"That cleans me out, Judge," he said stolidly. "I wasn't such a bad
husband, at that. I got sore--but I'll bet you get sore yourself and
tell your wife what-for, now and then. I didn't get a square deal, but
that's all right. I'm giving a better deal than I got. Now you can keep
that money and pay it out to Marie as she needs it, for herself and the
kid. But for the Lord's sake, Judge, don't let that wildcat of a mother
of hers get her fingers into the pile! She framed this deal, thinking
she'd get a haul outa me this way. I'm asking you to block that little
game. I've held out ten dollars, to eat on till I strike something. I'm
clean; they've licked the platter and broke the dish. So don't never ask
me to dig up any more, because I won't--not for you nor no other darn
man. Get that."
This, you must know, was not in the courtroom, so Bud was not fined for
contempt. The judge was a married man himself, and he may have had a
sympathetic understanding of Bud's position. At any rate he listened
unofficially, and helped Bud out with the legal part of it, so that Bud
walked out of the judge's office financially free, even though he had
a suspicion that his freedom would not bear the test of prosperity,
and that Marie's mother would let him alone only so long as he and
prosperity were strangers.