Sheldon Lord - A Girl Called Honey

Court was finished for the day, and Judge McBee sat with his nephew in his office, smoking his first cigarette of the day. “Well, Edward,” he said. “How did it look from my side of the bench?”

“Frightening,” said Edward McBee earnestly. “Sitting back in the spectator’s seats, you don’t see the expressions on their faces. That girl—”

Judge McBee raised a humorous eyebrow. “Girl?”

“The one you called Honey. Charged with using heroin.”

“Oh, yes.” Judge McBee nodded, smiling. “She’s an old friend,” he said. “In once or twice a month, for playing the prostitute. Been around for years.”

“How old is she?”

“Oh, I don’t know. Twenty-four, I suppose, maybe twenty-five.”

“She looked thirty or more.”

“They get that look,” said the judge wisely. “It’s the kind of life they lead.”

“How does a girl like that get involved in such a life?” his nephew asked him.

“A girl like what?”

The nephew blinked in embarrassment at his uncle’s amusement. “There was something about that girl—” He stopped in confusion.

“Now don’t go romanticizing a common whore,” said the judge sternly. “That’s all the girl is, a common whore.”

“But how did she get that way, that’s what I want know. How did she get that way?”

“They’re born that way,” the judge told him. “It’s simple as that. They’re born that way, and nothing can change them.” He heaved to his feet. “Now, let’s get some lunch,” he said. “I’m starving.”