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 tiny, granite-like gray eyes. "You're goin' around tryin' to steal the North Side outfit's business, tryin' to make the saloonkeepers switch over and buy from Lovo. Well, cut it out, see? We're only goin' to warn you this once, like we have the other Lovo men. Then you'll be taken for a ride."

The car raced away, leaving Tony staring after it. Taken for a ride—so that was what they threatened him with, the most feared of all gang land reprisals. "A ride" always ended in death—the body was usually found out in the country somewhere—but what happened before death was oftentimes an awful thing. Bodies of gangsters had been found without ears, without tongues, hacked in various ghoulish ways, bearing all too plainly evidences of dreadful torture before bullets had mercifully ended it all. But then that was the purpose of "a ride"—it was as much a warning to others as it was a wreaking of vengeance upon one man.

It was characteristic of Tony that he did not halt his activities after this warning. But he added another gun to his equipment and kept them handy at all times; he "watched his step" with greater care than he ever had before and he resumed his

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 old practice of having an armed bodyguard follow him.

At noon one day, Tony received a rush call from Lovo to come to the leader's office immediately. He found Johnny seated at his desk, his swarthy face pale and set, in his black eyes the bright ominous glitter that can be seen in the eyes of a rattlesnake when it is about to strike.

"Sit down," commanded Lovo. There was no greeting; no smile. Tony knew immediately that something serious either had happened or was about to happen. "Al Swali's been taken for a ride."

Tony gasped and his own swarthy countenance paled slightly. Al Swali was one of Lovo's best men, a man who had been on the same sort of assignment as himself. So those thugs had made good their threat!

"They found his body out the other side of Melrose Park," continued Lovo bitterly. "Tied hand and foot with wire and shot a dozen times. He was identified from some papers in his pockets and they telephoned me a few minutes ago."

"It was the North Side gang that got him, of course," said Tony in a low tone, and told Lovo of

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/

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 the warning that had been given him a few days before.

"I suppose you're marked to ride next," said Lovo with matter-of-fact resentment. "Well, they're not goin' to get you, nor anybody else in my mob. I'm goin' to put the fear of God in 'em and do it quick. Are you game to help me pull something daring?"

"Absolutely."

"Good. If you put it over, there'll be a grand in it for you. Be here at eight in a tux Have you got one?"

"No."

"Well, buy one—with all the trimmings. You'll probably need it often. You got to be fixed up fashionable to pull the job I'm planning Don't forget—eight o'clock here and be all togged out. I'll have a gun girl here to go with you."

Tony hurried out, feeling strangely excited. He knew that it was a killing on for that night and there is always a thrill—even to an experienced gunman—in going after such important game. And Lovo had said that a gun girl would go with him. He wondered if it would be the gun girl, that noted one about which he had heard so much, that striking brunette that he had seen in the cabaret

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 the night he knocked down Captain Flanagan for insulting Vyvyan. It wasn't likely, of course, yet it was a possibility. He looked forward to the night's activities with keen anticipation.

He approached Lovo's office that evening with his heart pounding. Would it be the gun girl? He certainly hoped so; he'd always wanted to know her. In conformity with orders, he was attired in a dinner jacket "with all the trimmings." And quite handsome he looked, with his erect, well-built figure and thoroughly barbered countenance.

He knocked, then turned the knob and crossed the threshold. Lovo was seated at his desk just as Tony had left him hours before. And by his side sat the gun girl. Tony recognized her instantly and a gasp of admiration caught in his throat. God! she was beautiful! A lithe, slender brunette with a superb figure cunningly revealed by the close-fitting, very low cut evening gown. Its sheer whiteness provided a startling contrast with her vivid dark beauty, the ivory tint of her skin, the long, fashionably coiffed hair so black that its depths held bluish glints like fine gunmetal, the great dark eyes with their hints of hidden inner fires, the beautifully shaped red mouth.

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 "Jane, Tony," introduced Lovo briefly. "Sit down, kid. You look great."

Tony sank into a chair, feeling trembly under the appraising stare of the girl's great dark eyes.

"This is a big job I'm trusting you to handle to-night, Tony," said Lovo. "Perhaps it's too big for you. But I don't think so and you've proven yourself so damn loyal to me that I'm going to give you a crack at it. Of course, if you fail, you're through with me and I'll have somebody else do it. But I'm not expecting you to fail. I want you to get Jerry Hoffman."

"Jerry Hoffman!" exclaimed Tony. The girl said nothing, not even indicating the surprise she must have felt.

"Exactly," continued Lovo. "Jerry Hoffman, the biggest guy on the North Side and leader of that whole mob. Right now, there's nobody big enough to step into his shoes and his death will ruin the whole outfit. They'll know, of course, that some of my mob did it but they won't know exactly who pulled the job—that is, if you two are as clever as I think you are—and his being bumped off will throw 'em into such a panic that I think they'll be afraid to try any jobs on us for a long time. It's

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 who, while earnestly inquiring the cause of those agonized cries, those cruel bonds, undid with all benevolent haste the rope that kept the poor fellow’s body rolled up almost in the form of a ball; next, he refreshed the Israelite’s inward man with a draught of right royal cordial from a gourd he bore at his girdle, then carried him into the high road, and, as soon as the patient had recovered the use of his limbs, supported him the remaining distance to Hirschberg, to the very door of the tavern where he intended to pass the night, and there only bade him adieu, after having slipped into his hand a small sum of money. What was the astonishment of the Jew, on entering the house, to see the vagabond who had plundered him sitting at a table in the common room, as calm and unembarrassed as though he were the most innocent creature in the world. Before him stood a great pitcher of wine; around him were other lusty lads, with whom he was laughing and joking in the most hardened manner; beside him lay his wallet, in which Master Rubezahl, having, after taking leave of the Jew at the door as the honest burgess, entered the room, invisible to all eyes, had placed the purse which, as a robber, he had forced from poor Moses. The latter, hardly knowing how to believe his eyes, slunk into a corner, to consider of the best and readiest means of recovering his property. After having minutely examined his man, he was convinced there could be


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 high stakes we're playing for, folks, but the reward will make the risk worthwhile."

"All right," said Tony shortly. "I'm game. What's the plan?"

"I've found out that Hoffman is giving a little party to-night at the Embassy Club."

Him—at the Embassy Club?" exclaimed the girl incredulously, speaking for the first time. And her voice—rich, full, throaty, gave Tony as big a thrill as did her appearance.

"Oh, yes," answered Lovo with a short laugh. "Surprising the places you can buy your way into—if you've got the price. Well, he's giving a little party there to-night. Very select affair, couple of judges and an assistant district attorney or two and so on. He won't have the slightest suspicion of being attacked there and in that company, so he won't have his bodyguards around, and as he doesn't know either one of you by sight it ought to be easy for you to get him. I'm not going to give you any orders as to how to handle the job. Work it out on the spot as you think best. But get him! Got a gat on you, Tony?"

"Certainly."

"Give it to me. Jane does the gat carrying to-night—she's got it on her now. When you're

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 Tony felt a little nervous as he ordered. This was the first time he had ever worked with a gun girl and he found it a strange sensation not to have his own gun where he could reach for it whenever he wished. But Jane was as calm as though they were there bent only on pleasure and her calmness finally soothed him. God! she was beautiful! What he would give to have a woman like that for his very own.

They chatted about this and that as they ate. But she did most of the talking. Tony was quite content to just sit and watch her, drinking in her beauty. The little pauses that fell between them now and then were tense to the point of being electrical. Tony believed he was making progress.

There was considerable hubbub when the Hoffman party came in. It required the attentions of the owner, the head waiter and half the other waiters to see that the party was properly seated. Truly, money—regardless of its source—commanded respect and service.

Tony stiffened and his keen glance surveyed the situation. He recognized Hoffman immediately—a tall, rather heavy man with a red face and sandy hair. Tony scanned the rest of the party carefully but he could find none that looked like a

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 ready and want it, she'll give it to you. The minute you've pulled the job, slip it back to her at once and she'll hide it again. Then if some wise guy should recognize you and have you frisked, you haven't got a thing on you. See?"

Reluctantly Tony passed over his own gum, accepted the admission card to the Embassy Club which Lovo handed him, and escorted the gun girl out to the waiting limousine which Lovo had provided.

The Embassy Club was the most exclusive of the expensive night clubs which had sprung up since the war—and Prohibition. As well as providing food, dancing and entertainment, it sold the best of liquors and one had to have a card to gain admittance. Where Lovo had secured the card which now rested in his well-filled pin seal wallet, Tony had no idea, but as the gang leader had said—money would do amazing things.

A large table, handsomely set for ten or twelve, indicated where the Hoffman party was to be and Tony maneuvered the head waiter into seating him and his companion directly across from it and not more than thirty feet away. It was a splendid position, too, for a strategic retreat, being in a direct line with the door and not far from it.

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 gunman or a bodyguard. No, Hoffman probably felt entirely safe there in that exclusive cabaret in the company of men whose importance was unquestioned. It would be a cinch to bump him off there; the only thing was to pull the job at the proper time. Tony waited, smoking one cigarette after another with an outward calmness that was the result of iron self-control. Jane was chatting gayly about nothing in particular and occasionally laughed lightly for no reason. Tony realized that she was playing her part well, giving their table an air of casualness and gayety. He tried to join in with her but he was naturally a silent type and now he could hardly keep his eyes off the man who was soon to be his target.

Champagne corks were popping at that other table and there was much loud laughing. Tony called for his check and paid it. Then the main lights were snapped off, a spotlight centering on the small dance floor. A brash, overdressed young man stepped out into its glow and began telling about the show that was to follow, interspersing his remarks with supposedly funny "wise-cracks." Now was the time to pull the job, when everybody's attention was centered on the show.

Tony looked at Jane and nodded slightly. She

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 gave him a look of understanding, then, with every appearance of affection, caught his right hand and gently maneuvered it beneath the table. His hand found her knee, rested there. And he thrilled at the contact. But she did not shrink. Then he felt cold steal [sic] against his flesh and his eager fingers clutched an automatic. His thumb slipped off the safety catch and he waited.

Some woman sang a comic song that made Tony laugh—even in the tensity of the moment—then the chorus came on. While doing a fancy dance routine, they sang at the top of their voices, the jazz band blared madly, and the customers beat time with little wooden mallets provided for the purpose. The din was tremendous.

Tony brought the gun up into his lap, then cautiously reached out, holding the weapon close beside the table and well below the level of its top. Nobody yet had been seated on that side of them; at the moment not even a waiter was there. Tony took careful aim and fired three times, so rapidly that the reports almost merged into each other. He saw Hoffman slump forward as he jerked the pistol under the table and slipped it back to Jane. Her fingers were cool and steady as she took it from him.

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text:
Rosengart v. Laird

Certiorari granted, judgment vacated, and case remanded for reconsideration in light of suggestions of the Solicitor General and upon independent examination of entire record.

Reported below: 449 F. 2d 523.

title: Rosengart v. Laird


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 The noise of the shots had penetrated even that din, of course, and there was a sudden commotion. The main lights were snapped back on and everybody stood up, staring horror-stricken at that table where Hoffman lay slumped low in his chair, an ever widening spot of crimson disfiguring his snowy shirtfront. Then began a mad scramble to get away before the police should arrive. These people had no wish to be questioned about a murder, and have their names and perhaps their pictures in the papers.

Tony and Jane were in the van of that frantic, fear-struck mob. Within less than two minutes they were comfortably seated in their limousine and were being driven rapidly away from the scene. Tony took a long breath.

"Well, that's done," he said calmly. Now that it was all over, he felt calm, even gay. "We've done a good night's work for ourselves. And for Lovo. He won't forget it either, I think. But say, girlie, you sure have got guts."

"A person has to have to get along these days," answered Jane Conley quietly.

He reached out and caught her hand, fondled her fingers. It thrilled him to see that she made no effort to pull away.

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 After years of protracted struggle, the slave trade was abolished. But still another great achievement remained to be accomplished—the abolition of slavery itself throughout the British dominions. And here again determined energy won the day. Of the leaders in the cause, none was more distinguished than Fowell Buxton, who took the position formerly occupied by Wilberforce in the House of Commons. Buxton was a dull, heavy boy, distinguished for his strong self-will, which first exhibited itself in violent, domineering, and headstrong obstinacy. His father died when he was a child; but fortunately he had a wise mother, who trained his will with great care, constraining him to obey, but encouraging the habit of deciding and acting for himself in matters which might safely be left to him. His mother believed that a strong will, directed upon worthy objects, was a valuable manly quality if properly guided, and she acted accordingly. When others about her commented on the boy's self-will, she would merely say, "Never mind—he is self-willed now—you will see it will turn out well in the end." Fowell learnt very little at school, and was regarded as a dunce and an idler. He got other boys to do his exercises for him, while he romped and scrambled about. He returned home at fifteen, a great, growing, awkward lad, fond only of boating, shooting, riding, and field sports—spending his time principally with the gamekeeper, a man possessed of a good heart—an intelligent observer of life and nature, though he could neither read nor write. Buxton had excellent raw material in him, but he wanted culture, training, and development. At this juncture of his life, when his habits


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 "You and I will probably work together quite a bit from now," he said huskily. "Why can't we be good pals and—play together, too?"

"Perhaps we can." Obeying a sudden irresistible impulse, he caught her in his arms and kissed her, with all the frantic ardor of a strong, eager passion long repressed. And she made no effort to resist.

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 death created a sensation and for days the city was rife with conjectures as to who could have carried out such a daring murder plot. But the police and gangland both had a good idea as to who was responsible. The dicks took Johnny Lovo down to headquarters and questioned him for half a day but he told them nothing beyond proving an alibi for himself. Nor did he give the impression of defiantly holding back something. On the contrary, he blandly and smilingly convinced them that he actually knew nothing. But the North Side gang was far from convinced and some day they meant to have vengeance for the death of their chief.

Neither Tony nor Jane was ever mentioned in connection with the affair. Lovo gave them a thousand dollars each and thanked them profusely, promising to let them handle any other little jobs he might have in the future. In the meantime he sent an enormous and elaborate floral piece bearing his card to Jerry Hoffman's garish and expen-

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 were being formed for good or evil, he was happily thrown into the society of the Gurney family, distinguished for their fine social qualities not less than for their intellectual culture and public-spirited philanthropy. This intercourse with the Gurneys, he used afterwards to say, gave the colouring to his life. They encouraged his efforts at self-culture; and when he went to the University of Dublin and gained high honours there, the animating passion in his mind, he said, "was to carry back to them the prizes which they prompted and enabled me to win." He married one of the daughters of the family, and started in life, commencing as a clerk to his uncles Hanbury, the London brewers. His power of will, which made him so difficult to deal with as a boy, now formed the backbone of his character, and made him most indefatigable and energetic in whatever he undertook. He threw his whole strength and bulk right down upon his work; and the great giant—"Elephant Buxton" they called him, for he stood some six feet four in height—became one of the most vigorous and practical of men. "I could brew," he said, "one hour, do mathematics the next, and shoot the next, and each with my whole soul." There was invincible energy and determination in whatever he did. Admitted a partner, he became the active manager of the concern; and the vast business which he conducted felt his influence through every fibre, and prospered far beyond its previous success. Nor did he allow his mind to lie fallow, for he gave his evenings diligently to self-culture, studying and digesting Blackstone, Montesquieu, and solid commentaries on English law. His maxims in reading were,


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 "never to begin a book without finishing it"; "never to consider a book finished until it is mastered"; and "to study everything with the whole mind."

When only thirty-two, Buxton entered Parliament, and at once assumed that position of influence there of which every honest, earnest, well-informed man is secure who enters that assembly of the first gentlemen in the world. The principal question to which he devoted himself was complete emancipation of the slaves in the British colonies. He himself used to attribute the interest which he early felt in this question to the influence of Priscilla Gurney, one of the Earlham family—a woman of a fine intellect and warm heart, abounding in illustrious virtues. When on her deathbed, in 1821, she repeatedly sent for Buxton, and urged him "to make the cause of the slaves the great object of his life." Her last act was to attempt to reiterate the solemn charge, and she expired in the ineffectual effort. Buxton never forgot her counsel; he named one of his daughters after her; and on the day on which she was married from his house, on the 1st of August, 1834—the day of negro emancipation—after his Priscilla had been manumitted from her filial service, and left her father's home in the company of her husband, Buxton sat down and thus wrote to a friend: "The bride is just gone; everything has passed off to admiration; and there is not a slave in the British colonies!"

Buxton was no genius—not a great intellectual leader nor discoverer, but mainly an earnest, straightforward, resolute, energetic man. Indeed, his whole character is most forcibly expressed in


text: The Commonweal/Volume 1/Number 2/Record of the International Movement


text: The Commonweal/Volume 1/Number 2/Reports


text: The Commonweal/Volume 1/Number 2/Lecture List for March


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 hands, when it is transmitted either from the dead to the living, or from the living to the living, such taxes have frequently been imposed upon it as necessarily take away some part of its capital value.

The transference of all sorts of property from the dead to the living, and that of immovable property, of lands and houses, from the living to the living, are transactions which are in their nature either public and notorious, or such as cannot be long concealed. Such transactions, therefore, may be taxed directly. The transference of stock, or movable property, from the living to the living, by the lending of money, is frequently a secret transaction, and may always be made so. It cannot easily, therefore, be taxed directly. It has been taxed indirectly in two different ways; first, by requiring that the deed, containing the obligation to repay, should be written upon paper or parchment which had paid a certain stamp duty, otherwise not to be valid; secondly, by requiring, under the like penalty of invalidity, that it should be recorded either in a public or secret register, and by imposing certain duties upon such registration. Stamp duties and duties of registration have frequently been imposed likewise upon the deeds transferring property of all kinds from the dead to the living, and upon those transferring immovable property from the living to the living, transactions which might easily have been taxed directly.

The Vicesima Hereditatum, the twentieth penny of inheritances, imposed by Augustus upon the ancient Romans, was a tax upon the transference of property from the dead to the living. Dion Cassius, the author who writes con-


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 sive funeral and gave Tony various assignments in connection with the gang's activities. But he didn't send Tony back to the interesting but perilous task of proselyting saloonkeepers—he considered the boy too valuable an aid now to risk in such reckless fashion. No, Tony had become a staff officer now. His work consisted mainly in relaying Lovo's orders to the powerful leader's henchmen and in receiving reports that Lovo himself was too busy to hear. There was no detail of the gang's operation that Tony did not come to know.

He spent all his spare time in pursuing Jane Conley. And the more he saw of her, the more fascinated he became with her. Yet there was something elusive about her. He could never feel that he had a definite grasp upon her. Yet he finally got his courage up to the point of proposing that they take a flat together.

"I'm not interested in marriage," she answered with a shake of her shapely head.

"Neither am I," agreed Tony quickly. "But who said anything about marriage? I said I thought it would be nice for us to have a flat together."

Again she shook her head.

"I've never lived with a man."

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 cerning it the least indistinctly, says that it was imposed upon all successions, legacies, and donations in case of death, except upon those to the nearest relations, and to the poor.

Of the same kind is the Dutch tax upon successions. Collateral successions are taxed, according to the degree of relation, from five to thirty per cent upon the whole value of the succession. Testamentary donations, or legacies to collaterals, are subject to the like duties. Those from husband to wife, or from wife to husband, to the fiftieth penny. The Luctuosa Hereditas, the mournful succession of ascendants to descendants, to the twentieth penny only. Direct successions, or those of descendants to ascendants, pay no tax. The death of a father, to such of his children as live in the same house with him, is seldom attended with any increase, and frequently with a considerable diminution of revenue; by the loss of his industry, of his office, or of some life rent estate, of which he may have been in possession. That tax would be cruel and oppressive which aggravated their loss by taking from them any part of his succession. It may, however, sometimes be otherwise with those children who, in the language of the Roman law, are said to be emancipated; in that of the Scotch law, to be foris-familiated; that is, who have received their portion, have got families of their own, and are supported by funds separate and independent of those of their father. Whatever part of his succession might come to such children would be a real addition to their fortune, and might, therefore, perhaps, without more inconvenience than what attends all duties of this kind, be liable to some tax.

The casualties of the feudal law were taxes upon the


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 "Well, you might find it a pleasant experience."

"Yes," she admitted frankly, looking him straight in the eye. "And then again I might not. I'm afraid it would be too—intimate; that people, even if they were very much in love when they started, would surely tire each other finally."

"Is there—somebody else?"

"Not particularly."

"But there is somebody?" he persisted jealously.

She laughed lightly. "There is always somebody else. Any girl knows more than one man and often likes more than one very much."

"Then you do like me a little?" He was at her side, with her hand caught in both of his.

She nodded.

"And you will think about what I proposed?"

"Yes, I'll think about it."

And with that he had to be content. This Jane Conley was a very strange woman, he reflected. He often wondered who she was, where she came from. As much as he had been with her, he really didn't know her at all. And he knew enough about women to realize that that very mystery and elusiveness was one of the main reasons why she fascinated him so intensely.

But he had enough on his mind without trouble-

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 some love affairs. Contrary to expectations, the North Side gang had found a new leader and apparently an able one, a wily little Italian rightly named Schemer Bruno. Rumor had it that he was reorganizing things in every direction and preparing to set out on a campaign of reprisals and business-getting that would set the city by the ears. That he was utterly ruthless and intended carrying on with gusto the feuds begun by his predecessor was proven by the fact that another of Johnny Lovo's best men was "taken for a ride," his body discovered out in the country with a scrawled note: "In Memory of Hoffman," tacked to his chest with the blade of a pocketknife.

"I tell you, Tony, I don't like this," said Lovo after the man's body bearing its gruesome message was brought in.

"Not gettin' scared, are you?" demanded Tony. He talked to Lovo now with the freedom of a privileged counselor.

"Hell, no!" snapped the gang leader, but he talked like a man who is assuming a falsely ferocious air to maintain his own courage. "But just the same I don't like it. It may be you next—or me. I don't want to spend the rest of my life hav-

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 ing somebody shot and trying to keep somebody else from shooting me or my employees."

"Forget it!" advised Tony. "It's all in the game. We'll fight 'em to a finish and get this Schemer guy too if necessary."

"No, not yet. Maybe he'll quit now. I don't want to spend all my time in a war; it takes too much time away from making money."

Tony departed from that interview much disgusted with Johnny Lovo. He did not realize the essential differences between them; that Lovo was merely a shrewd and unscrupulous man willing to do anything for money; that he was much more a business man than a fighter; and that he had had none of Tony's war experience which had taught the younger man such a supreme contempt for human life.

Then for the first time Tony actually saw the close contact which exists between crime and the law. Lovo was summoned to the District Attorney's office and he took Tony along as a sort of bodyguard and aide-de-camp. The District Attorney was a little man with a flat nose, an undershot belligerent jaw and mean little eyes.

"This shooting has got to be stopped," he barked at Lovo. "It's—"

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 "But I'm paying—"

"Of course you are. And you'll keep on paying if you want to keep on doing business. It isn't your business that I'm objecting to; it's this damned shooting that's going on among you. It's getting the city a bad name and what's more important, the newspapers are beginning to ride me and my administration. I don't want to interfere with you boys any more than is absolutely necessary, but this killing has got to be stopped."

"I'm willing. It's that North Side outfit."

"And they say it's you. I had this Schemer Bruno in here for an hour this morning and he promised his mob would do no more killing if yours didn't. So that's settled, then. Now I don't want to hear of any more gang wars."

For six months there was peace, that is, on the surface. There were no killings but fist-fighting and stabbings occurred with too great frequency to be accidental. The rivalry for business was becoming keener and more bitter daily, and all sides knew that it was merely a question of time until somebody blew the lid off and started the old feuds all over again. The two South Side factions also were beginning to meddle in districts which belonged to other gangs and on the near west side a

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 crowd of five brothers had suddenly set up in the bootlegging and allied rackets with a strong gang of their own.

Tony was growing restive from inaction. And he was deeply resentful of many things, of the fact that the last murder of a Lovo man was still unavenged, of the fact that other gangs were beginning to encroach upon the Lovo territory and that they were not being challenged by the bullets that should be poured into them. He had just about decided to begin a lone war of reprisal when the lid was blown off.

He and Johnny Lovo were dining at a table in the ground floor restaurant of the hotel where Lovo had his headquarters and which he owned. Suddenly there was a rapid staccato rattle of shots from outside somewhere, the tinkling crash of shattered plate glass windows and the spiteful whizzing of bullets. With one sweep of his arm, Tony overturned the table and dragged Lovo down behind it. He had recognized that peculiar stuttering of those guns outside. Machine guns! Why hadn't somebody used them before? Why hadn't he, an expert machine gunner, thought of them and brought them into play in this other war that was for money only? Well, if that was the way they were going

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 to play now, he'd give them a nasty dose of their own medicine.

That shooting had been a direct attempt to get Johnny Lovo himself. It was the most daring move of the enemy so far. And it had been partly successful. Lovo had been hit in the shoulder. It wasn't a serious wound but the fact remained that he had been hit for the first time and it brought a hunted look into his eyes that remained there for ever after. Johnny wasn't a warrior when his own person was involved; his nerves weren't constructed to stand the strain.

That attempt to kill Lovo made Tony furious. He felt that it was a gesture of contempt which must not be allowed to remain unanswered if the Lovo organization was to continue and to endure. Without saying a word to anybody, he managed to purchase a machine gum himself. Then one night he set out on a little war of his own.

The headquarters of the North Side gang was upstairs over a florist's shop which had been the property and hobby of the gang's first and greatest leader, the famous Dean Martin, who had been shot down among his own flowers—the first post-war gang leader to die from the bullets of an enemy. The shop, which was directly across the

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 street from a large cathedral, was located on a thoroughfare which was dark and quiet at night.

Sitting in the tonneau of the car with his machine gun on his lap, Tony ordered his chauffeur to drive slowly past the shop. As the car moved deliberately along, Tony lifted the machine gun to his shoulder—it was one of the new type that are operated much as a rifle—and riddled the front of the shop, both upstairs and down. There had been a light on the second floor which went off the moment he started firing and he had no means of knowing if he hit anybody. But he had certainly done plenty of damage, he reflected happily as the car raced away from the scene. He'd given them as good as they sent, and with their own weapon. Since machine guns had been introduced into the war, the score was even.

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first Tony had considered that long scar on the left side of his face a blessing because of the change it had made in his appearance. But now he was beginning to regard it as a curse. It was making him a marked man. Already he was known through the underworld, not only to the members of the Lovo gang but to those of other mobs, as "Scarface Tony." And to be so well known that he could be easily identified was distinctly not a part of his plans.

He felt, too, that that scar might be hurting his suit with Jane Conley, the gun girl. Women could not make themselves love men who had disfiguring marks of any kind and that scar, even though it was becoming less noticeable as time went on, was not a thing of beauty.

He and Jane were the best of friends, often going places together and seeing a great deal of each other. Yet he felt that he was actually no closer to her than he had been the first time they met, the night they had disposed of Jerry Hoffman. But the

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 lure of her was growing upon him more and more, if such a thing were possible.

"Listen, girlie," he said one night, "I love you—more than I could ever tell you; I'm not much good at talkin'. But all I want is a chance to prove it. Please say 'yes' to that proposition I made you a long time ago."

Jane looked him straight in the eye for a moment and the directness of her gaze was rather disconcerting.

"All right," she answered. "We'll look around to-morrow for a place."

"You'll do it?" he cried, almost beside himself with elation.

"For one month—on trial. If at the end of that time I am not pleased witheverything, I am to leave and you are to say nothing, not even seeing me again if I ask you not to. Those are my conditions. Do you accept them?"

"Yes."

"Very well; it's a bargain."

"And if you are pleased with—everything?" he queried.

"The arrangement will probably last some time," she answered quietly.

Tony went away from the house that night, al-

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 most choking with triumph. At last he had won; that glorious creature was about to become his―even if only for a month. But he meant to make things so pleasant that the arrangement would last much longer.

But he said nothing about it to Lovo when they met next morning. In the first place, it was a private matter and nobody else's business; and in the second, the gang leader was obviously preoccupied. Tony watched him pace nervously around the office, his unseeing gaze now on the ceiling, now on the floor, with a funny little sense of fright catching at his heart. What was troubling Lovo?

"I want to talk to you, Tony," said the other finally. "Sit down."

Tony took his place on the other side of the desk, feeling an odd sense of drama as though important events were about to transpire. Finally Lovo sat down himself in his big chair and lit another cigar.

"I've heard about your shooting up the florist shop the other night," he began.

"Yes?" said Tony uneasily. He wondered if he was to be sharply reprimanded.

"It was daring and all that but terribly dangerous. You must learn not to risk yourself like that."

"I—I'll try. But there's a lot of fun in pulling a job like that."

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 "I suppose so," assented Lovo. "For those that like it. Well, I'm not one of them. I'd rather be peaceable and make money. When they drag in machine guns, it's a bit too much. I've got plenty of money, Tony; more than I can ever spend if I use common sense. I think I'll take a trip, to Monte Carlo or Havana or some other gay sporting place where life is pleasant."

"For how long?"

"Years. In fact, I doubt very much if I shall ever return."

"But the mob! You can't let it break up and go to pieces—"

"It would be a shame to let such a complete organization wreck itself, wouldn't it? Well, can't somebody else run it?"

"Certainly." Then remembering to whom he was talking, he added: "Perhaps not as well as you've run it, but they could hold the crowd together and keep things moving. And there's so much jack laying around just waiting to be picked up."

His voice almost became a groan as he remembered and mentioned the large illicit profits waiting to be garnered.

"I know," assented Lovo. "I'm not through

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 with those profits yet myself Listen, Tony, do you think you could run this mob?"

"I know I could," answered the young man eagerly. "I wish you'd give me the chance."

"I'm going to. It's a heavy responsibility for a young fellow or even for an old one. But I'm going to take a chance on you and I believe you'll make good. You're to send half the net profits to me every month wherever I direct. If my payments don't come through regularly, of course I'll have to come back and—make other arrangements." Their eyes met as he said that and it was evident that they understood each other completely. "Of the other half, you're to keep two-thirds of it and give the other third to your first lieutenant, Steve Libati."

"You want him to work that close to me?" asked Tony. He disliked Libati intensely.

"Yes. He's much older at the game than you are and can give you good advice. Besides, he's always been completely loyal to me and I know he would never do anything that would hurt the organization. If—anything should happen to you, he is to take command."

"Does he know about all this?"

"No. But I'm going to tell him in an hour or

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text:
Rosengart v. Laird/Dissent White

MR. JUSTICE WHITE, with whom THE CHIEF JUSTICE and MR. JUSTICE REHNQUIST concur, dissenting.

The Court vacated the judgment of the Court of Appeals, 449 F. 2d 523, and directs that the Court of Appeals consider the views of the United States pursuant in this case. Finding the suggestions of the United States unacceptable, I dissent from today's judgment.

In its memorandum filed October 13, 1971, in response to the petition for certiorari, the United States asserted that in passing on petitioner's conscientious objector's claim the Army considered petitioner's opposition to war to be sincere and rejected the claim solely because [p909] petitioner's views did not qualify as religious under the standards of Welsh v. United States, 398 U.S. 333 (1970). It was therefore error, the United States urged, for the Court of Appeals to have put aside the Welsh issue and to have affirmed the denial of habeas corpus on insincerity grounds after making an "independent search of the administrative record" to discover a basis in fact for such a judgment.

These assertions were incredible. The Army Review Board, in its final order entered on September 10, 1970, denying the conscientious objector claim, unanimously found that "1LT Rosengart's purported conscientious objector beliefs are not truly held; and that any objection to war in any form he might sincerely hold is based solely on philosophical views and sociological experiences." The plain meaning of this order is that the Board both found that petitioner was not sincere and determined that his views were solely philosophical and sociological.

The Court of Appeals so read the Board's order, saying "[t]he Board found that any conscientious objection held by Rosengart was based solely on philosophical views and sociological experiences (a curious finding in the light of Welsh) and that Rosengart's 'purported conscientious [objector] beliefs are not truly held.'" Supra, at 528. The Court of Appeals then put aside the issue of whether petitioner's beliefs were religious within the meaning of the Act and affirmed the denial of habeas corpus after agreeing with the District Court that there was a basis in fact for a conclusion of insincerity because the record "cast a cloud upon the sincerity of his professed deeply-held beliefs of conscientious objection." Ibid.

There was nothing untoward in the way the Court of Appeals approached the case, particularly since the United States in its October 13 memorandum flatly asserted that there was indeed sufficient evidence in the [p910] record to support the judgment of insincerity and that "under normal circumstances, such evidence would, in our view, provide ample factual basis for a denial of petitioner's application for discharge."

When asked for further response, the United States filed a supplemental memorandum on December 10, 1971, modifying its position. It now concedes the dual basis of the Board's order and that "[v]iewed solely in light of the September 10 Board decision, the majority's conclusion in this regard is not unwarranted." It also reveals that "[i]ndeed, such a result was suggested by the government's argument below...." Nevertheless, although again not disagreeing "with the conclusion reached by the majority below that there was basis in fact on this record to sustain a finding of 'insincerity' with respect to petitioner's claimed opposition to war," the Government's position in the Court of Appeals is characterized as placing "undue emphasis on the final recommendation of the Army Review Board." It is now urged that the Board's September 10 decision be read in conjunction with its earlier decisions and that in context the Board be deemed to have found petitioner to be sincere.

I find nothing to commend the Government's position in this case. It would be one thing if it forthrightly supported petitioner's sincerity. It is quite another thing to assert that the record supports a judgment of insincerity, and then, notwithstanding this concession, to urge setting aside the final order of the Army Review Board which plainly found petitioner insincere and which the United States does not straightforwardly argue was beyond the power of the Board.

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 two after you and I have gone over some details."

For two hours the gang leader and his successor discussed various aspects of the mob and its activities. Tony merely assented to whatever Lovo said but his own mind was formulating rapidly a plan of campaign, an aggressive, ruthless campaign that would leave the Lovo organization in command of the field. His eyes glinted as he thought of the many daring moves he wanted to make.

At last Steve Libati was called in and apprised of the situation. He was an ugly brute in the late thirties, a gangster of the old school, the type that wore sweaters and shapeless checked caps and lounged in front of frowsy corner saloons with a cigarette dangling from one corner of their ugly mouths while they talked hoarsely from the other. He had hard gray eyes and a nose bent slightly to one side and a mean mouth that sneered easily and nastily.

Tony disliked him intently and he had never evidenced any particular affection for Tony. They represented two entirely different epochs in gangland, and had practically nothing in common. Steve was of the pre-war "strong-arm" type, who knew nothing except the law of might. Tony was of the dapper, business-like, post-war type that

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 went in for efficiency and regular business administration in crime, and that handled its necessary "rough stuff" with a breath-taking speed and thoroughness that accomplished the end without leaving any traces of the perpetrators.

Furthermore, Tony had none of Lovo's faith in either Steve's ability or his loyalty. He had never seen the fellow do anything that proved either one. And he resented having the man handed to him on a plate and being told to make the best of it. But already he had resolved one thing—if he and Steve didn't get along well together, he intended to rid himself of the fellow. There were ways

"Well, kid, we'll hit it off together in great shape, won't we?" exclaimed Steve with a great show of heartiness when the conditions of Lovo's virtual abdication had been explained to him. But there was a sly look in his hard eyes and a patronizing note in his rough voice that angered Tony.

"I hope so," he said coldly and turned to say something to Lovo.

Tony walked out of the hotel in the grip of a strange mixture of emotions. He was elated, of course, at being elevated to command of the big Lovo organization—it furnished him with the "break" he had always wished for and which would

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 give him a chance to make good in a big way and clean up. But he resented Steve Libati. The more he thought about him, the more he disliked and distrusted the fellow. He could see him only as a spy for Lovo and as a general meddler. Oh, well, that problem would work itself out in time.

He met Jane and they went flat-hunting together. He told her of his big promotion and she was as excited as a child over a new toy.

"What a marvelous opportunity!" she exclaimed over and over. "You ought to be able to clean up and retire in a couple of years."

"Who wants to retire?" he demanded. "I want to live. Just because I'm the boss don't mean that I'm goin' to hide myself in an office some place and let somebody else have all the fun. I'm goin' to be out on the firing line myself every now and then. You and I are goin' to pull some more little jobs, girlie; don't forget it. And there's goin' to be plenty of jobs to be done. If I'm to run this mob, I'm goin' to run it, and no half way business. Moreover, I'm either goin' to run the competition out of town or kill 'em off."

They found a handsome furnished apartment in a large building in a fashionable section. The rent was enormous but they both liked the place

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text:
Author talk:Leon Trotsky

Not PD in Russia
Hello there. Just wanted to note that Trotsky was rehabilitated in 2001. As he was rehabilitated posthumously, copyright term is counted from January 1 of the year following the year of rehabilitation, that is, 2002. (In Russia, at least; his works are PD in the US). Bedivere (talk) 01:49, 6 March 2024 (UTC)

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 and Tony was a "big shot" now. They rented the place for one month and he paid the rent in cash. And the following day found them installed, Jane as tremulously happy as a bride on her honeymoon.

Lovo departed on Friday. Tony drove him to a small station on the far South Side where he took a train for New York. Thus, there were no reporters or photographers around and the public at large had no inkling that he was gone. Tony wanted to have everything running smoothly and have his own position and leadership thoroughly established before Lovo's absence was known.

Returning to Lovo's former office in the hotel to take command, Tony found Steve Libati comfortably established there, tilted back in Lovo's big chair, his feet on the desk, smoking a cigar.

" ’Lo, kid!" he greeted Tony. And again his voice held that patronizing tone that made the younger man furious.

"Would you mind moving to another chair?" asked Tony coldly. "I want to sit there."

"Oh, all right." Steve shifted to another chair and Tony sat down at the desk. "As we're goin' to run the mob, I thought you and I ought to have a little talk."

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 "I don't know what about," retorted Tony coolly, picking up some papers and riffling through them in a This-is-my-busy-day manner. "I haven't decided on any definite plans yet. When I do. I'll let you know and give you your orders for your part in them."

For a long moment the two men stared at each other. Tony's right hand had moved quietly to his side coat pocket. He was waiting for definite insubordination. It did not come. Steve's mean eyes narrowed and his ugly mouth twisted into a snarl. Then he relaxed and forced a smile.

"All right," he said, "if that's the way you feel about it." He picked up his hat and walked out. Tony had won the first tilt. But he realized that the inevitable serious trouble between them had only been postponed.

Tony worked hard the rest of that day and evening and all the next day and evening, getting things organized both in his head and on paper. The gang had been gradually falling lately, both in efficiency and income, because of Lovo's reluctance to carry out reprisals. There was much to do. The first thing was to carry out successfully two or three daring coups—preferably killings—

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 against the enemy so as to give the boys some confidence and pride in their own outfit. Then would come the serious organization work that meant big profits. Within sixty days, Tony meant to have those profits bigger than they had ever been under Lovo's leadership.

It was almost ten o'clock on Saturday night when Al, the little rat-faced gangster who acted as guard and doorman for the office, came in to Tony.

"Captain Flanagan's here," he announced.

Tony looked up quickly.

"Who?" he demanded.

"Captain Flanagan, chief of the dicks at head quarters."

A grim smile played about Tony's lips. So Flanagan was here! Well he remembered that bullying officer whom he had knocked down in the cabaret for insulting Vyvyan and who thereafter had practically run him out of town. The shoe was on the other foot now. Tony took an ugly automatic out of a drawer and laid it on the desk within easy reach.

"Show him in!" he ordered grimly.

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, chief of detectives, came striding into the new gang leader's office with the confident, arrogant air of one who is on familiar ground and who, though not expecting a warm welcome, realizes that his position demands a certain courtesy and respect.

Scarface Tony, seated behind the desk to which he had just succeeded, with his right hand resting lightly on the automatic lying on its top, watched the official enter. And a blast of rage as fierce as the heat from a suddenly opened furnace door swept through him. But the main thing he wondered was whether or not Flanagan would recognize him.

Flanagan evidently did not see in this smartly dressed man with a livid scar traversing the left side of his hard face from ear to jaw the handsome boy who had knocked him down less than three years before and whom he later had practically run out of the city. For there was no hint of recognition in the officer's granite gray eyes as he pushed

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 his derby to the back of his head and with his big feet planted widely apart and his hands thrust deep into his pockets, stood staring at the new leader of the powerful Lovo gang.

"Where's Johnny?" demanded Flanagan.

"Mr. Lovo is not in." Tony's eyes were as coldly impersonal as his tone.

"I can see that," snapped Flanagan, his cruel mouth twisting angrily. "I ain't blind. Where is he?"

"Out of town. And he won't be back for some time."

Flanagan snorted.

"Quit kiddin'," he snarled. "Johnny's always in on the first of the month—for me."

"Oh! I see. Just a moment."

From one of the desk drawers Tony produced a small notebook which contained the gang's "pay off" list, the names of those officials, high and low, who had to be "padded," and the amount of the monthly "bit" of each. The list was carefully arranged in alphabetical order and Tony soon ascertained that the Lovo mob's monthly contribution to the happiness and prosperity of Captain Flanagan was $500.

Tony dropped the little book back in the desk

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 drawer. Then he pulled out a fat roll of money and peeling off five $100 bills, threw them across the desk in a manner most contemptuous.

"There you are. But remember that we want some service for all this jack we pay out."

"As if you didn't get it," snarled Flanagan, snatching up the money and stuffing it into his pocket.

"What I could do to this outfit if I wanted would be a sight."

"Yes, I suppose so," admitted Tony reflectively. "Yet we boys have our own methods for discouraging our enemies."

"What do you mean?" "Nothing," answered Tony calmly, but he could see that his veiled warning had registered. "And now, Flanagan, I think it might be a good idea for you and I to have a little talk. I'm Tony Camonte. And from now on I'm in command of this mob."

"You!"

"Me," asserted Tony solemnly. "Johnny Lovo left yesterday for a long vacation. He may be back sometime but I don't think so. He's got plenty of dough and he's tired of this racket. Of course he's still interested but he turned the active control of things over to me."

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 now was too wealthy to allow itself to be hunted down. But even a cop was human, thought Tony; how could people be so foolish as to expect him to do his duty for five thousand a year—and sometimes less—when not doing it would make him twenty-five thousand and oftentimes more. A knock at the door roused him from his reflections on cops in general and Flanagan in particular.

"Come in," he called brusquely and had the automatic trained on the portal before one could turn the knob.

But it was only Al, the little rat-faced outer door-keeper.

"Somebody just phoned on that back room wire at the cigar store downstairs," he announced, "and said that Charlie Martino, one of our truck drivers, was hi-jacked and shot a little bit ago. He's at a garage in Maywood now—here's the addressand whoever phoned said he needs a doctor bad."

"Wonder why he didn't give 'em one of our numbers up here to call," Tony said.

"Prob'ly didn't want to give 'em to strangers. Charlie's a good, reliable boy, boss," said Al pleadingly. "I know him well."

"If it's true, I want to help him all I can," said Tony. "But most likely it's that North Side mob

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 tryin' to put me on the spot. We got to go careful on this."

Within five minutes—so thoroughly systematized was the Lovo organization and its operations—Tony was in possession of Charlie Martino's scheduled movements for the evening and also of his part record with the gang. The latter was unblemished, both as to loyalty and ability, over a period of two years. This evening Charlie was supposed to be bringing a load of raw grain alcohol from Melrose Park, a suburb where almost every house had a big still and the Italian inhabitants were making comfortable little fortunes by "cooking" "alky" for the big syndicates, into a warehouse near the gang's headquarters in Cicero. A call to Melrose Park revealed that he had picked up his load and departed according to schedule. But another call revealed that he had not arrived at the warehouse. It looked as though the plea for assistance was genuine.

"Tell six or seven of the boys downstairs to bring around a coupla cars and plenty of gats," snapped Tony, his black eyes glittering with excitement, though his voice was as cool and calm as if he were giving a telephone number. "I'm going out and have a look at this."

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 Al hurried away, to relay orders to the cigar store downstairs which was a sort of "squad room" for the gang. Tony called a "safe" doctor—one of those rare physicians who, for enormous fees, will attend the underworld's gunshot wounds without going through the prescribed formality of reporting them to the police—and, giving him the address in Maywood, ordered him to proceed there immediately. Then he grabbed his automatic and hurried downstairs.

In the dark alley back of the hotelwhich was the gang's headquarters because Lovo owned it—he found a group of shadowy figures moving about two large dark touring cars with drawn side curtains. The clank of metal against metal came to his ears as he advanced. They were loading in the machine guns, of course.

"Ready, boys?" he inquired. "Good! Let's go!"

He leaped into the tonneau of one car. Men piled in around him and in front and he saw the other men climbing into the car ahead. Motors roared into pulsing life and with a whine of racing engines the two carloads of expert gunmen sped away on their errand of either mercy or murder. Tony hoped it would prove to be both.

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 To his left he could discern in the gloom the ugly snouts of two machine-guns. He reached over and pulled one of them into his lap.

"I'm with these babies like some people with a car," he said with a laugh. "I feel safer when I'm at the wheel."

A block away from the garage which was their objective, they cut out the engines and coasted the rest of the way. But their practiced eyes found nothing suspicious on any side. Abruptly the engines roared again and the two big cars, bristling with the most modern death-dealing machinery, ready for anything, swept into the garage and ground to a halt.

A man in greasy mechanic's coveralls came forward, wiping his hands on a bit of waste. Tony opened the door next to him and looked out.

"We had a call that there was a man here—hurt," he said brusquely.

"Yes. He's back there in my little office. A doctor just came to see him."

The man jerked a dirty thumb toward a small coupe which Tony recognized as belonging to the doctor he had summoned. The gang leader lifted his machine-gun to the floor of the car and stepped out. But as he followed the other man across the

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 grease-spotted concrete floor, his right hand was plunged deep into his side coat pocket and his keen glance was searching the shadows on all sides. Behind him, he knew that other keen glances were doing the same thing and that he was covered by an amazing amount of artillery.

As the two men entered the cluttered little space partitioned off from the rest of the building, the doctor looked up. He was a thin, nervous little man with a pallid complexion and shifty black eyes. But he knew his business, as many a live gangster could testify.

"Pretty serious," he said with a gesture toward his patient, who lay stretched out on a canvas cot, his eyes closed, his breathing slow and hoarse, "Shot twice through the chest. He's lost a lot of blood. We ought to get him somewhere where I can work on him."

"Can he be moved?" asked Tony.

"Yes. I'll give him a stimulant."

The doctor quickly filled a hypodermic needle from some of the bottles in his grip and injected the contents into the patient's wrist. In a few moments the boy—he was little more than that—opened his eyes. Tony walked over to him.

"He's too weak to talk," cautioned the doctor.

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 Tony grasped his henchman's hand. Their glances met, held, and the boy's vacant stare changed to happy recognition.

Was it the North Side outfit?" demanded Tony harshly. "Schemer Bruno's mob?"

The boy tried to speak but so much effort was beyond him. He nodded.

"All right, we'll see them, kid," promised Tony gruffly and gripped that limp hand hard.

The garage man's eyes widened when he heard that ominous threat of gangland vengeance. When Tony turned on him, he told his story quickly. Returning from towing a car out of a ditch, he had come upon the wounded boy lying at the side of a lonely road, and had brought him on to the garage. The boy had pleaded with him to call only a certain number, a request to which he had acceded.

"You see, I thought it was prob'ly a case that it was best not to make too much fuss about," he concluded.

"You've done well," Tony commended, and slipped him a $100 bill. "How's your memory?"

"Terrible, boss," grinned the man with a knowing wink. "Why, I have to look up the number every time I want to phone my own house."

Tony grinned himself and slapped the man on

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 the back. Money and power on one hand and lack of them on the other has a way of making people understand each other quickly and thoroughly.

They took the wounded boy back to a room in the hotel which was the gang's headquarters and the doctor went to work on him in an effort to save his life. Tony retired to his private office and sent for Steve Libati, the man whom Lovo had appointed as second in command of the gang during his absence and who, Tony realized, was very jealous of his position as chief. He felt that now was as good a time as any to give the man an important assignment, to test his ability and his loyalty.

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came in looking somewhat sullen and defiant. A gangster of a somewhat older school than Tony, of the sweater-and-checked-cap era, he had never quite accustomed himself to the smooth, suave, business-like methods of the modern, post-Prohibition gangsters. Though he now wore the best clothes and drove an expensive car, he still talked from one corner of his cruel mouth and, at times, revealed other distressing symptoms of having been a common street-corner thug.

"That North Side mob's at it again," said Tony, plunging immediately to the heart of the matter. "They hi-jacked one of our trucks of alky to-night and knocked off the driver. Kid named Charlie Martino. I took some of the boys and went out and got him a little bit ago. He's down the hall here now and Doc's workin' on him to try to keep him from croakin'. Happened between Maywood and Melrose Park. That's the first time that outfit has come that far into our territory and it's goin' to be the last."

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 "Think you can stop 'em?" asked Libati calmly, his head cocked on one side and his left eye closed against the smoke curling upward from his cigarette.

"I'm going to stop 'em." Tony punctuated the statement with a sharp blow on the desk with his clenched fist. "If I have to have every man in the mob bumped off. Things have been too quiet lately; from now on, they're goin' to see action that'll curl their hair. Johnny thought that Jerry Hoffman bein' bumped off would ruin that mob but they found this Schemer Bruno guy and he's turned out to be the best leader since Dean Martin, better than Jerry ever thought of bein'. From now on, the war's between that mob and this one; the others don't cut much ice.

"Now, Steve, bumpin' off small fry like Charlie is a nuisance but it don't really hurt a mob. You can always find plenty of kids who'll take a chance for the price. To ruin a mob, you gotta get the leaders, the brains of the outfit. And you can bet this Schemer guy knows that as well as we do. So it's just a matter of time till he takes a crack at me—or you. Well, I'm goin' to beat him to the draw and get him before he gets me. And I've picked you to do the job."

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 Steve tensed. His ugly features settled into an angry scowl.

"Why me?" he demanded.

"I gotta have somebody reliable that I can trust to handle it right."

"Why don't you do it yourself?" For a long moment Tony stared at his subordinate while fury gathered in his eyes. He strangled it with an obvious effort.

"Because I don't choose to. As head of the mob, I think my duty is to stay in the background and run things."

Libati laughed sarcastically. Tony's eyes blazed.

"I could get Bruno," he snapped furiously, "and do it within forty-eight hours. Don't think I wouldn't like to. And I will if necessary. But with my position now, I feel I shouldn't take chances like that if I don't have to. Just the same. I'll never ask a man in this mob to do anything that I can't or won't do myself. I got Jerry Hoffman and I got others. A good many times I proved I got guts enough for anything. But I never heard yet of you provin' that you had any. Now's your chance."

Libati paled at the insinuation and his cruel

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 mouth set in a nasty snarl. For a moment it looked as though he was going to pull a gun, Tony hoped he would, for he himself was ready and that would settle his problem of what to do with Steve Libati. But the fellow had sense enough to regain his self control.

"You talk like you was the only big shot in this mob," he snarled, "What about me? Ain't I one of the leaders?"

"Yes," answered Tony quietly, "And I didn't ask you to do the job yourself. But I want you to handle it, to get the dope about where and when he can be put on a spot and then get him. You can work it your own way, have any of the boys you want to help you, but I want it done."

"And if I don't care to do it?" queried Steve impudently.

"You're through with this mob," retorted Tony coldly.

"After the orders Johnny left?"

"That don't cut any ice. There's nobody stays in this mob a minute that don't obey my orders. That goes for you as well as the truck drivers. And there's my authority!"

He whipped out his heavy, ugly automatic and slammed it down on the desk, Libati's glance riv-

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 eted to the gun for a moment, then he looked up at Tony and his eyes shifted again. He rose.

"All right, I'll do it," he said, and walked out.

Tony smiled a little when the man had gone. Again he had won over the sullenly defiant Libati. He felt that he might yet master the fellow and make him a highly useful subordinate. Well, one thing certain; he'd either master him or make use of the "authority" he had exhibited to clinch his argument.

For half an hour Tony sat quietly smoking while he thought over the situation. It began to look as if this Schemer Bruno had come by his name rightfully, as if he were a worthy foe. And as an instrument with which to carry out his schemes he had as powerful a gang as was to be found in the United States. Its personnel was at least as strong as that of the Lovo mob and had proved itself to be equally resourceful and ruthless. And under the able leadership of this Schemer Bruno it seemed to have set out on the same sort of ambitious program of expansion that Tony himself now intended embarking upon with the aid of the Lovo gang.

Tony had heard, too, that the three most important gangs on the South Side were about to

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 If we take into account the qualities necessary for the successful conduct of any important undertaking,—that it requires special aptitude, promptitude of action on emergencies, capacity for organizing the labours often of large numbers of men, great tact and knowledge of human nature, constant self-culture, and growing experience in the practical affairs of life,—it must, we think, be obvious that the school of business is by no means so narrow as some writers would have us believe. Mr. Helps has gone much nearer the truth when he said that consummate men of business are as rare almost as great poets—rarer, perhaps, than veritable saints and martyrs. Indeed, of no other pursuit can it so emphatically be said, as of this, that "Business makes men."

It has, however, been a favourite fallacy with dunces in all times, that men of genius are unfitted for business, as well as that business occupations unfit men for the pursuits of genius. The unhappy youth who committed suicide a few years since because he had been "born to be a man and condemned to be a grocer," proved by the act that his soul was not equal even to the dignity of grocery. For it is not the calling that degrades the man, but the man that degrades the calling. All work that brings honest gain is honourable, whether it be of hand or mind. The fingers may be soiled, yet the heart remain pure; for it is not material so much as moral dirt that defiles—greed far more than grime, and vice than verdigris.

The greatest have not disdained to labour honestly and usefully for a living, though at the same time aiming after higher things. Thales, the first of the seven sages, Solon, the second founder


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 A man making the confession of any creed worth ten minutes' intelligent talk, is always a man who gains something and gives up something. So long as he does both he can create: for he is makimg an outline and a shape. Mahomet created, when he forbade wine but allowed five wives: he created a very big thing, which we have still to deal with. The first French Republie created, when it affirmed property and abolished peerages; France still stands like a square, four-sided building which Europe has besieged in vain. The men of the Oxford Movement would have been horrified at being compared either with Moslems or Jacobins. But their sub-conscious thirst was for something that Moslems and Jacobins had and ordinary Anglicans had not: the exalted excitement of consistency. If you were a Moslem you were not a Bacchanal. If you were a Republican you were not a peer. And so the Oxford men, even in their first and dimmest stages, felt that if you were a


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 you were not a Dissenter. The Oxford Movement was, out of the very roots of its being, a rational movement; almost a rationalist movement. In that it differed sharply from the other reactions that shook the Utilitarian compromise; the blinding mysticism of Carlyle, the mere manly emotionalism of Dickens. It was an appeal to reason: reason said that if a Christian had a feast day he must have a fast day too. Otherwise, all days ought to be alike; and this was that very Utilitarianism against which their Oxford Movement was the first and most rational assault.

This idea, even by reason of its reason, narrowed into a sort of sharp spear, of which the spear blade was Newman. It did forget many of the other forces that were fighting on its side. But the movement could boast, first and last, many men who had this eager dogmatic quality; Keble, who spoilt a poem in order to recognise a doctrine; Faber who told the rich, almost with taunts, that God


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 sent the poor as eagles to strip them, Froude who, with Newman announced his return in the arrogant motto of Achilles. But the greater part of all this happened before what is properly our period; and in that period Newman, and perhaps Newman alone, is the expression and summary of the whole school. It was certainly in the Victorian Age, and after his passage to Rome, that Newman claimed his complete right to be in any book on modern English literature. This is no place for estimating his theology: but one point about it does clearly emerge. Whatever else is right, the theory that Newman went over to Rome to find peace and an end of argument, is quite unquestionably wrong. He had far more quarrels after he had gone over to Rome. But, though he had far more quarrels, he had far fewer compromises: and he was of that temper which is tortured more by compromise than by quarrel. He was a man at once of abnormal energy and abnormal sensibility: nobody without that combination could


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 have written the Apologia. If he sometimes seemed to skin his enemies alive, it was because he himself lacked a skin. In this sense his Apologia is a triumph far beyond the ephemeral charge on which it was founded; in this sense he does indeed (to use his own expression) vanquish not -his accuser but his judges. Many men would shrink from recording all their cold fits and hesitations and prolonged inconsistencies: I am sure it was the breath of life to Newman to confess them, now that he had done with them for ever. His Lectures on the Present Position of English Catholics, practically preached against a raging mob, rise not only higher but happier, as his instant unpopularity increases. There is something grander than humour, there is fun, in the very first lecture about the British Constitution as explained to a meeting of Russians. But always his triumphs are the triumphs of a highly sensitive man: a man must feel insults before he can so insultingly and splendidly avenge them. He is a naked


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 of Athens, and Hyperates, the mathematician, were all traders. Plato, called the Divine by reason of the excellence of his wisdom, defrayed his travelling expenses in Egypt by the profits derived from the oil which he sold during his journey. Spinoza maintained himself by polishing glasses while he pursued his philosophical investigations. Linnæus, the great botanist, prosecuted his studies while hammering leather and making shoes. Shakespeare was a successful manager of a theatre—perhaps priding himself more upon his practical qualities in that capacity than on his writing of plays and poetry. Pope was of opinion that Shakespeare's principal object in cultivating literature was to secure an honest independence. Indeed, he seems to have been altogether indifferent to literary reputation. It is not known that he superintended the publication of a single play, or even sanctioned the printing of one; and the chronology of his writings is still a mystery. It is certain, however, that he prospered in his business, and realized sufficient to enable him to retire upon a competency to his native town of Stratford-upon-Avon.

Chaucer was in early life a soldier, and afterwards an effective Commissioner of Customs, and Inspector of Woods and Crown Lands. Spencer was Secretary to the Lord Deputy of Ireland, was afterwards Sheriff of Cork, and is said to have been shrewd and attentive in matters of business. Milton, originally a schoolmaster, was elevated to the post of Secretary to the Council of State during the Commonwealth; and the extant Order-book of the Council, as well as many of Milton's letters which are preserved, give abundant evidence of his activity and usefulness in that office. Sir Isaac


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 man, who carries a naked sword. The quality of his literary style is so successful that it succeeds in escaping definition. The quality of his logic is that of a long but passionate patience, which waits until he has fixed all corners of an iron trap. But the quality of his moral comment on the age remains what I have said: a protest of the rationality of religion as against the increasing irrationality of mere Victorian comfort and compromise. So far as the present purpose is concerned, his protest died with him: he left few imitators and (it may easily be conceived) no successful imitators. The suggestion of him lingers on in the exquisite Elizabethan perversity of Coventry Patmore; and has later flamed out from the shy voleano of Francis Thompson. Otherwise (as we shall see in the parallel case of Ruskin's Socialism) he has no followers in his own age: but very many in ours.

The next group of reactionaries or romantics or whatever we elect to call them, gathers


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 roughly around one great name. Scotland, from which had come so many of those harsh economists who made the first Radical philosophies of the Victorian Age, was destined also to fling forth (I had almost said to spit forth) their fiercest and most extraordinary enemy. The two primary things in Thomas Carlyle were his early Scotch education and his later German culture. The first was in almost all respects his strength; the latter in some respects his weakness. As an ordinary lowland peasant, he inherited the really valuable historic property of the Scots, their independence, their fighting spirit, and their instinctive philosophic consideration of men merely as men. But he was not an ordinary peasant. If he had laboured obscurely in his village till death, he would have been yet locally a marked man; a man with a wild eye, a man with an air of silent anger; perhaps a man at whom stones were sometimes thrown. A strain of disease and suffering ran athwart both his body and his soul. In spite of his


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 praise of silence, it was only through his gift of utterance that he escaped madness. But while his fellow-peasants would have seen this in him and perhaps mocked it, they would also have seen something which they always expect in such men, and they would have got it; vision, a power in the mind akin to second sight. Like many ungainly or otherwise unattractive Scotchmen, he was a seer. By which I do not mean to refer so much to his transcendental rhapsodies about the Worldsoul or the Nature-garment or the Mysteries and Eternities generally, these seem to me to belong more to his German side and to be less sincere and vital. I mean a real power of seeing things suddenly, not apparently reached by any process; a grand power of guessing. He saw the crowd of the new States General, Danton with his "rude flattened face," Robespierre peering mistily through his spectacles. He saw the English charge at Dunbar. He guessed that Mirabeau, however dissipated and diseased, had something sturdy


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 inside him. He guessed that Lafayette, however brave and victorious, had nothing inside him. He supported the lawlessness of Cromwell, because across two centuries he almost physically felt the feebleness and hopelessness of the moderate Parliamentarians. He said a word of sympathy for the universally vituperated Jacobins of the Mountain, because through thick veils of national prejudice and misrepresentation, he felt the impossibility of the Gironde. He was wrong in denying to Scott the power of being inside his characters: but he really had a good deal of that power himself. It was one of his innumerable and rather provincial crotchets to encourage prose as against poetry. But, as a matter of fact, he himself was much greater considered as a kind of poet than considered as anything else; and the central idea of poetry is the idea of guessing right, like a child.

Hie first emerged, as it were, as a student and disciple of Goethe. The connection was not wholly fortunate. With much of what


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 Goethe really stood for he was not really in sympathy; but in his own obstinate way, he tried to knock his idol into shape instead of choosing another. He pushed further and further the extravagances of a vivid but very unbalanced and barbaric style, in the praise of a poet who really represented the calmest classicism and the attempt to restore a Hellenic equilibrium in the mind. It is like watching a shaggy Scandinavian decorating a Greek statue washed up by chance on his shores. And while the strength of Goethe was a strength of completion and serenity, which Carlyle not only never found but never even sought, the weaknesses of Goethe were of a sort that did not draw the best out of Carlyle. The one civilised element that the German classicists forgot to put into their beautiful balance was a sense of humour. And great poet as Goethe was, there is to the last something faintly fatuous about his half sceptical, half sentimental self-importance; a Lord Chamberlain of teacup politics; an earnest


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 and elderly flirt; a German of the Germans. Now Carlyle had humour; he had it in his very style, but it never got into his philosophy. His philosophy largely remained a heavy Teutonic idealism, absurdly unaware of the complexity of things; as when he perpetually repeated (as with a kind of flat-footed stamping) that people ought to tell the truth; apparently supposing, to quote Stevenson's phrase, that telling the truth is as easy as blind hookey. Yet, though his general honesty is unquestionable, he was by no means one of those who will give up a fancy under the shock of a fact. If by sheer genius he frequently guessed right, he was not the kind of man to admit easily that he had guessed wrong. His version of Cromwell's filthy cruelties in Ireland, or his impatient slurring over of the most sinister riddle in the morality of Frederick the Great—these passages are, one must frankly say, disingenuous. But it is, so to speak, a generous disingenuousness; the heat and momentum


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 of sincere admirations, not the shuffling fear and flattery of the constitutional or patriotic historian. It bears most resemblance to the incurable prejudices of a woman.

For the rest there hovered behind all this transcendental haze a certain presence of old northern paganism; he really had some sympathy with the vast vague gods of that moody but not unmanly Nature-worship which seems to have filled the darkness of the North before the coming of the Roman Eagle or the Christian Cross. This he combined, allowing for certain sceptical omissions, with the grisly Old Testament God he had heard about in the black Sabbaths of his childhood; and so promulgated (against both Rationalists and Catholics) a sort of heathen Puritanism: Protestantism purged of its evidences of Christianity.

His great and real work was the attack on Utilitarianism: which did real good, though there was much that was muddled and dangerous in the historical philosophy which he


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 for young men is hardly justifiable; and it is of all things the most prejudicial to themselves. They think what they have much larger than it really is; and they make no exertion. The young should never hear any language but this: 'You have your own way to make, and it depends upon your own exertions whether you starve or not.' Believe me, &c., ."

Practical industry, wisely and vigorously applied, always produces its due effects. It carries a man onward, brings out his individual character, and stimulates the action of others. All may not rise equally, yet each, on the whole, very much according to his deserts. "Though all cannot live on the piazza," as the Tuscan proverb has it, "every one may feel the sun."

On the whole, it is not good that human nature should have the road of life made too easy. Better to be under the necessity of working hard and faring meanly, than to have everything done ready to our hand and a pillow of down to repose upon. Indeed, to start in life with comparatively small means seems so necessary as a stimulus to work, that it may almost be set down as one of the conditions essential to success in life. Hence, an eminent judge, when asked what contributed most to success at the bar, replied, "Some succeed by great talent, some by high connexions, some by miracle, but the majority by commencing without a shilling."

We have heard of an architect of considerable accomplishments—a man who had improved himself by long study, and travel in the classical lands of the East—who came home to commence the practice of his profession. He determined to begin


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 106 an had washed for him, he went to call upon the rich man of the village (who held a mortgage on his meadow and rye-field) to plead with him for mercy, in the hope that the rich man might let him go free.

But he failed to find mercy in the heart of the mortgagee. The latter's only response was, "Bring the money."

So in the evening the peasant returned to his home in deep sorrow, and on entering the house was unable to suppress his tears. On hearing this sad news, Elissey became lost in thought.

"How," said he to himself, "will they now manage to live? They will go out to mow and have nothing for their labor, as the meadow is mortgaged. The rye will be ripe and the people will go harvesting (for the crop is abundant), but they need expect none of the fruits, for the whole deciatina [about three acres] is mortgaged to the rich peasant. When I go they will again be left to starve."


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 little paper box made for it, and had it ticketed with the day of the month and my age.

"Just before the French revolution broke out, the ambassador from Paris to the English Court was the Comte d’Adhémar. That nobleman had some influence on my fate as far as regarded my wish to go abroad, which, however, I was not able to gratify until many years afterwards. I was but seven or eight years old when I saw him; and when he came by invitation to pay a visit to my papa at Chevening, there was such a fuss with the fine footmen with feathers, in their hats, and the count’s bows and French manners, and I know not what, that, a short time afterwards, when I was sent to Hastings with the governess and my sisters, nothing would satisfy me but I must go and see what sort of a place France was. So I got into a boat one day unobserved, that was floating close to the beach, let loose the rope myself, and off I went. Yes, doctor, I literally pushed a boat off, and meant to go, as I thought, to France. Did you ever hear of such a mad scheme?

"But I was tired of all those around me, who, to all my questions, invariably answered, 'My dear, that is not proper for you to know,—or, you must not talk about such things until you get older; and the like. So I held my tongue, but I made up for it, by treasuring up everything I heard and saw. Isn’t it extraordinary


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 preached as an alternative. It is his real glory that he was the first to see clearly and say plainly the great truth of our time; that the wealth of the state is not the prosperity of the people. Macaulay and the Mills and all the regular run of the Early Victorians, took it for granted that if Manchester was getting richer, we had got hold of the key to comfort and progress. Carlyle pointed out (with stronger sagacity and humour than he showed on any other question) that it was just as true to say that Manchester was getting poorer as that it was getting richer: or, in other words, that Manchester was not getting richer at all, but only some of the less pleasing people in Manchester. In this matter he is to be noted in connection with national developments much later; for he thus became the first prophet of the Socialists. Sartor Resartus is an admirable fantasia; The French Revolution is, with all its faults, a really fine piece of history; the lectures on Heroes contain some masterly sketches of


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. But I think it is in Past and Present, and the essay on Chartism, that Carlyle achieves the work he was chosen by gods and men to achieve; which possibly might not have been achieved by a happier or more healthy-minded man. He never rose to more deadly irony than in such macabre descriptions as that of the poor woman proving her sisterhood with the rich by giving them all typhoid fever; or that perfect piece of badinage about "Overproduction of Shirts"; in which he imagines the aristocrats claiming to be quite clear of this offence. "Will you bandy accusations, will you accuse us of over-production? We take the Heavens and the Earth to witness that we have produced nothing at all... He that accuses us of producing, let him show himself. Let him say what and when." And he never wrote so sternly and. justly as when be compared the "divine sorrow" of Dante with the "undivine sorrow" of Utilitarianism, which had already come down to talking about the breeding of the poor


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 and to hinting at infanticide. This is a representative quarrel; for if the Utilitarian spirit reached its highest point in Mill, it certainly reached its lowest point in Malthus.

One last element in the influence of Carlyle ought to be mentioned; because it very strongly dominated his disciples—especially Kingsley, and to some extent Tennyson and Ruskin. Because he frowned at the cockney cheerfulness of the cheaper economists, they and others represented him as a pessimist, and reduced all his azure infinities to a fit of the blues. But Carlyle's philosophy, more carefully considered, will be found to be dangerously optimist rather than pessimist. As a thinker Carlyle is not sad, but recklessly and rather unscrupulously satisfied. For he seems to have held the theory that good could not be definitely defeated in this world; and that everything in the long run finds its right level. It began with what we may call the "Bible of History" idea: that all human affairs and politics were a clouded but


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 revelation of the divine. Thus any enormous and unaltered human settlement— as the Norman Conquest or the secession of America—we must suppose to be the will of God. It lent itself to picturesque treatment; and Carlyle and the Carlyleans were above all things picturesque. It gave them at first a rhetorical advantage over the Catholic and other older schools. They could boast that their Creator was still creating; that he was in Man and Nature, and was not hedged round in a Paradise or imprisoned in a pyx. They could say their God had not grown too old for war: that He was present at Gettysburg and Gravelotte as much as at Gibeon and Gilboa. I do not mean that they literally said these particular things: they are what I should have said had I been bribed to defend their position. But they said things to the same effect: that what manages finally to happen, happens for a higher purpose. Carlyle said the French Revolution was a thing settled in the eternal councils to be; and therefore


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 (and not because it was right) attacking it was "fighting against God." And Kingsley even carried the principle so far as to tell a lady she should remain in the Church of England mainly because God had put her there. But in spite of its superficial spirituality and encouragement, it is not hard to see how such a doctrine could be abused. It practically comes to saying that God is on the side of the big battalions—or at least, of the victorious ones. Thus a creed which set out to create conquerors would only corrupt soldiers; corrupt them with a craven and unsoldierly worship of success: and that which began as the philosophy of courage ends as the philosophy of cowardice. If, indeed, Carlyle were right in saying that right is only "rightly articulated" might, men would never articulate or move in any way. For no act can have might before it is done: if there is no right, it cannot rationally be done at all. This element, like the Anti-Utilitarian element, is to be kept in mind in connection with after


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 sufficiently improved himself. Though a corpulent man, he was wonderfully active at picking up cut tennis balls, and when asked how he contrived to do so, he playfully replied, "Because I am a very pains-taking man." The same accuracy in trifling matters was displayed by him in things of greater importance; and he acquired his reputation, like the painter, by "neglecting nothing."

Method is essential, and enables a larger amount of work to be got through with satisfaction. "Method," said the Reverend Richard Cecil, "is like packing things in a box; a good packer will get in half as much again as a bad one." Cecil's despatch of business was extraordinary, his maxim being, "The shortest way to do many things is to do only one thing at once"; and he never left a thing undone with a view of recurring to it at a period of more leisure. When business pressed, he rather chose to encroach on his hours of meals and rest than omit any part of his work. De Witt's maxim was like Cecil's: "One thing at a time." "If," said he, "I have any necessary despatches to make, I think of nothing else till they are finished; if any domestic affairs require my attention, I give myself wholly up to them till they are set in order."

A French minister, who was alike remarkable for his despatch of business and his constant attendance at places of amusement, being asked how he contrived to combine both objects, replied, "Simply by never postponing till to-morrow what should be done to-day." Lord Brougham has said that a certain English statesman reversed the process, and that his maxim was, never to transact to-day what could be postponed till to-morrow. Unhappily, such is the practice of many besides


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 developments: for in this Carlyle is the first cry of Imperialism, as (in the other case) of Socialism: and the two babes unborn who stir at the trumpet are Mr. Bernard Shaw and Mr. Rudyard Kipling. Kipling also carries on from Carlyle the concentration on the purely Hebraic parts of the Bible. The fallacy of this whole philosophy is that if God is indeed present at a modern battle, He may be present not as on Gilboa but Golgotha.

Carlyle's direct historical worship of strength and the rest of it was fortunately not very fruitful; and perhaps lingered only in Froude the historian. Even he is more an interruption than a continuity. Froude develops rather the harsher and more impatient moral counsels of his master than like Ruskin the more romantic and sympathetic. He carries on the tradition of Hero Worship: but carries far beyond Carlyle the practice of worshipping people who cannot rationally be called heroes. In this matter that eccentric eye of the seer certainly helped Carlyle: in Cromwell and


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 Frederick the Great there was at least something self-begotten, original or mystical; if they were not heroes they were at least demigods or perhaps demons. But Froude set himself to the praise of the Tudors, a much lower class of people; ill-conditioned prosperous people who merely waxed fat and kicked. Such strength as Henry VIII had was the strength of a badly trained horse that bolts, not of any clear or courageous rider who controls him. There is a sort of strong man mentioned in Scripture who, because he masters himself, is more than he that takes a city. There is another kind of strong man (known to the medical profession) who cannot master himself; and whom it may take half a city to take alive. But for all that he is a low lunatic, and not a hero; and of that sort were too many of the heroes whom Froude attempted to praise. A kind of instinct kept Carlyle from over-praising Henry VIII; or that highly cultivated and complicated liar, Queen Elizabeth. Here, the only importance of this


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 is that one of Carlyle's followers carried further that "strength " which was the real weakness of Carlyle. I have heard that Froude's life of Carlyle was unsympathetic; but if it was so it was a sort of parricide. For the rest, like Macaulay, he was a picturesque and partisan historian: but, like Macaulay (and unlike the craven scientific historians of today) he was not ashamed of being partisan or of being picturesque. Such studies as he wrote on the Elizabethan seamen and adventurers, represent very triumphantly the sort of romance of England that all this school was attempting to establish; and link him up with Kingsley and the rest.

Ruskin may be very roughly regarded as the young lieutenant of Carlyle in his war on Utilitarian Radicalism: but as an individual he presents many and curious divergences. In the matter of style, he enriched English without disordering it. And in the matter of religion (which was the key of this age as of every other) he did not, like Carlyle, set up