The red window lit up: guilty as charged.
“Work!” the twerp muttered, his eyes haunted.
The judge said, shifting his wig and showing a bit of earphone under it, “Mr. Bailiff, take charge of the prisoner. Sentencing tomorrow at eleven. Court’s adjourned.”
The twerp moaned, “I hate them damn machines. Couldn’t you have got me a human jury, maybe get an injunction——”
Mundin said wearily, “A human jury would have crucified you. Why did you have to steal from the Stadium? Why not pick on something safe like the Church or the judge’s piggy bank? See you tomorrow.” He turned his back on the defendant and bumped into Harvard Law.
“Nice try, young man.” The grandee smiled frostily. “Can’t win them all, can we?”
Mundin snarled, “If you’re so smart why aren’t you a corporation lawyer?” \and stamped out of the courtroom.
He was on the street before he regretted the crack. Harvard’s face had fallen satisfactorily, but the jibe was another O-O. Why, indeed? The same reason Mundin himself wasn’t, of course. He hadn’t inherited one of the great hereditary corporation-law practices and he never would. Even grinding through Harvard Law School can’t get you conveniently reborn into the Root, or Lincoln, or Dulles, or Choate families. Not for Harvard (or for Charles Mundin) the great reorganizations, receiverships, and debenture issues. Not for them the mergers and protective committees. Not for them the golden showers that fell when you pleaded before human judges and human juries, human surrogates and human commissions. For them—the jury box and the trivia of the criminal law.
A morose fifteen-minute walk through Monmouth’s sweltering, rutted streets brought bun to his office building. His wallet
nerve twinged as his eye fell on the quietly proud little plaque beside the door of the building. It announced that its rental agents were sorry but could offer no vacancies. Mundin hoped it would stay that way, at least as far as bis own office was concerned.
He got an elevator to himself. “Sixteen,” he told it. He was thinking of his first client, the twerp. At least he would get a fee; you got a fee on conditionable cases. The twerp was terrified that he’d find himself unable to steal. Maybe Counselor Mundin himself might soon be driven to dangling a hook and line over the wall of a ticket window at Monmouth Stadium. …
Or he might get really desperate, and find himself one of the contestants in the Field Day inside.
His mail hopper was empty, but his guaranteed fully automatic Sleepless Secretary—he was still payihg for it—was blinking for his attention. The rental agents again? Lawbook salesman? Maybe even a client? “Go ahead,” he said.
In its perfect voice the machine said: ‘Telephone call, 1205 hours. Mr. Mundin is out, Madam. If you wish to leave a message I will take it down.”
The voice was the voice of Del Dworcas, chairman of the County Committee and purveyor of small favors. It said: “Who the hell are you calling madam, sister?”
The secretary: “Gug-gug-gug—ow-wooh. Sir.”
Dworcas, his voice annoyed: “What the hell——? Oh. One of those damn gadgets. Well, listen, Charlie, if you ever get this. I sent somebody over to see you. Named Bligh. Treat him right. And give me a call. Something to talk about with you. And you better get that damn machine fixed unless you want to lose some business.”
The secretary, after a pause: “Is that the end of your message, madam?”
Dworcas: “Damn your guts, yes! And stop calling me madam!”
The secretary: “Gug-gag-gug—ow-woooh.” And click.
Oh, fine, thought Mundin. Now Dworcas was sore at him and nothing could be done about it. The secretary’s confusion between the sexes and banshee howl didn’t seem to be covered by the service contract.
And Dworcas was chairman of the County Committee,
which handed out poll-watching assignments to deserving young attorneys.
The mailtube popped while he was blaspheming Dworcas and the salesman who had flattered him into buying the secretary. He eagerly fished the letter from its hopper, but when he caught sight of the return address he dropped it unopened. The Scholarship Investors’ Realization Corporation could have nothing of interest to say to him; he knew he owed them the money, and he knew by virtue of the law course they had paid for that they couldn’t do anything drastic to make him pay.