The Man with the Wooden Spectacles. Harry Stephen Keeler
Allstyn. And he pointed out to me how badly I’d clouded my title to my property. If, that is, I tried to sue to set the paper aside. For don’t forget, Aunt, I was of age when I signed it—and I declared, moreover, before witnesses, that I’d read it! But Mr. Allstyn didn’t bow me out, Aunt, as your lawyers did—in the long ago. Yes—in the face of your ‘claimquit’! No. He showed me the exact way to completely circumvent Uncle Silas’ trickery—assuming it to be plainly that—and to force the paper to remain just what it was: an assignment, and nothing more.”
“He did? Whut wuz his way?”
“Well, his way, Aunt, was simply to render that dangerous clause impotent. To—to hamstring it, see?
Through my taking one case—and one case only—and one, moreover, in which it would be all set for my client to be acquitted—during my first three months of practice.
In that way I would not only completely nullify the factor involving the loss of my first case, by winning it!—but through not going before the Bar before or after—at least till my first 3 months of practice were over—I would not run any chance whatsoever of disbarment. And—but Aunt, do you follow me?”
Aunt Linda was figuring mentally, her brow creased into black wrinkles, her lips slightly moving, and counting some points of logic on several black fingers of her left hand.
“Yas, I sees de p’ints a’right. On’y, Elsa, Ah don’ see how you would gonna know, ahead ob tryin’ a case, dat you’ clien’ would be gonna win. Leas’ways, Elsa, wid no hund’ed thousum dollah assuh’ance whut you’d hafta have!”
“Well simply this, Aunt. Mr. Rutgers Allstyn’s cousin, who grew up with him virtually as a brother, is Judge Douglas Allstyn of the Criminal Court. And Mr. Rutgers Allstyn went with me, to his cousin—this was six years ago—and described the ticklish situation. And Judge Douglas Allstyn promised us that he would definitely assign to me a case, right after I graduated from school, in which—through consideration ahead of the time he was to render decision—he had definitely determined, on some technicality or other, to discharge the defendant. Some purely formal case, see? And by my taking that case—and technically winning it!—most of that vicious clause would be knocked out. You grasp that, do you, Aunt Linda?”
“Yas, Ah grasps it,” Aunt Linda nodded sagely. “Right by de tail, yas. An’ dat wuz a good way to git aroun’ de p’oblem. But yit you is heah, Elsa, ’cause day is somep’n wrong ’bout yo’ affairs. An’ ’bout dat vehy affair. All ob w’ich means dat dat judge gib you de wrong case—o’ some p’n?”
“No, Aunt. He wouldn’t do that. He even assured me so late as last June that he would take care of me all right. But, when I got out of school in September—and set up my office—he was in India, on a trip around the world. And not expected back till December. Which meant that I must just play safe and mark time, see, till he returned. So far as, I mean, taking any court cases.”
“Den how come, Honey, you is in trubble? W’y you don’ continue on mahkin’ time?”
“Because, Aunt Linda, a little while ago—just before I started over here—a judge of the Criminal Court called me up, and appointed me as defense counsel in a Criminal Court case—where the defendant has asked for immediate trial. For trial tonight, in short. I was quite frantic, for as it looked to me, from the judge’s words, the defendant’s chances were slim indeed. I—I almost had words with the judge. And he got very angry, Aunt, and told me that if I didn’t report to my client by 5 o’clock—I was disbarred. And—wait, that’s not all, Aunt!—he said that even though I did report to the client, the disbarment order would be held open—and if I then didn’t report in court tonight—it would go through at once.”
“Kin—kin he do dat?”
“By the new regulations, he can.”
“Hm? Well whut you do, den? Ah ’spose you got aholt ob dis Allstyn man quick?”
“I rang him, Aunt—yes. But he had just left Chicago. In his car. On a secret mission. Giving no one his whereabouts or his destination.”
“Hm r’ Den—whut? You called dis jedge back, mebbe?”
“I tried to—yes. But got only his man. And when I asked for the judge himself, his man said he’d gone out for a walk. To be gone till after 7 o’clock tonight.”
“Hm. Did he say whah you could cotch him?”
“Why, Aunt—this Judge couldn’t go for a walk! He has arthri—that is rheumatism in one knee, and gout in one foot. He simply won’t see me, that’s all; and is determined to put that disbarment order through if I don’t comply with his demands.”
“Hm? Da’s a complication a’right. Consid’an’ dat clause. An’—but if’n you wuz disbahhed now, Honey, cu’d you an’ways git ondisbahhed?”
“Undisbarred, Aunt? No! Only reinstated. There’s no such thing as undisbarment. If you’re disbarred—you’re disbarred.”
“Ah see. An’ he gonna do dis if’n you don’ repoht to yo’ clien’ by 5 o’clock?”
“So he said—angrily—positively—almost apoplectically.”
“Hm. An’ dis beah client, he’s guilty, eh?”
“Doubtlessly, Aunt, as I have the best reason in the world to believe—based on later information I’ve gotten.”
Aunt Linda pondered troubledly.
“But Ah wondah w’y dat jedge he so hell-set to p’int des a kid lak you?”
“Why, I presume, Aunt, he was going over the roster of new attorneys appointed to the Bar, and—”
“No, he wuz’n,” insisted Aunt Linda. “Dey’s somep’n undah dat! Whut dis jedge’s name?”
“Judge Penworth, Aunt Linda.”
“Jedge—Penwu’th?” Aunt Linda exclaimed. “Now is he fus’ name Hilbilly—O’ Hilton—somep’n?”
“Why yes, Aunt. It’s Judge Hilford Penworth.”
“Lan’ sakes, Chil’! Ah see it all now. You ain’ got no chance ob arguin’ dat jedge out ob dat app’intment. An’ you nebah did hab.”
“I didn’t? But how—”
“ ’Cause, Chil’, yo’ Unc’ Silas, he done got—but fus’—dey is one link whut still missin’ in mah mind—but not ye’s. Fo’ you ain’ seen nothin’ whut Ah sees. Sense—but heah is de link: Is dey an’buddah ’tall, Chil’, whut knowed you wuz nullerfrying dat dang’ous clause by playin’ possum till dis heah Jedge Allstyn git back fm India, at w’ich time he gonna gib you des a cut-an’-dried case to try—one de winnin’ ob w’ich is all in de bag already—no, wait, Elsa—is dey an’body else know dat, whut would o’ could hab tol’ yo’ Unc’ Silas?”
“Well,” replied Elsa, “the only person, outside of my lawyer—and now you—and Judge Douglas Allstyn himself, in India—who knows the fact, is my landlady, Mrs. Hirschberg.”
“Hm? Jewisher, eh? An’ yo’ Unc’ Silas’ son-in-law a Jewisher? Well, whut coffee-gabbin’ societies do she belong to?”
“Coffee-gabbing soc—Oh, I get you, Aunt. Well, she belongs to a flock of them. One is known as the ‘Ladies’ Weekly Social Club,’ and another is the ‘Ladies’ Self-Improvement Society,’ and anoth—”
“Huh! Don’ go no fuddah! Spos’n Ah wuz to tell you dat Manny’s mama, Mrs. Lena Levinstein, de wife ob his papa whut int’rested in all dat Norfwes’ Side proputty, she ’long to de Ladies’ Self-Improbement Club today. W’ich ’zackly is whut Ah’s tellin’ you! Fo’ Ah huhd huh tryin’ to git Bella to ’long to it—on’y ob cose, Bella she too lazy