By Advice of Counsel — A Closer Reading

Mistaken Identity and the Red Sweater

The opening story hinges on a single piece of clothing: a red sweater. Terry McGurk, the actual thrower, wears one; Tony Mathusek, the innocent bystander, also wears one. Officer Delany seizes on this coincidence, twisting Tony's arm and ignoring his protests: 'Say, mister, you got the wrong feller!' The butcher Froelich, described as 'not over-intelligent,' confirms the identification because he saw 'a feller mit a red sweater.' The police and the tradesman collaborate to railroad a child, with Delany promising 'the reformatory for him.'

Train uses dialect and physical detail to underscore the injustice. Tony's 'white face drawn with agony' contrasts with Delany's casual brutality. The episode is not a courtroom scene but a street-level arrest, showing how the legal system can fail before a case even reaches a judge. The red sweater becomes a symbol of arbitrary evidence—a detail that is visually striking but meaningless as proof.

Bargaining and Bluff in the District Attorney's Office

In a later story, Mr. Tutt negotiates with District Attorney Peckham over multiple cases. The dialogue is crisp and tactical: Tutt offers to plead Angelo Ferrero to manslaughter if Peckham drops a bigamy charge against Higgleby. Peckham counters with 'murder in the second,' but Tutt holds firm: 'Manslaughter.' The exchange reveals a system where charges are traded like commodities, with little regard for the underlying facts.

Peckham's suspicion about the Higgleby indictment leads him to force the terrified clerk Caput Magnus to try the case himself. Magnus, a 'perfect pundit' in chambers, is reduced to stammering and practicing his opening statement in the early dawn. His colleagues mock him: 'Caput's practisin'! Ain't he the little cuckoo!' The scene highlights the divide between theoretical legal knowledge and the performative skill required in court. Train portrays the D.A.'s office as a place of bluster, insecurity, and horse-trading.

The Office Lawyer Forced into the Arena

Caput Magnus is the collection's most vivid minor character. He is introduced as an 'office lawyer' who has 'never gone into court save as an onlooker or—as he would have phrased it—an amicus curiae.' Stripped of his books and forms, he is helpless. Peckham's fury—'You little blathering shrimp!'—drives Magnus to prepare frantically, reciting 'Gentlemen of the jury' to an empty room.

Train emphasizes the physical and psychological transformation: Magnus's 'dulcet tones' replace his usual roaring for stenographers. His colleagues eavesdrop and 'embrace themselves wildly' at his efforts. The story sets up a confrontation with Mr. Tutt, who is described as 'a fair dealer' but also a shrewd opponent. The reader is left to wonder whether Magnus will survive the trial or be 'eaten alive.' The tension between the desk-bound scholar and the courtroom gladiator is a recurring theme in Train's legal world.

Readers should pay attention to the way Train uses dialect, physical description, and rapid dialogue to create character and advance plot. The stories reward attention to small details—a red sweater, a misplaced brick, a clerk's stammer—that carry outsized consequences. The collection does not offer grand moral lessons but rather a series of ironic vignettes about the gap between law and justice, where cleverness often matters more than truth.

Reading Train's Tutt stories, I keep circling back to that boy in the red sweater—how the law's eyes see what they expect, not what's true. It's a quiet ache that lingers, the gap between verdict and understanding. That same ache surfaces when I revisit The Indian Question — Background and Themes. Different courtroom, same shadow.