac-
customs one to money, which no longer has
value to the man who plays. Every gam bier
IS prodlgal, spending money as freely as he
wins It, lie literally wastes 1t, scattering it
about with Il lavish hand
THE GAMEsTER's TEMPTATION.
One morning Chaverny entered his Office
at Maitre Lance's on the Boulevard Saint
German, pale and worn out, having passed
the night at the club. The sleeves of his
coat were green by dint of rubbing against
the cloth of the table on which he had lost
all his winnings of the previous night and :
$4,000 francs more, for which he had given:
his l. .. u.
BE had until the following day, no longer,
&C ording to the accepted code of honor. to
pay this debt, to raise the $4,000 francs. In
his office, all of q fever, with red eyes and
his chin in his hand. he wondered what he
was going TO 90 and what would become of
him.
How was he to earn the money, OF whom
a In horro,u II . M HE
hard lawyer, inaccessible to such weak
nesses, who surely would not hesitate to
sacrifice him in order to punish him. in
stead of coming to his rescue? Never would
he have dared 10 try. To confess his loss
would mean his expulsion and finding him
self without bread, in the blacklist poverty,
in that city which has smiles only for for
tunate people.
His eyes strayed toward the safe, Of
which he had the key and knew the secret;
toward the safe in which were j0,000 francs.
Safety was there, but there was also cTimel
Amid his anguish the morning passed
Matte Lance was continually entering
ChaveTny'S Office from his own private study
The young man was so pale ana his troubled
look so strange that the lawyer twice asked
him bruSQuely:
''Are you Hip"
NO nothing ails me. answered Georges,
in changed tone.
lie went out about IL o'clock to breakfast,
but 1t was impossible for him to eat Then
he stTayed along the quays, his head ready
to burst, pursued by the obstinate idea Of the
robbery.
Would it be a robbery? No-only an un-
known loan. He would take 10000 francs,
pay his debt and try his luck with the re-
naming 5000 A voice within him cried:
You will win and pay back the money!
Save yourself-dO not hestatew
THE ROBBERY.
Toward . o'clock he was again in his
office, irresoute. All the honesty in him
was fighting his terrible project. Maitre
Lance entered, ran over some papers, and
then said to Georges:
Il am going to Chatpauroux 10 try the
DellevauX case. l shall be absent three
days. Adieu."
Half an hour afterward Georges was
alone; no witnesses to fear; ana the safe
tempted him more and more with the
promise of delverance. WAS it robbery?
No, a loan. That was ALP loan to be
paid back the next day sure and which
Maitre Lance would never suspect!
He carefully closed the door, leaving the
by an iEdiscreet eye. He drew the curtains
OF the windows. He was ready No one
was there. The boy was out on an errand.
He had taken care to send him away.
Quickly lie verified the combination of the
safe-702 His hands trembled, his heart
HO lNikCl utdt. IluBS uIOpS VI sweat ElOlSl-
ened his forehead. His sight grew cIouded.
When the heavy door opened, he started
back, because he imagined he saw behind
him the thin and yellow face Of his dying
father which looked kindly upon him and
because he thought he heard a word uttered
by q voice which death had silenced:
"Conscence"
He wiped his forehead and began to laugh.
His twitching fingers grasped thirty notes
of Thousand francs cash. The safe was
closed. The window curtains were reopened
and the sunlight flooded his office. Below
the Omnibuses rolled the promenaders
passed and all noisy Paris gave itself up to
pleasure. Nothing had changed. There
was only one thief more!
LUCK AND RETRIBUTIoN.
That evening at the club he paid his debt.
Toward midnight he broke the bank, and in
the morning. when he left, drunken with
gambling and staggering upon his legs, he
carried with him $4,000 francs which he had
won.
At 10 o'clock the thirty notes had resumed
their place in the safe. 1t was over. He
no longer had anything to fear-no longer
anything but memoryl But all day he
trembled Dervousy; he said to himself:
IF MaitTe Lance had returned-if the
robbery had been discOvered-and it all de-
pended upon chanee-I should have been
lostp
Twenty years had elapsed. Matre Lance
was dead. George de Chaverny was mar
ried, and we find him again, already worn
by excessive toll and with whitened locks,
presiding over a session of the Court of AS
sizes in Paris. His wife was still living. He
had a daughter who was his JOY, a son of
whom he was proud, and who like Georges,
like his grandfather, was destined for the
msglsUracy. Chaverny lacked nothing to
make him happy. And he was So for time
had gradually toned down the memory of
his youthful error Since then his life had
been spent in acts of kindness and Justice.
He had made himself beloved by every body.
The session which was about to open
presented no interesting cases. Common