Old Judge Priest

“I don’t mind telling you I didn’t feel this way about it first-off. It was a pretty tolerably hard jolt to me – the way the proposition first came up. I’ve spent a good many sleepless nights thinking it over. At least I couldn’t sleep very much for thinking of it,” he amended with the literal impulse of a literal mind to state things exactly and without exaggeration. “And then finally I saw my way clear to come to this decision. And so – ”

“Lysandy Curd,” broke in Judge Priest, “I don’t aim to give you any advice. In the first place, you ain’t asked fur it; and in the second place, even ef you had asked, I’d hesitate a monstrous long time before I’d undertake to advice any man about his own private family affairs. But I jest want to ask you one thing right here: It wasn’t you, was it, that first proposed the idea of this here divorce?”

“Well, no, Judge, I don’t believe ‘twas,” confessed the old man whose misery-reddened eyes looked into Judge Priest’s from across the littered desk. “I can’t say as it was me that first suggested it. But that’s neither here nor there. The point I’m trying to get at is just this:

“The papers have all been drawn up and they’ll be bringing them in here sometime to-day to be filed – the lawyers in the case will, Bigger & Quigley. Naturally, with me and Luella agreeing as to everything, there’s not going to be any fight made in your court. And after it’s all over I’m aiming to sell out my feed store – it seems like I haven’t been able to make it pay these last few months, the same as it used to pay, and debts have sort of piled up on me some way. I reckon the fellow that said two could live as cheap as one didn’t figure on one of them being a young woman – pretty herself and wanting pretty things to wear and have round the house. But I shouldn’t say that – I’ve come to see how it’s mainly my fault, and I’m figuring on how to spare Luella in every way that it’s possible to spare her. So as I was saying, I’m figuring, when it’s all over, on selling out my interests here, such as they are, and going back to live on that little farm I own out yonder in the Lone Elm district. It’s got a mortgage on it that I put on it here some months back, but I judge I can lift that and get the place clear again, if I’m given a fair amount of time to do it in.

“And now that everything’s been made clear to you, I want to ask you, Judge, to do all in your power to make things as easy as you can for Luella. I’d a heap rather there wouldn’t be any fuss made over this case in the newspapers. It’s just a straight, simple divorce suit, and after all it’s just between me and my present wife, and it’s more our business than ‘tis anybody else’s. So, seeing as the case is not going to be defended, I’d take it as a mighty big favour on your part if you’d shove it up on the docket for the coming term of court, starting next Monday, so as we could get it done and over with just as soon as possible. That’s my personal wish, and I know it’s Luella’s wish too. In fact she’s right anxious on that particular point. And here’s one more thing: I reckon that young Rawlings boy, that’s taken a job reporting news items for the Daily Evening News, will be round here in the course of the day, won’t he?”

“He likely will,” said Judge Priest; “he comes every day – purty near it. Why?”

“Well,” said Mr. Curd, “I don’t know him myself except by sight, and I don’t feel as if I was in a position to be asking him to do anything for me. But I thought, maybe, if you spoke to him yourself when he came, and put it on the grounds of a favour to you, maybe he’d not put any more than just a little short piece in the paper saying suit had been filed – Curd against Curd – for a plain divorce, or maybe he might leave it out of his paper altogether. I’d like to see Luella shielded from any newspaper talk. It’s not as if there was a scandal in it or a fight was going to be made.” He bent forward in his eagerness. “Do you reckon you could do that much for me, Judge Priest – for old times’ sake?”

“Ah-hah,” assented Judge Priest. “I reckin part of it kin be arranged anyway. I kin have Lishy Milam set the case forward on the docket at the head of the list of uncontested actions. And I’ll mention the matter to that there young Rawlings ef you want me to. Speaking personally, I should think jest a line or two ought to satisfy the readers of the Daily Evenin’ News. Of course him bein’ a reporter and all that, he’ll probably want to know whut the facts are ez set forth in your petition – whut allegations are made in – ”

He stopped in mid-speech, seeing how the other had flinched at this last. Mr. Curd parted his lips to interrupt, but the old judge, having no wish to flick wounds already raw, hurried on: “Don’t you worry, Lysandy, I’ll be glad to speak to young Rawlings. I jedge you’ve got no call to feel uneasy about whut’s goin’ to be said in print. You was sayin’ jest now that the papers would be filed sometime to-day?” “They’ll be filed to-day sure.”

“And no defence is to be made?” continued Judge Priest, tallying off the points on his fingers. “And you’ve retained Bigger & Quigley to represent you – that’s right, ain’t it?”

“Hold on a minute, Judge,” Mr. Curd was shaking his whity-grey head in dissent. “I’ve taken up a lot of your valuable time already, and still it would seem like I haven’t succeeded in getting this affair all straight in your mind. Bigger & Quigley are not going to represent me. They’re going to represent Luella.”

He spoke as one stating an accepted and easily understood fact, yet at the words Judge Priest reared back as far as his chair would let him go and his ruddy cheeks swelled out with the breath of amazement.

“Do you mean to tell me,” he demanded, “that you ain’t the plaintiff here?”

“Why, Judge Priest,” answered Mr. Curd, “you didn’t think for a minute, did you, that I’d come into court seeking to blacken my wife’s good name? She’s been thoughtless, maybe, but I know she don’t mean any harm by it, and besides look how young she is. It’s her, of course, that’s asking for this divorce – I thought you understood about that from the beginning.” Still in his posture of astonishment, Judge Priest put another question and put it briskly: “Might it be proper fur me to ask on what grounds this lady is suin’ you fur a divorce?”

A wave of dull red ran up old Mr. Curd’s throat and flooded his shamed face to the hair line.