Читать книгу Old Ebenezer - Opie Percival Read - Страница 6

Lyman must long have indulged his secret study before the observation of old Buckley Lightfoot fell upon it, for, at the close of the school term a few weeks later, the teacher announced that he had formed a co-partnership with John Caruthers, the noted advocate of Old Ebenezer, and that together they would practice law in the county seat. He offered to the people no opportunity to bid him good-bye, for that evening, with his law library under his arm, he set out for the town, twenty miles away. Old Uncle Buckley, Jimmie and Lige followed him, but he had chosen a trackless path, and thus escaped their reproaches.

The noted advocate, John Caruthers, had an office in the third story of a brick building, which was surely a distinction, being so high from the ground and in a brick house, too. There he spent his time smoking a cob pipe and waiting for clients. His office was a small room at the rear end of the building. The front room, the remainder of the suite, was a long and narrow apartment, occupied by the Weekly Sentinel, the county newspaper, published by J. Warren, not edited at all, and written by lawyers and doctors about town. The great advocate paid his rent with political contributions to the newspaper, and the editor discharged his rental obligations by supporting the landlord for congress, a very convenient and comforting arrangement, as Caruthers explained to Lyman.

"I don't see how we could be more fortunately situated," said he, the first night after the co-partnership had been effected. "What do you think of it?"

"I don't know that I could improve on an arrangement that doesn't cost any money," Lyman answered. He sat looking about the room, at the meager furniture and the thin array of books. "We've got a start, anyway, and I don't think Webster could have done anything without a start. Are all these our books?"

"Yes," said Caruthers, shaking his sandy head. "That is, they are ours as long as they are here. Once in awhile a man may come in and take one; but the next day, or the next minute, for that matter, we can go out and get another. The Old Ebenezer bar has a circulating library." He yawned and continued: "I think we ought to do well here, with my experience and your learning. They tell me you can read Greek as well as some people can read English."

"Yes, some people can't read English."

"I guess you are right," Caruthers laughed. "But they say you can read Greek like shelling corn, and that will have a big effect with a jury. Just tell them that the New Testament was written in Greek, and then give them a few spurts of it, and they've got to come. I had a little Latin and I did very well with it, but a fellow came along who knew more of it than I did and crowded me out of my place."

Just then the editor came in. He looked about, nodded at Lyman, whom he had met earlier in the day, and then sat down, with a sigh.

"Well, I have got a good send off for you fellows—already in type, but I lack eighty cents of having money enough to get my paper out of the express office."

No one said anything, for this was sad news. Warren continued: "Yes, I lack just eighty cents. It's about as good a notice as I ever read, and it's a pity to let it lie there and rust. Of course I wouldn't ask either of you for the money: That wouldn't look very well. Eighty cents, two forties. I could go to some of the advertisers, but an advertiser loses respect for a paper that needs eighty cents."

"Warren," said Caruthers, "I'd like to see your paper come out, for I want to read my roast on the last legislature, but I haven't eighty cents."

Lyman sat looking about with a dozing laugh on his lips: "Are you sure you'll not need eighty cents every week?" he asked.

The editor's eyes danced a jig of delight. "I may never need it again," he declared.

"Well, but how often are you going to print a notice of the firm?"

"I don't know. Why?"

"Well, I didn't know but your paper might get stuck in the express office every time you have something about us. It's likely to go that way, you know. I've got a few dollars—"

The editor grabbed his hand: "I want to welcome you to our town," he cried. "You come here with energy and new life. Now, Caruthers, what the deuce are you laughing at? You know that no one appreciates a man of force and ideas more than I do. Just let me have the eighty, Mr. Lyman, for I've got a nigger ready to turn the press. Now, I'm ten thousand times obliged to you," he effusively added as Lyman gave him the money.

He hastened out and Caruthers leaned back with a lazy laugh. "He told the truth about needing the money. I've known his paper to be stuck in the throat of the press, and all for the want of fifty cents. I'm glad you let him have it. He's not a bad fellow. He lives in the air. Every time he touches the earth he gets into trouble."

"So do we all," Lyman replied, "and nearly always on account of money. I wish there wasn't a penny in the world."

"Sometimes there isn't, so far as I am concerned," Caruthers said. "No, sir," he added, "they keep money out of my way. And I want to tell you that I'm not a bad business man, either. But I'm close to forty and haven't laid up a cent, and nothing that I can ever say in praise of myself can overcome that fact. I don't see, however, why you should be a failure. You have generations of money makers behind you."

"Yes, hundreds of years behind me," said Lyman. "And the vein was worked out long before I came on. There is no failure more complete than the one that comes along in the wake of success. But I am not going to remain a failure. I'll strike it after awhile."

"I think you have struck it now," replied Caruthers. "Business will liven up in a day or two. When a thing touches bottom it can't go any further down, but it may rise."

"Yes," said Lyman, "unless it continues to lie there."

"But we must stir it up," Caruthers declared. "We've got the enterprise all right—we've got the will, and now all that's needed is something for us to take hold of."

"That's about so," Lyman agreed. "Unless a man has something to lift, he can never find out how strong he is."

And thus they talked until after the midnight hour, until Caruthers, his feet on a table, his head thrown back, his pipe between the fingers of his limp hand, fell asleep. Lyman sat there, more thoughtful, now that he felt alone. At the threshold of a new venture, we look back upon the hopes that led us into other undertakings, and upon many a failure we bestow a look of tender but half reproachful forgiveness. The trials and the final success of other men make us strong. And with his mild eyes set in review, Lyman thought that never before had he found himself so well seasoned, so well prepared to do something. He listened to the grinding of the press, to the midnight noises about the public square, the town muttering in its sleep. "I am advancing" he mused, looking about him. "I was not content to skimp along in New England, nor to buy cross-ties, nor to singe the pin feathers off a chicken at night, nor to worry with the feeble machinery of a dull schoolboy's head. And I will not be content merely to sit here and wait for clients that may never come. I am going to do something."