“Yes,” Choate said. “Well, you might say I’ve won my spurs. The old man made me counsel for the Group E Debenture Holder’s Protective Committee. Old Haskell died in harness, you know. Think of it—forty years as counsel for the Protective Committee! And with a hearing before the Referee in Receivership coming up. Well, I won my spurs, as you might say. I argued before the referee this morning, and I got a four-year stay!”
“Well,” Charles Mundin said. ‘To use a figure of speech, you certainly won your spurs, didn’t you?”
“I thought you’d see it that way,” Choate beamed. “I simply pointed out to old Rodeheaver that rushing through an immediate execution of receivership would work a hardship on the committee, and I asked for more time to prepare our roits for the trust offices. Old Rodeheaver just thought it over and decided it would be hi the public interest to grant a stay. And, Charles, he congratulated me on my presentation! He said he had never heard the argument read better!”
“Well done,” said Charles. It was impossible to resent this imbecile. A faint spark of technical interest made him ask, “How did you prove hardship?”
Choate waved airily. “Oh, that was easy. We have this smart little fellow in the office, some kind of cousin of mine, I guess. He handles all the briefs. A real specialist; not much at the “big picture,” you know, but very good in his field. He could prove old Green, Charlesworth were starving in the gutter if you told him to. I’m joking, of course,” he added hastily.
Poor Willie, thought Mundin. Too dumb for Harvard Law,
too dumb for Columbia, though he was rich enough to buy and sell them both. That’s how he wound up at John Marshall, a poor man’s school which carried him for eight years of conditions and repeats until sheer attrition of memorizing had worn grooves in his brain that carried him through his exams. Mun-din had written most of his papers, and nothing but good-heartedness and a gentle, sheep’s gaze had got him through the orals.
And poor dumb Willie glowed, “You know what that little job is worth? The firm’s putting in for two hundred and twenty-five thousand dollars, Charlesl And as counsel for record I get half!”
That did it. Mundin licked his lips. “Willie,” he said hoarsely, “Willie——”
He cut it oft there. His mind played out the conversation to its end: The abject begging, Willie, you owe me something, give me a job, I can be a smart little fellow as well as anybody’s cousin. And the dismally embarrassed, Gosh, Charles, be fair, the old man would never understand, what would you do if you were in my place? _
Hopeless, Mundin knew the answer. In Willie’s place, he would keep the lucrative practice of corporate law right in the grip of the Choate family. He would sit on top of his practice with a shotgun in his lap. And if anybody tried to take it away from him he would blast with both barrels and then club him with the butt until he stopped twitching. . . .
“Yes, Charles?” Willie was patient and expectant.
“Nothing,” said Mundin heavily. “You were saying there’s more work to do?”
“More work?” Willie beamed. “Why, with any luck I’ll hand the Group E Debenture Holders’ Protective Committee down to William Choate the Fifth! The reorganization’s only been going for forty-three years. Soon lots of principals in the case will be dead, and then we’ll have trusts and estates in the picture. Sub-committees! Sub-sub-committees! I tell you, Charles, it’s great to be on the firing line of the law.”
“Thank you, Willie,” Mundin said gently. “Must you go now?”
Willie said, “Must I? Oh. Yes, I guess I must. It’s been good seeing you, Charles. Keep up the good work.”
Mundin stared impotently at his pudgy back. Then he
turned wearily and went on to Dworcas’s office, not very optimistically. But it was the only thing he could think of to do, apart from suicide. And he wasn’t ready for that, yet.
Dworcas had still not arrived. The manager’s office, back of the closed-up ticket booth, was tiny and crowded with bales of literature. The people waiting there were a young man and a young woman, obviously brother and sister. Big sister, kid brother; they were maybe twenty-eight and twenty-two.’