The Allen House Part 30

Worldly prudence spoke there.

My wife laid her hand upon my arm, and looking calmly in my face, said,

"The right way is always a safe way."

"Granted."

"It will be right for you to give such advice as your judgment dictates, and therefore safe. I do not know much about law matters, but it occurs to me that her first step should be the employment of counsel."

"Is her father going to stand wholly aloof?" I inquired.

"Yes, if she be resolved to defend herself in open court. He will not sanction a course that involves so much disgrace of herself and family."

"Has she shown him the letter you saw?"

"No."

"Why?"

"I think she is afraid to let it go out of her hands."

"She might trust it with her father, surely," said I.

"Her father has been very hard with her; and seems to take the worst for granted. He evidently believes that it is in the power of Dewey to prove her guilty; and that if she makes any opposition to his application for a divorce, he will hold her up disgraced before the world."

"This letter might open his eyes."

"The letter is no defence of her; only a witness against him. It does not prove her innocence. If it did, then it would turn toward her a father's averted face. In court its effect will be to throw doubt upon the sincerity of her husband's motives, and to show that he had a reason, back of alleged infidelity, for wis.h.i.+ng to be divorced from his wife."

"I declare, Constance!" said I, looking at my wife in surprise, "you have taken upon yourself a new character. I think the case is safe in your hands, and that Mrs. Dewey wants no more judicious friend. If you were a man, you might conduct the defence for her to a successful issue."

"I am not a man, and, therefore, I come to a man," she replied, "and ask the aid of his judgment. I go by a very straight road to conclusions; but I want the light of your reason upon these conclusions."

"I am not a lawyer as you are aware, Constance--only a doctor."

"You are a man with a heart and common sense," she answered, with just a little shade of rebuke in her tones, "and as G.o.d has put in your way a wretched human soul that may be lost, unless you stretch forth a saving hand, is there any room for question as to duty? There is none, my husband! Squire Floyd believes his daughter guilty; and while he rests in this conclusion, he will not aid her in anything that points to exposure and disgrace. She must, therefore, if a vigorous defence is undertaken, look elsewhere for aid and comfort."

I began to see the matter a little clearer.

"Mr. Wallingford is the best man I know."

"Mr. Wallingford!" I thought Constance would have looked me through.

"Mr. Wallingford!" she repeated, still gazing steadily into my face.

"Are you jesting?"

"No," I replied calmly. "In a case that involves so much, she wants a wise and good defender; and I do not know of any man upon whom she could so thoroughly rely."

Constance dropped her eyes to the floor.

"It would not do," she said, after some moments.

"Why?"

"Their former relation to each other precludes its possibility."

"But, you must remember, Constance, that Delia never knew how deeply he was once attached to her."

"She knows that he offered himself."

"And that, in a very short time afterwards, he met her with as much apparent indifference as if she had never been to him more than a pleasant acquaintance. Of the struggle through which he pa.s.sed, in the work of obliterating her image from his mind, she knows nothing."

"But he knows it," objected Constance.

"And what does that signify? Will he defend her less skillfully on this account? Rather will he not feel a stronger interest in the case?"

"I do not think that she will employ him to defend her," said Constance.

"I would not, were the case mine."

"Womanly pride spoke there, Constance."

"Or rather say a manly lack of perception in your case."

"Perception of what?"

"Of the fitness of things," she answered.

"That is just what I do see," I returned. "There is no man in S----better fitted for conducting this case than Mr. Wallingford."

"She will never place it in his hands; you may take a woman's word for that," said my wife confidently. "Of all living men he is the last one to whom she could talk of the humiliating particulars involved in a case like this."

"Suppose you suggest his name to her. Twelve years of such a life as she has led may have almost obliterated the memory of that pa.s.sage in her life."

"Don't believe it. A woman never forgets a pa.s.sage like that; particularly when the events of every pa.s.sing day but serve to remind her of the error she once committed."

"I don't know what else to advise," said I. "She ought to have a good and discreet man to represent her, or all may be lost."

"Would you have any objection to confer with Mr. Wallingford on the subject in a private, confidential way?"

"None in the world," I replied.

"Will you see him at once?" The interest of Constance was too strongly excited to brook delay.

"Yes, immediately."

And putting on my overcoat I went to the office of Mr. Wallingford. I found him alone, and at once laid the whole case before him--relating, with particularity, all that had occurred between my wife and Mrs.

Dewey. He listened with deep and pitying attention; and when I was through, expressed his opinion of Dewey in very strong language.