The Prudence of the Flesh by Ralph McInerny

Author:Ralph McInerny [McInerny, Ralph]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780312351441
Publisher: Minotaur Books
Published: 2010-04-02T04:00:00+00:00

6

Because encountering Tuttle of Tuttle & Tuttle posed such delicate problems of conscience, Amos Cadbury kept those encounters to a minimum. Should the little lawyer loom on the horizon in the courthouse, skating across the great granite floor beneath the cupola, doubtless having descended the great spiral staircase that did not interfere with the ground-level view of the allegorical depiction of justice up among the painted clouds—should Tuttle surprise him there, a simple nod from Cadbury sufficed. If he intended to enter an elevator, he made certain that this was not Tuttle’s intention as well. Needless to say, Tuttle did not come to Cadbury’s office or, if he did, was told some white lie that sent him away. Was this uncharitable or, as Amos wanted to think, a laudable shunning for the sake of the profession? If Amos had been truly vindictive, he would have pressed for Tuttle’s disbarment on the two occasions he chaired the committee looking into Tuttle’s activities. The few disbarred lawyers Amos Cadbury knew filled him with compassion. Oh, he believed in punishment for misdeeds, and he did not think life imprisonment was too severe a penalty for certain crimes, but for a man to be cut off from the knowledge and skills he had acquired in order to earn his bread, ah, that must be a veritable hell. So he had been lenient in judging Tuttle, hoping that the threat of disbarment would prove a stimulus to reform.

Now, dressing formally on the evening of the Fox River bar’s annual spring banquet, Amos stood before his dressing room mirror and remembered times when his late wife’s arm had lain on the arm of this dinner jacket. By half closing his eyes, he could conjure her up at his side, a replica of a photograph in his den of the two of them formally attired, taken by the ship photographer on the cruise that had marked the fiftieth anniversary of their marriage. The cruise had been aboard a Holland America vessel bearing the same name, Statendam, as that on which they had sailed to Europe on their honeymoon. There was another photograph of them with the pope, his bride now veiled in black, when they had attended the private papal Mass with a handful of others who had powerful friends in Rome. Why with his heart so full did he now think of the redoubtable Tuttle?

The reason occurred to him as he was driven to the hotel where the banquet would take place—in the Loop, there being no hotel adequate for the purpose in Fox River. In St. Peter’s Square one was constantly accosted by men selling postcards and trinkets, men who would not take no for an answer and trailed along until defeat was certain. They seemed the very model of Tuttle seeking legal business by whatever means was effective. The annual banquet of the bar was the supreme test, since it would never do to snub a fellow lawyer on that occasion. He only wished that Tuttle were selling postcards and rosaries so he could make a purchase and be done with it.

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