d town!"

CHAPTER VI

THE LADY LAWYER

When old Hosie had withdrawn with his expectorative plunder, Katherine
sat down at the desk and gazed thoughtfully out of her window, taking
in the tarnished dome of the Court House that rose lustreless above
the elm tops and the heavy-boned farmhorses that stood about the iron
hitch-racks of the Square, stamping and switching their tails in
dozing warfare against the flies.

Once more, she began to go over the case. Having decided to test all
possible theories, she for the moment pigeon-holed the idea of a
mistake, and began to seek for other explanations. For a space she
vacantly watched the workmen tearing down the speakers' stand. But
presently her eyes began to glow, and she sprang up and excitedly
paced the little office.

Perhaps her father had unwittingly and innocently become involved in
some large system of corruption! Perhaps this case was the first
symptom of the existence of some deep-hidden municipal disease!

It seemed possible--very possible. Her two years with the Municipal
League had taught her how common were astute dishonest practices. The
idea filled her. She began to burn with a feverish hope. But from the
first moment she was sufficiently cool-headed to realize that to
follow up the idea she required intimate knowledge of Westville
political conditions.

Here she felt herself greatly handicapped. Owing to her long residence
away from Westville she was practically in ignorance of public
affairs--and she faced the further difficulty of having no one to whom
she could turn for information. Her father she knew could be of little
service; expert though he was in his specialty, he was blind to evil
in men. As for Blake, she did not care to ask aid from him so soon
after his refusal of assistance. And as for others, she felt that all
who could give her information were either hostile to her father or
critical of herself.

For days the idea possessed her mind. She kept it to herself, and, her
suspicious eyes sweeping in all directions, she studied as best she
could to find some evidence or clue to evidence, that would
corroborate her conjecture. In her excited hope, she strove, while she
thought and worked, to be indifferent to what the town might think
about her. But she was well aware that Old Hosie's prophecy was swift
in coming true--that a storm was raging, a storm of her own sex. It
should be explained, however, in justice to them, that they