A Thousand Acres_ A Novel - Jane Smiley [151]
I shook my head, and snapped back to the events in the courtroom.
Caroline had returned and was stepping up to the witness stand. She straightened her skirt and sat down. She smiled at her lawyer, then at Ken LaSalle. The lawyer said, “Ms. Cook, when were your suspicions aroused about the plans going forward for the division of the Cook farm?”
“I was suspicious from the first. The whole project was very untypical of my father.”
He asked her what she meant. They conversed in a friendly way about Daddy, portraying him as a “hands-on manager,” a “lifelong farmer.”
“What was your response to the project?”
“I made my reservations known.”
“How were they greeted?”
“My sister Ginny Smith urged me very strongly to go along with the idea.”
“What did you think of that?”
“I suspected her of ulterior motives. I knew she and Rose both wanted to get their hands—”
Mr. Cartier objected.
Rose said, “Oh my God, listen to this.” The judge cast her a severe glance.
The Des Moines lawyer tried another tack. He said, “Later, it was more than suspicions, right? Later you were really worried about your father’s safety, right?”
“They sent him out into a terrible storm—”
Mr. Cartier objected. Hearsay.
The lawyer tried again, “Mr. Smith told you that they had sent your father out into a terrible storm, did he not?” Rose leaned toward me and whispered, “Did he?”
I let Caroline speak for me. “Yes, he did. It was common knowledge—”
Rose sat back in her chair. “I’m not surprised.”
Judge Ottarson pulled his reading glasses down on his nose and skimmed a document on his desk. Then he interrupted her. He said, “The mismanagement or abuse clause in the preincorporation agreement that is the occasion for this suit refers, Ms. Cook, to the farm properties only. You may not introduce the subject of your father and his relation to your sisters into this courtroom.”
Caroline flushed red, and said, “But—” Her lawyer shushed her. Then he smiled slyly, comfortingly. I looked over at Mr. Cartier, who was watching with lively interest.
The lawyer said, “Has the Cook farm ever incurred debt?”
Caroline said, “No.”
“Is it now burdened with debt?”
“It certainly is—” She wanted to go on, but she stopped, triumphantly, with a glance at Rose, then at me. After a moment, she turned her face stonily forward again, and smoothed her hair. Mr. Cartier declined to interview her, and she stood up. There was dead silence as her hundred-dollar heels clicked back to her seat, then a loud screech as she pulled out her chair. Marv Carson was called to the stand.
Yes, he said, his bank was owed about $125,000 with the farm as collateral.
Yes, he said, if all went as planned, the bank would loan us $300,000. He smiled proudly.
He said, “This is going to be a first-class hog operation.”
Yes, he said, the Smiths and Mrs. Lewis were up-to-date in their payments.
The Des Moines lawyer said, “Mr. Carson, many would consider it remarkably risky for a family operation to take on this kind of debt. Don’t you?”
“Oh, no. I feel good about it.”
The Des Moines lawyer raised his eyebrows.
“Hogs are an excellent investment. Profit is going to be in hogs. The idea of being debt-free is a very old-fashioned one. A family can be debt-free, that’s one thing. A business is different. You’ve got to grasp that a farm is a business first and foremost. Got to have capital improvements in a business. Economy of scale. All that.” Marv was grinning. Clearly, he considered that he was giving everyone in the courtroom a well-deserved lesson. He went on, “What I worry about is the delay, frankly. This delay is very