"Well," said Marriott, "Koerner's amputated leg is all knotted up with rheumatism."
Miss Masters's dark face was pinched in a scowl.
"And Archie's in jail."
"In jail!" Elizabeth dropped back in her chair.
"Yes, in jail."
"Why! What for?"
"Well, he seems to belong to a gang that was arrested day before yesterday for something or other."
"There, Mr. Eades," said Elizabeth suddenly, "there now, you must let Archie Koerner go."
"Oh, I'll not let John get a chance at him," said Marriott. "He's charged with a misdemeanor only--he'll go to the workhouse, if he goes anywhere."
"And you'll defend him?"
"Oh, I suppose so," said Marriott wearily. "You've given me a whole family of clients, Elizabeth. I went out to see the old man about his case--I think we'll try it early this term."
"These Koerners are a family in whom I've been interested," Elizabeth suddenly thought to explain to Miss Masters, and then she told them of Gusta, of old Koerner's accident, and of Archie's career as a soldier.
"They've had a hard winter of it," said Marriott "The old man, of course, can't work, and Archie, by his experience as a soldier, seems to have been totally unfitted for everything--except shooting--and shooting is against the law."
Now that the conversation had taken this turn, Miss Masters moved to go.
She bade Marriott farewell coldly, and Eades warmly, and Elizabeth went with her into the hall. Eades realized that all hope of a tete-a-tete with Elizabeth had departed, and he and Marriott not long afterward left to walk down town together. The sun was warm for the first time in months, and the hope of the spring had brought the people out of doors.
Claybourne Avenue was crowded with carriages in which families solemnly enjoyed their Sunday afternoon drives, as they had enjoyed their stupefying dinners of roast beef four hours before. Electric automobiles purred past, and now and then a huge touring car, its driver in his goggles resembling some demon, plunged savagely along, its horn honking hoarsely at every street crossing. The sidewalks were thronged with pedestrians, young men whose lives had no other diversion than to parade in their best clothes or stand on dusty down-town corners, smoke cigars and watch the girls that tilted past.
"That Miss Masters is a fool," said Marriott, when they had got away from the house.
"Yes, she is," Eades assented. "She was boring Miss Ward to death."
"Poor Elizabeth!" said Marriott with a little laugh. "She is so patient, and people do afflict her so."
Eades did not like the way in which Marriott could speak of Elizabeth, any more than he liked to hear Elizabeth address Marriott as Gordon.
"I see the _Courier_ gave you a fine send-off this morning," Marriott went on. "What a record you made! Not a single acquittal the whole term!"
Eades made no reply. He was wondering if Elizabeth had seen the _Courier's_ editorial. In the morning he thought he would send her a bunch of violets, and Tuesday--
"Your course is most popular," Marriott went on. And Eades looked at him; he could not always understand Marriott, and he did not like to have him speak of his course as if he had deliberately chosen it as a mere matter of policy.
"It's the right course," he said significantly.
"Oh, I suppose so," Marriott replied. "Still--I really can't congratulate you when I think of those poor devils--"
"I haven't a bit of sympathy for them," said Eades coldly. This, he thought, was where Elizabeth got those strange, improper notions.
Marriott should not be permitted--
Just then, in an automobile tearing by, they saw Dick Ward, and Eades suddenly recalled a scene he had witnessed in the club the day before.
"That young fellow's going an awful gait," he said suddenly.
"Who, Dick?"
"Yes, I saw him in the club yesterday--"
"I know," said Marriott. "It's a shame. He's a nice little chap."
"Can't you do something for him? He seems to like you."
"What can I do?"
"Well, can't you--speak to him?"
"I never could preach," said Marriott.
"Well," said Eades helplessly, "it's too bad."
"Yes," said Marriott; "it would break their hearts--Ward's and Elizabeth's."
XI
The Koerners, indeed, as Marriott said, had had a hard winter. The old man, sustained at first by a foolish optimism, had expected that his injury would be compensated immediately by heavy damages from the railroad he had served so long. Marriott had begun suit, and then the law began the slow and wearisome unfolding of its interminable delays.
Weeks and months went by and nothing was done. Koerner sent for Marriott, and Marriott explained--the attorneys for the railroad company had filed a demurrer, the docket was full, the case would not be reached for a long time. Koerner could not understand; finally, he began to doubt Marriott; some of his neighbors, with the suspicion natural to the poor, hinted that Marriott might have been influenced by the company.
Koerner's leg, too, gave him incessant pain. All winter long he was confined to the house, and the family grew tired of his monotonous complainings. To add to this, Koerner was now constantly dunned by the surgeon and by the authorities of the hospital; the railroad refused to pay these bills because Koerner had brought suit; the bills, to a frugal German like Koerner, were enormous, appalling.
The Koerners, a year before, had bought the house in which they lived, borrowing the money from a building and loan association. The agent of the association, who had been so kind and obliging before the mortgage was signed, was now sharp and severe; he had lately told Koerner that unless he met the next instalment of interest he would set the family out in the street.
Koerner had saved some money from his wages, small as they were; but this was going fast. During the winter Mrs. Koerner, though still depressed and ill, had begun to do washings; the water, splashing over her legs from the tubs in the cold wood-shed day after day, had given her rheumatism. Gusta helped, of course, but with all they could do it was hard to keep things going. Gusta tried to be cheerful, but this was the hardest work of all; she often thought of the pleasant home of the Wards, and wished she were back there. She would have gone back, indeed, and given her father her wages, but there was much to do at home--the children to look after, the house to keep, the meals to get, the washings to do, and her father's leg to dress. Several times she consulted Marriott about the legal entanglements into which the family was being drawn; Marriott was wearied with the complications--the damage suit, the mortgage, the threatened actions for the doctor's bills. The law seemed to be snarling the Koerners in every one of its meshes, and the family was settling under a Teutonic melancholia.
Just at this time the law touched the family at another point--Archie was arrested. For a while he had sought work, but his experience in the army had unfitted him for every normal calling; he had acquired a taste for excitement and adventure, and no peaceful pursuit could content him.
He would not return to the army because he had too keen a memory of the indignities heaped on a common soldier by officers who had been trained from youth to an utter disregard of all human relations save those that were unreal and artificial. He had learned but one thing in the army, and that was to shoot, and he could shoot well. Somehow he had secured a revolver, a large one, thirty-eight caliber, and with this he was constantly practising.
Because Archie would not work, Koerner became angry with him; he was constantly remonstrating with him and urging him to get something to do.
Archie took all his father's reproaches with his usual good nature, but as the winter wore slowly on and the shadow of poverty deepened in the home, the old man became more and more depressed, his treatment of his son became more and more bitter. Finally Archie stayed away from home to escape scolding. He spent his evenings in Nussbaum's saloon, where, because he had been a soldier in the Philippines and was attractive and good looking, he was a great favorite and presently a leader of the young men who spent their evenings there. These young men were workers in a machine shop; they had a baseball club called the "Vikings," and in summer played games in the parks on Sundays. In the winter they spent their evenings in the saloon, the only social center accessible to them; here, besides playing pool, they drank beer, talked loudly, laughed coarsely, sang, and now and then fought, very much like Vikings indeed.
Later, roaming down town to Market Place, Archie made other acquaintances, and these young men were even more like Vikings. They were known as the Market Place gang, and they made their headquarters in Billy Deno's saloon, though they were well known in all the little saloons around the four sides of the Market. They were known, too, at the police station, which stood grimly overlooking Market Place, for they had committed many petty raids, and most of them had served terms in the workhouse. One by one they were being sent to the penitentiary, a distinction they seemed to prize, or which their fellows seemed to prize in them when they got back. The gang had certain virtues,--it stuck together; if a member was in trouble, the other members were all willing to do anything to help him out. Usually this willingness took the form of appearing in police court and swearing to an alibi, but they had done this service so often that the police-court habitues and officials smiled whenever they appeared. Their testimonies never convinced the judge; but they were imperturbable and ever ready to commit perjury in the cause.
When Archie was out of money he could not buy cartridges for his revolver, and he discovered by chance one afternoon, when he had drifted into a little shooting gallery, that the proprietor was glad to give him cartridges in return for an exhibition with the revolver, for the exhibition drew a crowd, and the boozy sailors who lounged along the Market in the evening were fascinated by Archie's skill and forthwith emulated it. It was in this way that Archie met the members of the Market Place gang, and finding them stronger, braver, more enterprising spirits than the Vikings, he became one of them, spent his days and nights with them, and visited Nussbaum's no more. He became the fast friend of Spud Healy, the leader of the gang, and in this way he came to be arrested.
Besides Archie and Spud Healy, Red McGuire, Butch Corrigan, John Connor and Mike Nailor were arrested. A Market Place grocer had missed a box of dried herrings, reported it to the police, and the police, of course, had arrested on suspicion such of the gang as they could find.