“I don’t need your help, thank you,” said Peter calmly.

“Good,” said Dummer.  “You think a briefless lawyer of thirty can go it alone, do you, even against the whole city government?”

“I know I have not influence enough to get that case pushed, Mr. Dummer, but the law is on my side, and I’m not going to give up yet.”

“Well, what are you going to do about it?” said Dummer, sneeringly.

“Fight,” said Peter, walking away.

He went back to his office, and sitting at his desk, wrote a formal letter to the District Attorney, calling his attention to the case, and asking information as to when it would be brought to trial.  Then he copied this, and mailed the original.  Then he read the Code again.  After that he went over the New York reports, making notes.  For a second time the morning sun found Peter still at his desk.  But this time his head was not bowed upon his blotter, as if he were beaten or dead.  His whole figure was stiff with purpose, and his jaw was as rigid as a mastiff’s.

CHAPTER XV.

THE FIGHT.

The only reply which Peter received to his letter to the District-Attorney, was a mere formal reiteration of that officer’s verbal statement, that the case would be taken up in its due order, after those which preceded it had been dealt with.  Peter knew enough of the numberless cases which never reach trial to understand that this meant in truth, the laying aside of the case, till it was killed by the statute of limitations.

On receiving this reply, Peter made another move, by going to three newspapers, and trying to see their managing editors.  One declined to see him.  A second merely told Peter, after his statement, which the editor only allowed him partly to explain, that he was very busy and could not take time to look into it, but that Peter might come again in about a month.  The third let Peter tell his story, and then shook his head: 

“I have no doubt you are right, but it isn’t in shape for us to use.  Such a case rarely goes to trial for six months or a year, and so, if we begin an attack now, it will simply fall flat.  If you can get us a written statement from the District Attorney that he doesn’t intend to push the case, we can do something, but I suppose he’s far too shrewd to commit himself.”

“Yes.”

“Then there’s no use in beginning an attack, for you really have no powder.  Come in again a year from now, and then we may be able to say something, if he hasn’t acted in the meantime.”

Peter left the office, knowing that that chance of pressure was gone.  If the papers of the Republican party would not use it, it was idle spending time in seeing or trying to see the editors of the Democratic papers.  He wasted therefore no more efforts on newspapers.

The next three days Peter passed in the New York Law Institute Library, deep in many books.  Then he packed his bag, and took an afternoon train for Albany.  He was going to play his last card, with the odds of a thousand to one against his winning.  But that very fact only nerved him the more.