Lincoln, the unknown

50•LINCOLN THE UNKNOWNAnd so, for the next five and a half years, Lincoln slept inthe bed with Speed, over the store, without paying any rentat all.Another friend, William Butler, took Lincoln into his homeand not only boarded him for five years, but bought many ofhis clothes for him.Lincoln probably paid Butler a little something when, as,and if he could; but there was no specific charge. The wholething was a haphazard arrangement between friends.And Lincoln thanked God that it was, for if it hadn't beenfor the help of Butler and Speed, he could never have made ago of the law.He went into partnership with another attorney, namedStuart. Stuart devoted most of his time to politics, and saddledthe office routine on Lincoln. But there wasn't much routine tosaddle, and there wasn't much of an office. The furnishingsconsisted of "a small, dirty bed, a buffalo robe, a chair, a bench"and a sort of bookcase containing a few legal volumes.The office records show that during the first six months thefirm took in only five fees: one was for two dollars and a half,two were for five dollars each, one was a ten-dollar fee, andthey had to take an overcoat as part payment in another case.Lincoln became so discouraged that he stopped one day atPage Eaton's carpenter shop in Springfield and confessed thathe had a notion to abandon law and go to work as a carpenter.A few years before that, while studying law back in New Salem,Lincoln had seriously thought of giving up his books and becominga blacksmith.That first year in Springfield was a lonely one for Lincoln.About the only people he met were the men who forgatheredof an evening, in the back of Speed's store, to argue politics andkill time. Lincoln wouldn't go to church on Sundays, because,as he said, he wouldn't know how to act in fine churches likethose in Springfield.Only one woman spoke to him during that first year, and hewrote to a friend that she wouldn't have spoken "if she couldhave avoided it."But in 1839 a woman came to town who not only spoke tohim, but courted him and determined to marry him. Her namewas Mary Todd.Somebody asked Lincoln once why the Todds spelled theirname as they did, and he replied that he reckoned that one "d"