The Just And The Unjust (26 page)

'He could do worse,' Judge Coates said. 'Yes. Mustn't keep a lady waiting. Give Bonnie my love. Where are you going?'

'Out to Candy's, maybe.'

'The quarry? Jesse Gearhart's brother, Mike, with some friends about your age, went swimming there one night thirty years ago; and Mike hit his head on a rock, and that was the last thing he ever did.'

'You wouldn't know the place now,' Abner said. 'A fellow named Walsh bought it and put a fence around it and built some bath houses, and has it all full of flood lights at night. It was better before.'

'Well, don't go in too soon after dinner,' Judge Coates said. 'You'll get cramps.'

2

Bathed and dressed — his shirt still smelling of the iron, and a little damp — Abner was only five minutes late. Cousin Mary lived in one of the dozen small houses on what was called Hillside Crescent, a new street laid out in an arc across a pasture behind the old Ormsbee place. The development had occasioned a lot of legal fuss; first, over the title; and then between the borough and the promoters about sewers; and street paving. For Childerstown lawyers it was a picnic; and even Harry Wurts had joined in the general barratry long enough to name the project Cowflop Gardens. An aftermath of mechanics' liens still occupied Mark Irwin and George Stacey in Common Pleas. Jesse Gearhart was interested originally; but was supposed to have dropped out when the trouble began.

As far as Abner could tell, nobody made any money; for though the Ormsbees got a good price, they took notes instead of cash for the land. The houses, all new, all different — that is, different from each other — were built to prize-winning plans for low cost housing in a variety of materials. They were necessarily small, almost miniature — small areas cased with brick or field stone, cramped wings and gables of stucco or white clapboarding. Most of them had foundation plantings of miscellaneous mean evergreens, and the new curved street was set out with sycamore saplings, several of them now dead.

Abner halted his car at the clean new cement kerb along which grew a little grass and many weeds. Jared, junior, was in the front yard trying to coax his brothers, the twins, within range of a revolving lawn sprinkler. He sang out, 'Hello, Ab! Bonnie's taking a bath.' He was an obstreperous brat at an unattractive age, and made short work of any sympathy you might feel for him because of his father's misbehaviour.

Cousin Mary showed herself at the screen door in the shadow. 'Want to come in, Ab?' she called. 'Bonnie will I be right down. She was helping me get the kids' supper. Junior, don't do that! Now, just turn the hose off! It's simply wasting water. Harold, why don't you and Philip play in the swing? You'll have to go to bed pretty soon.' She held the door open, so Abner, though he did not want to come in,' was obliged to.

Putting down on the nearest table the dish and dishtowel she had been holding, Cousin Mary found and lit a cigarette. The little living-room was in great disorder, partly the natural work of three small boys in crowded quarters, partly Cousin Mary's own lackadaisical neglect — a way of letting it be seen that it was all more than she could face. There were one or two pieces of good furniture, though much battered and too large for the room; things salvaged from the wreck Jared had made of his affairs and hers. These were supplemented with painted and poorly upholstered junk from Wister's, the cheap Childerstown 'home furnishings' store. Abner did not claim to have much taste himself; but it seemed to him that Cousin Mary had none at all — unless, of course (and when you knew her it was not impossible), she deliberately let her surroundings be ugly and depressing, so that, while always brave and silent about it herself, her setting would protest her hard life.

Abner sat down with constraint. On a heap of old magazines on the table lay a copy of the afternoon's
Examiner
and Abner could see the two-column headlines: 'Leming Called to Stand by Commonwealth.'

'Coates Questions Zollicoffer Defendant. Witness Says Basso Fired 2nd Shot.' The story began: 'Continued this morning before Judge Thomas Vredenburgh in Oyer and Terminer, the Zollicoffer murder trial was high-lighted by the examination, conducted by Assistant District Attorney Abner Coates, of Roy Leming, one of the...'

Abner, reading at an angle, read no further. The recount could be of no interest to him now, since this was the last criminal case he would ever help to prosecute. The thought represented, he realized, a new decision, arrived at while he was thinking of other things; but if he were going to quit, he might as well quit at once, as soon as May Sessions ended. That would give Marty more time to break in someone else, someone Jesse wanted. Casting his mind about, trying to think of someone Jesse might want, no name occurred to him; and Abner was aware of a certain grim pleasure at Jesse's predicament. Jesse might find getting someone on short notice harder than he thought; not because the work required rare abilities, but because it did require experience; and, like the post of justice of the peace, most men with the experience and judgment to make them desirable in the office used that experience and judgment to say no. Let some sap with political ambitions take the work and the worry and the responsibility! With Marty resigning, Jesse might find himself in a tough spot, and that was all right with Abner.

The little reverie of revenge held him only a moment; for he saw then with a jolt what was wrong with that picture of Jesse at his wit's end, and Jesse properly sorry that he didn't have Abner. It might be all right with Abner, sulky and disgruntled; but one thing you could be sure of was that Marty, who never had, never would let anyone down. To imagine that Marty, because of his own interest or ambition, would throw up a job for which he had assumed responsibility, that he would resign without being sure that he had left his office in competent hands, was impossible for anyone who ever knew Marty. If Abner were there, Marty might have planned to resign after September Sessions, leaving Abner, without too much work on hand, to fill the office to which, in November, barring a practically impossible upset, he would be elected.

Abner coloured. That he had come so close to doing, that he had actually been deciding to do, a thing like that was a fact; and yet it was the kind of dirty trick he himself would not excuse a man for doing. He had never understood how a man could do such a thing; and if that mystery were now cleared up — the doer's own object engrossed him; he never saw what a louse he was — it did not make the things done any better. Abner's plan was to make Marty bear the brunt (to say he didn't mean it that way simply showed that, as well as a sorehead, he was a fool). Marty would have to abandon his plans for the moment, and perhaps for the next four years. He might think it was his job to solve Jesse's difficulties by running again; and if Marty thought it was his job, that was what Marty would at any cost do.

Cousin Mary said, 'How's Cousin Philander? Does the heat bother him? I meant to go up thereto-day. I didn't have a minute—' Not waiting for answers, she gabbled along quickly, shaking ashes from the cigarette on to the frayed and wrinkled chintz of the couch. 'It was just too hot to do anything. I simply took the children this afternoon and went to the movies — it's the only cool place in town. Oh, Ab; look at this, will you? Do I have to do anything about it?'

She got up and went over to a flimsy little green-painted writing desk, emptied out several pigeon holes, and came back with a letter. 'It's not legal, is it?'

Abner, unfolding it, saw the more or less expected words: 'Dear Madam : We have repeatedly brought to your attention...'

'No,' said Abner, 'it's just a letter. It's not legal, if you mean, is it a process; but, if you don't pay them they can — '-Well, I can't pay them at present. What ought I to do?'

'If you tell them that, and offer to pay a little, they'll probably agree.'

'Well, Ab,' Cousin Mary said, 'like a lamb, would you answer them? If they got a letter from a lawyer, they might stop bothering me.'

'I don't know exactly what I could say to them,' Abner said. 'What they want is their money, I'm afraid —'

'Oh, Ab, write them anything! I mean, I'm sure if they saw your letterhead, they'd realize that they'd better be careful!'

Nothing would be served by telling Cousin Mary that she was the one who'd better be careful, so Abner said, 'I could write them that you're unfortunately unable to settle in full; but —how much could you give them?'

'Ab, I don't see how I can give them anything now. You'd better just tell them they'll have to wait until September, or better say, October.'

'Couldn't you give them a couple of dollars? You know, they don't pay much attention to what you say unless you do something, too.'

'I don't see how,' Cousin Mary said. Her face settled in hurt, resentful lines. 'Bonnie has a little money; but I won't ask her for it. It isn't right. She hardly has anything for clothes and things —'

Abner did not like her air of virtuous abnegation. During nine months of the year Bonnie earned a fairly good salary in Mr. Rawle's office at the high school; and if she hardly had anything for clothes and things, there was a reason for that, and not a very good one. Abner didn't mean to minimize Cousin Mary's expenses; but what she did with her money was a puzzle — a feat of bad management. You could not blame her for taking the children to the movies on a hot afternoon, and doubtless stilling their subsequent clamours at Lloyds' soda fountain. Only in the meanest, most trifling sense could it be said to run to money; but that was where the money went, just the same. It was not possible to ask her to account for it — some of Bonnie's salary for last month, which she probably received when school ended Saturday, must be what Bonnie was mentioned as having; probably all Bonnie had been able to keep for her own use for six months or more; and keeping it might make her mother short. But how about the money, always fifty and often a hundred dollars, that Judge Coates provided for Cousin Mary every month? Abner folded the letter and slipped it in his coat pocket. 'I'll send them something,' he said, 'and tell them you'll take it up in September.' Cousin Mary said, 'Oh, Ab! I don't want you to do that! There's no reason why you should —'

'Look, Mary,' Abner said, 'you've got to pay them sometime.' But the fact was, of course, that Cousin Mary didn't feel the obligation. By a not uncommon sleight of mind, time passing was made to eliminate the element of honesty or dishonesty. She would not steal from a shop counter (or, not to be arbitrary about a matter in which the district attorney's office had seen circumstances alter cases; she would not, unless the opportunity appeared ideal and her need very great); but if a shop wanted to let her have things, she would take them without considering too seriously how she was going to pay. When the bill was presented, it actually seemed to her unfair, the inconvenient reopening of a closed and half-forgotten transaction for which she now had nothing to show, anyway. Abner said, 'They can make things pretty unpleasant for you.'

Yes, they could! Nobody knew it better than Cousin Mary. They had the outrageous power; and that was now the point. Cousin Mary was furious with them; yet, in spite of the way they were acting, they had the effrontery to expect her to pay them!'Well, I wouldn't give them a thing!' Cousin Mary said. 'Not one red cent! They were anxious enough to carry an account for me, heaven knows!' She crushed out her cigarette. 'Now, don't give them much, Ab. They don't deserve it.'

The quick click of heels upstairs sounded; and, lowering her voice, she added, 'Don't say anything to Bonnie about it, will you? She'll just want to use her own money; and I don't want her to. Were you going out to the quarry swimming? I hope you'll both be careful. You know, it was out there, you wouldn't remember, I think it was the year you were born — yes, it was; I remember Edith couldn't go anywhere that summer — that Michael Gearhart broke his neck. It was the most shocking thing. He was such a good looking boy, and much nicer than Jesse —'

'Yes, Father told me,' Abner said. 'But I never heard of anyone else getting hurt.'

The footsteps started downstairs; and, turning his head, he could see Bonnie — her white shoes and slender bare legs; the short full skirt of a yellow frock sprigged with white flowers. She had a jacket of yellow linen over her arm and carried a loose bag into which she was tucking a bathing cap of white rubber. 'Hello,' she said, 'I'm sorry.'

She looked, Abner thought, very pretty; fresh and clean, remote from the shabby confusion of the living-room into which she was descending; by youth or grace, by the candour of eye and manner, equally remote from her mother. Abner thought to himself, 'I'd like to get her out of this damned place, this mess —' And that, the impulsive feeling, was perhaps the answer; and ought to resolve any uncertainty of mind.

Cousin Mary said, 'You look sweet, darling.'

'Yes, you do,' said Abner; but he could not help seeing that he should have said it first. He took the bag with her bathing suit.

'Thanks, everyone,' said Bonnie. 'I don't think we'll be very late, Mother. '' Abner held the screen door open, and she went out and down the brick steps in front of him.

Jared, junior, lying on the grass, said, 'Hi-ya, Toots? Why don't you put your stockings on?'

'Because it's too hot,' said Bonnie.

Jared got up, his small, insolent-looking tanned face counterfeiting good will. Catching hold of Abner's arm he swung into step with him as he reached the gate. Looking up, lowering his voice, Jared said, 'Give's a dime, will you?'

'No, don't!' said Bonnie, turning. 'Jared, if I have to speak to you again about —'

'Whyn't you go to hell, you crummy bitch?' said Jared. His own dreadful words obviously shocked him; and backing off with flustered defiance, he added in haste, 'Now, tell Mother! Go on, why don't you?'

'We won't have to bother her,' said Abner, taking a step; but Jared fled away through the gate and ran behind the house as hard as he could.

'Isn't he nice?' said Bonnie, getting into the car. 'Oh, God, Ab; let's go somewhere and have a drink!'