CHAPTER V
KATHERINE PREPARES FOR BATTLE
For a long space after Bruce had gone Katherine sat quiveringly uponthe old haircloth sofa beside her father, holding his hands tightly,caressingly. Her words tumbled hotly from her lips--words of love ofhim--of resentment of the injustice which he suffered--and, fiercestof all, of wrath against Editor Bruce, who had so ruthlessly, and forsuch selfish ends, incited the popular feeling against him. She wouldmake such a fight as Westville had never seen! She would show thoselawyers who had been reduced to cowards by Bruce's demagogy! She wouldbring the town humiliated to her father's feet!
But emotion has not only peaks, but plains, and dark valleys. As shecooled and her passion descended to a less exalted level, she began tosee the difficulties of, and her unfitness for, the role she had soimpulsively accepted. An uneasiness for the future crept upon her. Asshe had told Mr. Blake, she had never handled a case in court. True,she had been a member of the bar for two years, but her duties withthe Municipal League had consisted almost entirely in working upevidence in cases of municipal corruption for the use of her legalsuperiors. An untried lawyer, and a woman lawyer at that--surely aweak reed for her father to lean upon!
But she had thrown down the gage of battle; she had to fight, sincethere was no other champion; and even in this hour of emotion, whentears were so plenteous and every word was accompanied by a caress,she began to plan the preliminaries of her struggle.
"I shall write to-night to the league for a leave of absence," shesaid. "One of the things I must see to at once is to get admitted tothe state bar. Do you know when your case is to come up?"
"It has been put over to the September term of court."
"That gives me four months."
She was silently thoughtful for a space. "I've got to work hard, hard!upon your case. As I see it now, I am inclined to agree with you thatthe situation has arisen from a misunderstanding--that the agentthought you expected a bribe, and that you thought the bribe a smalldonation to the hospital."
"I'm certain that's how it is," said her father.
"Then the thing to do is to see Doctor Sherman, and if possible theagent, have them repeat their testimony and try to search out in itthe clue to the mistake. And that I shall see to at once."
Five minutes later Katherine left the house. After walking ten minutesthrough the quiet, maple-shaded back streets she reached the WabashAvenue Church, whose rather ponderous pile of Bedford stone was themost ambitious and most frequented place of worship in Westville, andwhose bulk was being added to by a lecture room now rising against itsside.
Katherine went up a gravelled walk toward a cottage that stoodbeneath the church's shadow. The house's front was covered with awide-spreading rose vine, a tapestry of rich green which June wouldgorgeously embroider with sprays of heart-red roses. The cottagelooked what Katherine knew it was, a bower of lovers.
Her ring was answered by a fair, fragile young woman whose eyes werethe colour of faith and loyalty. A faint colour crept into the youngwoman's pale cheeks.
"Why--Katherine--why--why--I don't know what you think of us,but--but----" She could stammer out no more, but stood in the doorwayin distressed uncertainty.
Katherine's answer was to stretch out her arms. "Elsie!" Instantlythe two old friends were in a close embrace.
"I haven't slept, Katherine," sobbed Mrs. Sherman, "for thinking ofwhat you would think----"
"I think that, whatever has happened, I love you just the same."
"Thank you for saying it, Katherine." Mrs. Sherman gazed at her intearful gratitude. "I can't tell you how we have suffered overthis--this affair. Oh, if you only knew!"
It was instinctive with Katherine to soothe the pain of others, thoughsuffering herself. "I am certain Doctor Sherman acted from the highestmotives," she assured the young wife. "So say no more about it."
They had entered the little sitting-room, hung with soft white muslincurtains. "But at the same time, Elsie, I cannot believe my fatherguilty," Katherine went on. "And though I honour your husband, why,even the noblest man can be mistaken. My hope of proving my father'sinnocence is based on the belief that Doctor Sherman may somehow havemade a mistake. At any rate, I'd like to talk over his evidence withhim."
"He's trying to work on his sermon, though he's too worn to think.I'll bring him right in."
She passed through a door into the study, and a moment later reenteredwith Doctor Sherman. The present meeting would have been painful toan ordinary person; doubly so was it to such a hyper-sensitive nature.The young clergyman stood hesitant just within the doorway, his usualpallor greatly deepened, his thin fingers intertwisted--in doubt howto greet Katherine till she stretched out her hand to him.
"I want you to understand, Katherine dear," little Mrs. Sherman put inquickly, with a look of adoration at her husband, "that Edgar reachedthe decision to take the action he did only after days of agony. Youknow, Katherine, Doctor West was always as kind to me as anotherfather, and I loved him almost like one. At first I begged Edgar notto do anything. Edgar walked the floor for nights--suffering!--oh, howyou suffered, Edgar!"
"Isn't it a little incongruous," said Doctor Sherman, smiling wanly ather, "for the instrument that struck the blow to complain, in thepresence of the victim, of _his_ suffering?"
"But I want her to know it!" persisted the wife. "She must know it todo you justice, dear! It seemed at first disloyal--but finally Edgardecided that his duty to the city----"
"Please say no more, Elsie." Katherine turned to the pale youngminister. "Doctor Sherman, I have not come to utter one single word ofrecrimination. I have come merely to ask you to tell me all you knowabout the case."
"I shall be glad to do so."
"And could I also talk with Mr. Marcy, the agent?"
"He has left the city, and will not return till the trial."
Katherine was disappointed by this news. Doctor Sherman, thoughobviously pained by the task, rehearsed in minutest detail the chargeshe had made against Doctor West, which charges he would later have torepeat upon the witness stand. Also he recounted Mr. Marcy's story.Katherine scrutinized every point in these two stories for the looseend, the loop-hole, the flaw, she had thought to find. But flaw therewas none. The stories were perfectly straightforward.
Katherine walked slowly away, still going over and over DoctorSherman's testimony. Doctor Sherman was telling the indubitabletruth--yet her father was indubitably innocent. It was a puzzlingcase, this her first case--a puzzling, most puzzling case.
When she reached home she was told by her aunt that a gentleman waswaiting to see her. She entered the big, old-fashioned parlour, freshand tasteful despite the stiff black walnut that, in the days of hermother's marriage, had been spread throughout the land as beauty bythe gentlemen who dealt conjointly in furniture and coffins.
From a chair there rose a youthful and somewhat corpulent presence,with a chubby and very serious pink face that sat in a glossy highcollar as in a cup. He smiled with a blushful but ingratiatingdignity.
"Don't you remember me? I'm Charlie Horn."
"Oh!" And instinctively, as if to identify him by Charlie Horn'swell-remembered strawberry-marks, Katherine glanced at his hands. Butthey were clean, and the warts were gone. She looked at him in doubt."You can't be Nellie Horn's little brother?"
"I'm not so little," he said, with some resentment. "Since you knewme," he added a little grandiloquently, "I've graduated fromBloomington."
"Please pardon me! It was kind of you to call, and so soon."
"Well, you see I came on business. I suppose you have seen thisafternoon's _Express_?"
She instinctively stiffened.
"I have not."
He drew out a copy of the _Express_, opened it, and pointed a plump,pinkish forefinger at the beginning of an article on the first page.
"You see the _Express_ says you are going to be your father's lawyer."
Katharine read the indicated paragraphs. Her colour heightened. Thes
tatement was blunt and bare, but between the lines she read thecontemptuous disapproval of the "new woman" that a few hours sinceBruce had displayed before her. Again her anger toward Bruce flaredup.
"I am a reporter for the _Clarion_," young Charlie Horn announced,striving not to appear too proud. "And I've come to interview you."
"Interview me?" she cried in dismay. "What about?"
"Well, you see," said he, with his benign smile, "you're the firstwoman lawyer that's ever been in Westville. It's almost a biggersensation than your fath--you see, it's a big story."
He drew from his pocket a bunch of copy paper. "I want you to tell meabout how you are going to handle the case. And about what you think awoman lawyer's prospects are in Westville. And about what you thinkwill be woman's status in future society. And you might tell me,"concluded young Charlie Horn, "who your favourite author is, and whatyou think of golf. That last will interest our readers, for ourcountry club is very popular."
It had been the experience of Nellie Horn's brother that the goodpeople of Westville were quite willing--nay, even had a subduedeagerness--to discourse about themselves, and whom they had visitedover Sunday, and who was "Sundaying" with them, and what beauties hadimpressed them most at Niagara Falls; and so that confident youngambassador from the _Clarion_ was somewhat dazed when, a moment later,he found himself standing alone on the West doorstep with a dim senseof having been politely and decisively wished good afternoon.
But behind him amid the stiff, dark, solemn-visaged furniture(Calvinists, every chair of them!) he left a person far more dazedthan himself. Charlie Horn's call had brought sharply home toKatherine a question that, in the press of affairs, she hardly had asyet considered--how was Westville going to take to a woman lawyerbeing in its midst? She realized, with a chill of apprehension, howprofoundly this question concerned her next few months. Dear,bustling, respectable Westville, she well knew, clung to its own ideaof woman's sphere as to a thing divinely ordered, and to seek to leavewhich was scarcely less than rebellion against high God. Inpatriarchal days, when heaven's justice had been prompter, such adisobedient one would suddenly have found herself rebuked into a bitof saline statuary.
Katherine vividly recalled, when she had announced her intention tostudy law, what a raising of hands there was, what a loud regrettingthat she had not a mother. But since she had not settled inWestville, and since she had not been actively practising in New York,the town had become partially reconciled. But this step of hers wasnew, without a precedent. How would Westville take it?
Her brain burned with this and other matters all afternoon, allevening, and till the dawn began to edge in and crowd the shadows fromher room. But when she met her father at the breakfast table her facewas fresh and smiling.
"Well, how is my client this morning?" she asked gaily. "Do yourealize, daddy, that you are my first really, truly client?"
"And I suppose you'll be charging me something outrageous as a fee!"
"Something like this"--kissing him on the ear. "But how do you feel?"
"Certain that my lawyer will win my case." He smiled. "And how areyou?"
"Brimful of ideas."
"Yes? About the----"
"Yes. And about you. First, answer a few of your counsel's questions.Have you been doing much at your scientific work of late?"
"The last two months, since the water-works has been practicallycompleted, I have spent almost my whole time at it."
"And your work was interesting?"
"Very. You see, I think I am on the verge of discovering that thetyphoid bacillus----"
"You'll tell me all about that later. Now the first order of yourattorney is, just as soon as you have finished your coffee and foldedyour napkin, back you go to your laboratory."
"But, Katherine, with this affair----"
"This affair, worry and all, has been shifted off upon your eminentcounsel. Work will keep you from worry, so back you go to your darlinggerms."
"You're mighty good, dear, but----"
"No argument! You've got to do just what your lawyer tells you. Andnow," she added "as I may have to be seeing a lot of people, and ashaving people about the house may interrupt your work, I'm going totake an office."
He stared at her.
"Take an office?"
"Yes. Who knows--I may pick up a few other cases. If I do, I know whocan use the money."
"But open an office in Westville! Why, the people----Won't it be alittle more unpleasant----" He paused doubtfully. "Did you see whatthe _Express_ had to say about you?"
She flushed, but smiled sweetly.
"What the _Express_ said is one reason why I'm going to open anoffice."
"Yes?"
"I'm not going to let fear of that Mr. Bruce dictate my life. Andsince I'm going to be a lawyer, I'm going to be the whole thing. Andwhat's more, I'm going to act as though I were doing the most ordinarything in the world. And if Mr. Bruce and the town want to talk, why,we'll just let 'em talk!"
"But--but--aren't you afraid?"
"Of course I'm afraid," she answered promptly. "But when I realizethat I'm afraid to do a thing, I'm certain that that is just exactlythe thing for me to do. Oh, don't look so worried, dear"--she leanedacross and kissed him--"for I'm going to be the perfectest, properest,politest lady that ever scuttled a convention. And nothing is going tohappen to me--nothing at all."
Breakfast finished, Katherine despotically led her father up to hislaboratory. A little later she set out for downtown, looking veryfresh in a blue summer dress that had the rare qualities of simplicityand grace. Her colour was perhaps a little warmer than was usual, butshe walked along beneath the maples with tranquil mien, seeminglyunconscious of some people she passed, giving others a clear, directglance, smiling and speaking to friends and acquaintances in her mosteasy manner.
As she turned into Main Street the intelligence that she was comingseemed in some mysterious way to speed before her. Those exemplarsof male fashion, the dry goods clerks, craned furtively about frontdoors. Bare-armed and aproned proprietors of grocery stores and theirhirelings appeared beneath the awnings and displayed an unprecedentedconcern in trying to resuscitate, with aid of sprinkling-cans, bunchesof expiring radishes and young onions. Owners of amiable steeds thatdozed beside the curb hurried out of cavernous doors, the fear ofrun-away writ large upon their countenances, to see if a buckle wasnot loose or a tug perchance unfastened. Behind her, as she passed,Main Street stood statued in mid-action, strap in motionless hand,sprinkling-can tilting its entire contents of restorative over a boxof clothes-pins, and gaped and stared. This was epochal for Westville.Never before had a real, live, practising woman lawyer trod the cementwalk of Main Street.
When Katherine came to Court House Square, she crossed to the southside, passed the _Express_ Building, and made for the HollingsworthBlock, whose first floor was occupied by the New York Store's"glittering array of vast and profuse fashion." Above this alluringpageant were two floors of offices; and up the narrow stairway leadingthereunto Katherine mounted. She entered a door marked "HoseaHollingsworth. Attorney-at-Law. Mortgages. Loans. Farms." In theroom were a table, three chairs, a case of law books, a desk, onthe top of the desk a "plug" hat, so venerable that it looked a verygreat-grandsire of hats, and two cuspidors marked with chromaticevidence that they were not present for ornament alone.
From the desk there rose a man, perhaps seventy, lean, tall,smooth-shaven, slightly stooped, dressed in a rusty and wrinkled"Prince Albert" coat, and with a countenance that looked a rankplagiarism of the mask of Voltaire. In one corner of his thin mouth,half chewed away, was an unlighted cigar.
"I believe this is Mr. Hollingsworth?" said Katherine. The questionwas purely formal, for his lank figure was one of her earliestmemories.
"Yes. Come right in," he returned in a high, nasal voice.
She drew a chair away from the environs of the cuspidors and sat down.He resumed his place at his desk and peered at her through hisspectacles, and a dry, almost imperce
ptible smile played among thefine wrinkles of his leathery face.
"And I believe this is Katherine West--our lady lawyer," he remarked."I read in the _Express_ how you----"
Bruce was on her nerves. She could not restrain a sudden flare oftemper. "The editor of that paper is a cad!"
"Well, he ain't exactly what you might call a hand-raised gentleman,"the old lawyer admitted. "At least, I never heard of his exertinghimself so hard to be polite that he strained any tendons."
"You know him, then?"
"A little. He's my nephew."
"Oh! I remember."
"And we live together," the old man loquaciously drawled on, eying herclosely with a smile that might have been either good-natured orsatirical. "Batch it--with a nigger who saves us work by stealingthings we'd otherwise have to take care of. We scrap most of the time.I make fun of him, and he gets sore. The trouble with the editor ofthe _Express_ is, he had a doting ma. He should have had an almightylot of thrashing when a boy, and instead he never tasted beech limbonce. He's suffering from the spared rod."
Katherine had a shrinking from this old man; an aversion which in hermature years she had had no occasion to examine, but which she hadinherited unanalyzed from her childhood, when old Hosie Hollingsworthhad been the chief scandal of the town--an infidel, who had daredchallenge the creation of the earth in seven days, and yet was notstricken down by a fiery bolt from heaven! She did not pursue thesubject of Bruce, but went directly to her business.
"I understand that you have an office to rent."
"So I have. Like to see it?"
"That is what I called for."
"Just come along with me."
He rose, and Katherine followed him to the floor above and into a roomfurnished much as the one she had just left.
"This office was last used," commented old Hosie, "by a young fellowwho taught school down in Buck Creek Township and got money to studylaw with. He tried law for a while." The old man's thin prehensilelips shifted his cigar to the other side of his mouth. "He's down inBuck Creek Township teaching school to get money to pay his backoffice rent."
"How about the furniture?" asked Katherine.
"That was his. He left it in part payment. You can use it if you wantto."
"But I don't want those things about"--pointing gingerly to a pair ofcuspidors.
"All right. Though I don't see how you expect to run a law office inWestville without 'em." He bent over and took them in his hands. "I'lltake 'em along. I need a few more, for my business is picking up."
"I suppose I can have possession at once."
"Whenever you please."
Standing with the cuspidors in his two hands the old lawyer looked herover. He slowly grinned, and a dry cackle came out of his lean throat.
"I was born out there in Buck Creek Township myself," he said. "Folksall Quakers, same as your ma's and your Aunt Rachel's. I was broughtup on plowing, husking corn and going to meeting. Never smiled tillafter I was twenty; wore a halo, size too large, that slipped down andmade my ears stick out. My grandfather's name was Elijah, my father'sElisha. My father had twelve sons, and beginning with me, Hosea, henamed 'em all in order after the minor prophets. Being brought up in ahouseful of prophets, naturally a lot of the gift of prophecy sort ofgot rubbed off on me."
"Well?" said Katherine impatiently, not seeing the pertinence of thisautobiography.
Again he shifted his cigar. "Well, when I prophesy, it's inspired," hewent on. "And you can take it as the word that came unto Hosea, that awoman lawyer settling in Westville is going to raise the very dickensin this old town!"