The San Francisco call., 1905-05-21

face to face with them in our very
4 own personal experience.
1 have known ever since I first
sat on a pew cushion in a spirit of awe
and my starched and cracking Sunday
best that .the way OF the transgressor
is hard" but it was an abstract truth
TO me until I met Tax Collector
Smith on Monday afternoon, some fif-
teen hours after the prison door had
closed upon him.
Now-now that ! have seen him
the simple words OF that direct, UNI
qualified, unmitigated Biblical state
ment have taken on the vividness OF
writing in Ere across midnight sky.
What Tax Collector Edward J. Smith
was like in his halcyon days I know
not. but what he is like now, on this
Gay OF his shameful Homecoming, is not
a good nor plcasurabie thing to see.
he was In the hands OF the prison
barber when I sent in my name, and
he had said Not" TO every same re-
quest OF my fraternity ali day long,
peruIantly determined, was told, that
he would talk TO no one from the news
papers. But he is a man OF strange
and wayward impulse, and the word
came back, Yes. he will see you If
you viii wait until he is through with
the barber
But IL should not be in a cell. nor in
the outer lobby where the ordinary
prisoners come to meet their friends or
attorneys or callers on the wooden
benches. Externals, it seems, mean
much TO Mr.. Smith, and so We met in
the captains Office, in which. if you
keep your back TO the windows, you
can make believe you are in an ordi-
nary Office room on an ordinary errand.
Mr.. Smith, fresh-groomed, neat, ieck-
less Of dust. in a somewhat jaunty suit
OF blue, with a faint chalk line in it
and a breast pocket that buttons-a
suit that spoke in mocking echo Of the
debonair spirit Of gayety departed, not
your ordinary. sober, tailor-made of the
business world-sat dropping in chair
awaiting me, his hands together be-
tween his knees. his arms limp and list
less, his head down. picture of brood
ing melancholy.
he turned his head a little and raised
the heavy lids of his large. prominent
eyes. and with the mechanical courtesy
of habit, rose and extended his hand,
soft, small plump, weIl-kept hand,
feverishly hottie hand typical OF
luxurious self-iudulgeuce
Before me L saw standing a man
broken, bereft, ashamed, stripped of his
honor and his pride-and yet a. bay.
Like a light within, the suffering
spirit shone through.
Perhaps events and emotions had
crowded upon him too fast in the past
few hours and he had not had time nor
strength to recover his mask.
The mere physical evidence of suffering
was shocking. He looked shrunken,
covering, and he has been, should haz-
ard, rather a handsome man of the boule-
vardier type.
His appearance in the captains Office
Of the City Prison spoke of a change
sharp and sudden.
In his face it seemed as though the
substance had been drained from be-
meath the skin 10 mae that sagging
contour. His neck withered away from
his collar like that OF a convalescent
who after long sickness comes back to
his outdoor garb; his dark hair lay weak
and lifeless and clinging above the pallid,
drawn brow. 1 wondered if his clean
shaven cheeks could possibly have looked
more haggard when they were stubble-
bearded. His mouth-the loose, weak,
gross mouth OF unrestraint-was drawn
and 10 a certain degree refined by grief
and bitterness. His heavy eyelids were
reddened-who may know except him.
self whether by scalding tears or long
night-vigils2-an in his eyes there was
look OF settled pain so poignant that it
froze the words on my tongue.
How could 1.-The question caught my
heartstrings like a OBTAINING hand-how
could I proceed with my mission and
interview a fellow-being at such a pass?
For a passing moment it seemed like
vivisection, and 1 wavered toward re-
treat
But Mr.. Smith was speaking IN a
strained, panied voice that struggled for
composure and nonchalance-and 1 per-
force must listen. So does custom and
convention bind US all by hand md foot
You are the only one from any news
paper. the only reporter-writer," Mr..
Smith was saying, searching for the ap-
propriate word, that have G. nsented to
see, or that I have spoken TO since that
day I left here. All the interviews that
have been printed-that were sent out
from ST. Louis are-not interviews. 1
have nothing TO say about my case. What
is there to be said? There is nothing TO
be said that will make it better-or
worse"
After all, I reassured myself, he had
chosen to see me- and / wonder yet
whether that short half-hour in the cap
tain's Office was harder for him or for me.
Even sick in body and in mind as he
was, there was a certain manliness in his