The lawyer was bitterly despondent. Law practice in Clayton Center was no longer lucrative. Although Allen was very dextrous in twisting three-ply bandages around the eyes of the Lady with the Scales, the Lady with the Pencil at the right of the Judge was not so blind. The citizens of Clayton Center had developed a spineless, milksop tendency to settle even their constitutional rights out of court. Besides Betty’s seven dollars a day Allen’s income looked as ill-fed as a dromedary in an elephant parade.
The young lawyer’s heart was so heavy over his light matrimonial prospects that he went out that night with some of the boys and got drunk. In returning at one A. M., singing “It Was at Aunt Dinah’s Quilting Party—I was seeing Nellie home,” he fell off the board sidewalk and broke the established precedent that a drunken man cannot hurt himself by a fall.
The breaking of one leg was the most fortunate accident upon which a distressed barrister ever fell. It gave him two legs on which to stand in court.
He sued the city immediately for ten thousand dollars’ damages on account of the defective sidewalk. His three companions swore positively that there was not only one hole in the walk, but two, and not only two loose boards, but six.
Moreover, it was not a plain fracture of the limb. Allen proved by a liver specialist that the jolt had permanently deranged his liver; a spine specialist testified the jar had injured the fourteenth vertebra; a nerve specialist swore that the shock of the fall and subsequent anguish of mind in seeing his law practice drop away would probably result in a total breakdown.
The jury gave him four thousand dollars’ damages—twice what he hoped. And the city attorney, having a fraternal feeling for fractured legal legs, advised the city to pay instead of appeal.
One bright morning, fully recovered and adorned in a natty spring suit, Ben T. Allen went to the courthouse to get an order from the court to the city treasurer for his four thousand dollars’ damages.
There was a click of a typewriter in an anteroom. Betty Lane, the court stenographer, was down early working out some notes.
Ben T. Allen went in, laid his hat debonairly on a stack of notebooks, sat on the edge of her desk, and locked his hands around his knees and smiled possessively.
“Why, good morning, Mr. Allen.” Betty looked up and nodded. “Allow me to congratulate you.”