Orson Card - THE CRYSTAL CITY

"That doesn't get mentioned even in the pro-slavery press, and you'd think they'd make a big deal of it."

"She retired from the public use of her knack," said Verily. "But she still sees what she sees, and what she saw was this: The only way this expedition of runaway slaves and Frenchmen is going to find any peace or safety is with your help."

Lincoln's bony face suddenly looked sad. "Mr. Cooper, I hope your friend is ready for disappointment."

"You won't do it?"

"Oh, I'll do whatever I can. But you got to understand something. Everything I turn my hand to fails. I mean everything. I think I've got a knack for failure, because I manage it no matter what I undertake to do."

"I don't know," said Verily. "You tell a good story."

"Well, that's not something a man can make a living at."

"I do," said Verily.

"Telling stories? Forgive me for saying it, but you don't look like the humorous type."

"I didn't say my stories were funny, but it wouldn't hurt a bit in my profession if I had a little more humor from time to time."

"You're saying that lawyers are storytellers?"

"That's our main job. We take a set of facts, and we tell a story that includes them all and doesn't leave out or contradict a one of them. The other fellow's lawyer then takes the same facts and tells a different story. And the jury believes one story or they believe the other."

Lincoln laughed. "Why, you make your profession sound almost as useless as loafing around in a general store telling silly stories to help folks pass the time of day."

"Do you really believe that's all you do?" asked Verily.

"I think the evidence of your own eyes should confirm that story, sir," said Lincoln.

"My eyes see what your eyes can't," said Verily Cooper. "This town is a happy place-one of the happiest towns, house for house and man for man, that I've ever seen."

"It's a good place to live, and it's good neighbors make it that way, I always say," said Lincoln.

"A town's like a living thing," said Verily. "It all fits together like a body-not an attractive body, because there's a head of this and a head of that, and all kinds of arms and legs and fingers, but you get my analogy, I'm sure."

"Everybody's got his place," said Lincoln.

"Ah, but most towns have people who can't find their place, or aren't happy with it, or are trying to take a place that they're not suited for, or hurt somebody who belongs there just as much as they do. But from the feel of this town I'd say there's not too much of that."

"We got our skunks, like any other town. When they get their tail up, folks know to duck for cover."

"This town has a heart," said Verily.

"I'm glad you could see that," said Lincoln.

"And the heart is you."

Lincoln laughed. "Oh, I didn't see that coming. You do have a sense of humor after all, Mr. Cooper."

Verily just smiled. "Mr. Lincoln, I think if you set yourself to figuring out where these five or six thousand souls might find refuge, you'd not only come up with a good answer, but you'd be the very man best suited to persuading folks to let them go there."

Lincoln looked off into the distance. "I'm a terrible salesman," he finally said. "I always tell the truth about what I'm selling, and then nobody buys it."

"But how are you at pleading for the downtrodden? Especially when every word you'd say about them would be true?"

"In case you haven't noticed, Mr. Cooper, the downtrodden get less popular as their numbers increase. A man approached by one beggar is likely to give him a penny. A man approached by five beggars in one day won't give a thing to the last one. And a man approached by five beggars at once will run away and claim he was being robbed."

"Which is why we need to have a refuge for these folks before anybody can see with their own eyes how many they are."

"Oh, I know how many five thousand is. It's about four times the population of Springfield, and about equal to the population of this whole county."

"So there's not room for them here," said Verily.

"Or any other town along the Mizzippy. And I reckon if they're being carried on boats up the river, you'll want a place for them that's near a landing."

"Not on boats," said Verily.

"Walking? If they can make their way to Noisy River, with the militia of every slave-owning county roused against them, they don't need any help from me."

"They're not walking up the east bank of the river."

Lincoln grinned. "Oh, now, you're telling me that Alvin got them reds to let his people pass through."

"Pass through, but not linger."

"No, I reckon not," said Lincoln. "You let in five thousand one day, you'll have to let in ten thousand the next."

"Mr. Lincoln," said Verily, "I know you don't think you can do the job, but Margaret Larner thinks you can, and from what I've seen of you, I think you can, and all that is lacking at the moment is your agreement to try."

"Knowing that I'm likely to fail," said Lincoln.

"I can't fail worse with your help than I'm bound to fail without it," said Verily.

"You know that Coz will want to help, and he's even more of a blockhead than I am."

"I'd be happy to have the help of Coz, whoever that might be, as long as I can rely on you."

"I'll tell you what," said Lincoln.

"There's something you want in return?"

"Oh, I'll do it anyway," said Lincoln, "or try my best, I should say. But since you and I will be together for a while, and likely to have many an hour on the road together, what would you think of using your time to start teaching me the principles of law?"

"You don't talk law," said Verily Cooper, "you read law."

"You read law after you've decided that a lawyer's what you want to be," said Lincoln. "But before you decide, then you talk law so you find out just what it is you're getting yourself in for, and whether you want to spend your life doing it."

"I don't think you'll spend your whole life doing any one thing," said Verily. "I don't think that's in you, if I know anything about a man. But I think if you set your mind to lawyering, you'd be a good one. And not least because there's no chance under heaven that you will ever, for a single moment, look like a lawyer."

"You don't think that's a drawback?"

"I think that for a long while, every lawyer who comes up against you in court will think you're a country bumpkin and he won't have to work at all to beat you."

"But I am a country bumpkin."

"And I'm a kegmaker. A kegmaker who wins most of his cases in court."

Lincoln laughed. "So you're saying that by simply being myself, as I am, not pretending to be anything else, I'll fool those highfalutin lawyers better than if I tried to lie to them."

"You can't help what other people choose to believe about you, before they have all the evidence in hand."

Lincoln reached out his hand. "I'm with you, then, till we find a place for this tribe that Alvin's recruited. Though I have to say, he ain't gonna need some camp on the outskirts of a town. Lessen he's figuring to split those folks up among twenty towns or more, nobody's going to want them."

"Splitting them up might be necessary," said Verily. "But it might also be dangerous. You know there'll be slave catchers here as soon as it becomes known where they are."

"So you need them all to be in a place where slave catchers won't be able to cart them all back south one at a time."

"A place that will afford protection, yes," said Verily.

"A completely abolitionist county, then, is what you need. With its own judge, not a circuit rider, so you know how he's going to rule on every slavery issue."

"A strong enthusiasm for habeus corpus would be an advantage, yes."

"A county where every justice of the peace can be relied on not to cooperate with the catchers."