Mr. Bridge_ A Novel - Evan S. Connell [17]
“Do you have a headache?”
“I have had one since noon. How far is Douglas from here? Where does that Tipton boy live?”
“Oh, not far. Just the next block.”
“I don’t want him walking home alone in the middle of a snowstorm. He might get lost.”
Ruth said, “He won’t get lost. He knows where he lives. Stop worrying, Daddy.”
“Now you listen here, young lady: I am in no mood for an argument. I am the one who decides whether or not your brother is old enough to walk home by himself.” He had spoken more harshly than he intended. He pushed at the plate of lamb stew his wife set in front of him.
“If you want me to, I’ll walk over to Tipton’s and get him,” Ruth said.
“If those people invited him they should have had the decency to offer to bring him home.”
“I’m sure they will, if the snow starts again,” Mrs. Bridge said.
A few minutes later somebody knocked at the front door. Ruth answered it, and there stood Douglas accompanied by Mr. Tipton.
After the front door had been shut Mr. Bridge said, “Did they feed you enough? How about some dessert?”
Douglas said he didn’t think so, because he had eaten three pieces of chocolate pie at Tipton’s.
“You are tracking snow on the carpet, my young friend,” said his mother. “Go into the kitchen and take off your shoes.”
“Maybe later I’ll eat dessert,” Douglas said as he started for the kitchen.
“Pigs is pigs,” Carolyn remarked.
“We will have no more of that,” Mr. Bridge said, and after a moment he went on: “In fact, you may go to your room.”
Carolyn was startled. “What did I do?”
“You heard me.”
She turned to her mother, but Mrs. Bridge said, “You’d better obey your father. I’ll come see you in a little.”
“Daddy—” Ruth began.
“And you! Both of you. Right now. March.”
They looked at their mother, who shook her head helplessly. They got up and walked out of the dining room.
Mr. Bridge found himself very much alone at the opposite end of the table from his wife. He had not wanted this. He had been looking forward to a comfortable evening with his family. Now it was ruined. He began drumming his fingers on the table.
She asked if he would care for anything else, and he searched her voice. But she was not sarcastic. In all the time he had known her she had not once used herself that way.
“No. No, I can’t eat tonight. Take some dessert to the girls when you go to see them. That business in court has thrown my whole day off.”
“I do think you’re overworking,” she remarked. “Why don’t you take up a hobby? Other men do. Virgil has quite a stamp collection, you know.”
He went on as though she had not spoken: “I represented a boy who suffered irreparable injury because of negligence on the part of his employer. That boy will never again lead a normal life. The compensation was not unreasonable. So far as that goes, to my mind it is difficult to contemplate any sum which might be called ‘unreasonable’ after somebody’s life has been virtually destroyed. Be that as it may, the jury agreed that the sum requested was not unfair. This amount, however, was deemed excessive and reduced to the point of mockery by a judge who is totally incompetent. That boy, incidentally, is not quite nineteen years old, so he may anticipate a good many more years in his present condition.”
“It’s a shame. The judge should have realized.”
“The judge did not realize because he happens to be a fool.”
“Can’t anything be done?”
“I intend to appeal the judgment. However, what this means is more work for me, and I am not taking a fee for this case. What an appeal means is that I must invest more time and effort in a charity situation. I already have spent more time on it than I can afford to.”
“Oh,” she said uncertainly. “Well, of course I don’t understand the ins and outs of the case, but it does sound as though the judge was unfair.”
“Just what would you consider ‘fair’ in this life?” he demanded.
And hearing himself speak to his wife so rudely and so foolishly, he put down his knife and fork and held