To be your brother’s keeper is beautiful if you do not cease to be his friend.
Billy and the Book
One day last Winter in New York I attended a police court on a side street, just off lower Broadway. I was waiting to see my old friend Rosenfeld in the Equitable Life Building, but as his office didn’t open up until nine o’clock, I put in my time at the police court.
There was the usual assortment of drunks, petty thieves—male and female, black, white and coffee-colored—disorderlies, vagabonds and a man in full-dress suit and a wide expanse of dull ecru shirt-bosom.
The place was stuffy, foul-smelling, and reeked with a stale combination of tobacco and beer and patchouli, and tears, curses, fear and promises unkept.
The Judge turned things off, but without haste. He showed more patience and consideration than one usually sees on the bench. His judgments seemed to be gentle and just.
The courtroom was clearing, and I started to go.