Rising in the World CHAPTER 18.
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Poor Malcolm, after escaping from the clutches of Dunbar, sold off all the goods and household furniture which he had removed to the best possible advantage, and calling together his creditors, gave them a history of his misfortunes, and divided among them the sum of one thousand dollars — all that he had received from the sale of what he had been able to save. It liquidated but thirty-three percent of his debts. He had previously secured a clerkship paying a small salary. In consideration of his honesty in doing what was in his power, in this his last extremity, his creditors voluntarily signed him a full release from the balance of their claims against him.
One evening, a few days after this had taken place, Mr. Harrison called upon him at his boarding house. They met alone in the public parlor. Mr. Harrison was kind in his manner, but Malcolm was smarting yet too severely from the consequences of the late suit, to feel in any mood for a cordial reception of his relative.
"Malcolm," said the old gentleman, after they were seated, "from my attorney who defended the late suit that you brought against me, I learned some facts that I never knew before. I always believed my title to the property I hold to be clear, and never could imagine upon what just ground you claimed to contest it. But your attorney discovered, or you discovered it to him, a matter of which I have always been ignorant, and which gives color to the opinion you have so pertinaciously held in regard to your rights in my estate. That you have some right in it, I think may be the case, though certainly not to the extent you have imagined. I have little doubt that, if you had not been thrown out of court on a demurrer, the court would have given you some twenty or thirty thousand dollars. This is my own lawyer's opinion."
"Then," said Malcolm, "it is clearly my duty to begin again."
"I would advise you to try another lawyer, if you do."
"Why so?" asked Malcolm.
"Because the one you had, took a bribe to introduce to the court a defective bill."
"You are jesting," said Malcolm.
"No," replied Harrison, quietly; "I am entirely in earnest. My lawyer suggested that Dunbar could be bought over to our interests, and I took it into my head to see if he really was in earnest. Sure enough, Dunbar named thirty thousand dollars as the price he would take to introduce a defect in his bill, that we might throw you out of court, saddled with costs so great that you could not pay them, without which it would be impossible to begin again."
"And this was done?"
"Yes."
"You paid him thirty thousand dollars to defraud me?"
"I loaned him that much out of his wife's fortune — or, rather, his wife to be."
"I don't understand you."
Harrison explained all that matter, and then added —
"From the moment I was satisfied that you had any rights in my estate, I determined to grant them, let them be what they would. I was only half satisfied on this head, when I offered you the twenty-five thousand dollars which you declined. I now believe that thirty thousand dollars are all to which you are entitled, and that I am willing you shall have, if you will take it and settle the matter forever."
Malcolm could hardly believe that this was said in earnest. When satisfied that it was, the delight he felt was almost beyond expression.
Harrison was perfectly sincere in all this. It was what he intended when he bargained with Dunbar for the admission of a flaw in his client's bill. He was a man of thoroughly honest principles, but eccentric in some things. The boldness of the proposition made by his lawyer was so startling, that he told him to go on, merely because he was curious to see if such bold-faced iniquity could be practiced by a member of the bar. Before he agreed to pay the sum named, he understood the relationship that existed between Dunbar and his ward, and conceived the idea of making him pay his own bribe, which he succeeded so well in doing. He ran some little risk, certainly; but he was a pretty shrewd man in his calculations, and rarely went very far wrong.
On the day after the interview with Mr. Harrison, Malcolm called at the office of Mr. Dunbar. The lawyer met him with a scowl upon his brow.
"I have one or two things to say to you, friend Dunbar," said Malcolm, seating himself. He spoke in a very cool manner. "In the first place, I believe a pretty large bill of costs accrued in the late suit against Harrison, and that I stood charged with the same."
"Your memory is certainly accurate in the matter," returned the lawyer, with insult in his tone and manner.
"That bill I wish you to settle in full," returned Malcolm, in a firm voice. "There is another matter," he continued, "that I wish also settled. During the progress of the suit, unnecessarily delayed as you know, my business became involved, and finally, by your direct agency, was entirely broken up. I am in debt on that account about two thousand dollars, which I wish you also to settle for me, and to do it forthwith."
"Mr. Malcolm, will you leave my office instantly!" said the lawyer, smothering his excitement under a calmness of tone, and rising to his feet as he spoke.
"Don't get excited, Mr. Dunbar," replied Malcolm, retaining his seat. "This is a business of some importance and needs coolness in its settlement. I have demanded nothing but what is right, and nothing but what I mean to have. I will give you until tomorrow afternoon at four o'clock to deliberate upon the matter, and then if you do not present me with the clerk's receipt for that bill of costs, and with two thousand dollars to pay off my debts — I will instantly commence a suit against you and Harrison's lawyer for a conspiracy to defraud me, in which something about a demurrer will come out that will not be very pleasant to you or to him, as you both too well know."
Dunbar sank down in his chair as if suddenly deprived of strength, while the perspiration started upon his forehead.
"For heaven's sake! what do you mean?" he exclaimed, taken so completely by surprise as to be thrown off his guard.
"Simply what I say," replied Malcolm, as coolly and firmly as at first. "I have heard from Mr. Harrison, all about the bribe you accepted, and received out of your own pocket. So you needn't imagine that I am trying to frighten you with a bugbear. Pay the loss you have occasioned me — and I be done with you forever; if not, I will obtain damages. Tomorrow at four o'clock I will call, and if you are prepared to make all right — well; and if not — well; at least so far as I am concerned. Good day."
And Malcolm retired from the office of Dunbar, leaving the attorney more than half stupefied, yet in the fullest possession of every word that had been uttered.
When Malcolm called on the next day at the hour named, he received all that he had demanded.
The star of Lawrence Dunbar's rising fortunes, had already reached its point of culmination — as young as he was, and possessed of brilliant talents and a mind well stored with professional lore — and was now beginning its rapid descent. He had erred in supposing that, separated from Mr. Harker, he could take a high position at the bar. In this, he had overrated himself. Only a few petty cases came into his hands besides the case of Malcolm, which he managed so badly. The flaw left in his client's bill in this case was so palpable, that the whole bar expressed astonishment at the glaring oversight. It hurt his reputation seriously.
But, when a whisper of the truth began to be heard, first here, then there, and then everywhere among those who knew him, his star set in the horizon of Philadelphia. So flagrant a violation of all honest principles, met its just rebuke. He stood alone. No man of honor and respectability showed him any attentions or passed him the compliment of an invitation to his house. There was a ban upon him; so much so that men pointed at him in the streets and related the story of his affair with old Mr. Harrison. In less than a year, there was a public sale of his elegant furniture in Arch-street, and he moved somewhere South with his wife. Of his domestic felicity, nothing need be said. Enough can be imagined.
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