True Grit

The following day, Mattie visits the courthouse. She speaks to the deputy about Chaney, only to be disappointed to learn that he is very low on the list of priorities for the marshals. As she waits for the trial to begin, she visits Colonel Stonehill. In his barn, she finds the ponies her father planned to train and sell, and in the office she finds Stonehill. He shares his condolences, and Mattie reveals to him her plan to hire a marshal to bring Chaney to justice. There are few marshals, Stonehill says, so she may need to be patient. He also warns her that there are many “natural hiding places” (128) out in the Indigenous territory, so Chaney will be hard to find.

Mattie begins to negotiate. She wants Stonehill to buy back the ponies he sold to her father. Stonehill refuses. Mattie insists, as she and her family no longer have any use for the ponies. Mattie also wants compensation for the theft of Judy and the saddle since her father’s possessions were in Stonehill’s stable. Stonehill is taken aback by the forcefulness of Mattie’s haggling. When he still refuses, Mattie threatens to contact her lawyer. She warns that a court will not look fondly on Stonehill offering such poor treatment to a recently bereaved family. Stonehill becomes flustered. Mattie threatens to contact Lawyer Daggett. Stonehill continues to make low offers, but Mattie insists. She holds out for $325, close to her original demand, and promises Stonehill a letter that absolves him of any liability over the theft. 

Mattie leaves Stonehill’s office and sends a telegram to Lawyer Daggett, asking him for the letter and telling him to assure her mother that she is well. She naps a short while and then returns to the courthouse. Inside, Rooster Cogburn is delivering his testimony in the trial of Odus Wharton, whom Rooster captured in controversial circumstances. Judge Isaac Parker is known for his willingness to sentence criminals to death. Mattie studies Rooster. He is overweight, middle-aged, and has a patch over one eye. On the stand, he is grilled by Mr. Barlow, the prosecutor. Rooster shares his version of the story, in which a tip-off from an unnamed boy led him to the spot where Odus and his brother killed a man and a woman. The dying man claimed that the Wharton boys tried to rob him and his wife, only to kill her when she tried to run. They tortured the man and stole his money from a hiding place. 

Rooster and his partner, Potter, agreed with other marshals to pursue the Wharton boys. Rooster and Potter found the Wharton boys hiding out with their father, Aaron, beside a fire. As the marshals approached, the men became violent. Rooster claims that he was forced to shoot Aaron when Aaron attacked him with an ax. C.C. Wharton shot Potter, Rooster claims, forcing Rooster to shoot him. Odus fled; Rooster shot him but only “winged” (138) him. Once Odus was captured, Rooster questioned Aaron’s wife, but she told him nothing. Finding the dead man’s money, they returned to Fort Smith, and Potter died of his wounds a short time later.

Mr. Goudy, Odus’s lawyer, cross-examines Rooster. When he asks Rooster how many men he has shot, Rooster asks whether he means “shot or killed” (139). Rooster guesses that he has shot 12-15 men. The records show, Goudy says, that Rooster has shot an estimated 23 people. Goudy accuses Rooster of being dangerous. He says that Rooster has a personal dislike of the Wharton family, having already shot the Wharton boys’ elder brother the year before. Goudy picks apart Rooster’s story, implying that Rooster shot the men in cold blood and invented a story afterward. Rooster becomes awkward, blaming hogs for moving the bodies. The cross-examination is interrupted by Judge Parker, who says that the trial has gone on too long. They will reconvene the following day.

Mattie studies the people leaving the courtroom. To her, Odus looks like a sinful man. Rooster is the last to leave. Mattie chases after him, claiming that she has heard that he is a man with “true grit” (145). Rooster listens to her as he tries to roll a cigarette. Mattie takes over, expertly rolling the tobacco as she explains that she wants to hire him to capture Chaney. Rooster is dismissive. He tells Mattie to go home and help on the farm. Ignoring his comments, Mattie presses him, detailing the money offered by the government to capture Chaney. As well as this, she says, she will offer him a $50 reward.

Rooster spots the sugar sack carried by Mattie. Inside is her father’s dragoon pistol. She is too small for such a big gun, he claims. Mattie says she wants to kill Chaney with her father’s pistol if the law will not help her. Rooster does not believe that Mattie has the $50; she insists that she will soon once her account with Stonehill is settled. She asks about Ned. Rooster knows Ned well, having shot him in the lip the previous year. That day, Rooster says, Ned lived up to his “lucky” (146) moniker. Mattie says that Chaney is with Ned, but Rooster does not want to listen. He offers to discuss the matter over dinner. Rooster walks back to his living quarters: the back room of a general store owned by a Chinese man named Lee. They eat dinner, and then Rooster and Lee play cards. Rooster drinks whiskey with Mattie pestering him to take her case. He does not want to be rushed. Eventually, however, he claims that he would need $100 to track down Ned. When Mattie accuses him of trying to take advantage of her, he claims that this is his “children’s rate” (147).

Rooster and Lee play cards late into the night. As she waits for Rooster to walk her back to the boarding house, Mattie falls asleep. She wakes to find Rooster inspecting her father's dragoon pistol. He points it at a rat, pretending to arrest the rat for eating Lee’s products. After facetiously trying to arrest the rat in the “new way” (149), Rooster shoots it. Mattie is angry at him for wasting her ammunition. Rooster is amused. Mattie does not even know how to reload the gun, he jokes. He loads the gun from his own box of mismatched bullets. Drunk on whiskey, he criticizes the lawyers who think that they can “serve papers on a rat” (150). The only thing to do with a rat, he says, is to kill it or leave it alone. Rats do not care about papers. Rooster criticizes the legal system; it is full of lawyers who protect the rats. Mattie abandons Rooster to his drunken rambling. She presumes that he will follow her, escorting her back to the boarding house. He does not. Mattie finds her own way back to the boarding house, feeling the first inklings of a cough.