Page:Weird Tales Volume 35 Issue 04 (1940-07).djvu/11

From the angle of legal ethics and such bunk, I ought to be shot for what I've got in mind. There's just one thing about it to remember. It's going to get an innocent person clear of a lousy mess. And if you ask me, that's pretty damned good ethics all by itself."

Before crossing the border, we stopped a couple of days in a small town. How Carter managed it, I can only surmise. When we left there, however, I had a legalized birth certificate in the name of Arthur Sullivan. As such, I came into the United States with him, and I continued to be Artliur Sullivan for some little time thereafter.

At a suburban station a few miles outside his home city. Carter let me out.

"Ride into town and go to the Grand Hotel," he said. "Get yourself some clothes and study the stock market; you're a broker from San Francisco and you never heard of me. Let your mustache grow. You'll hear from me in a week."

I obeyed orders. The Grand Hotel deserved its name; I spent money, but did not pad my swindle sheet. The mustache made a great change in my appearance, and I hung around board rooms and learned the jargon of the market, for I was anxious to make good at this job. Meantime, I heard a lot about the Petty case.

It was the biggest, juciest and hottest scandal tliat had ever struck town, and when it came to trial promised to be still hotter.

Colonel Petty had died three years before, leaving a sister, a widow and a daughter. He was many times a millionaire, owning about a third of everything in the city, and his estate all went to his daughter, under the guardianship of his widow, who had plenty in her own right. And now the sister, who was one of these thin-lipped women, had chipped in to demand the guardianship, the money and the daughter, alleging that the widow was an improper person to have the child, and so forth. And they had the goods on her, too.

Around the hotel I had met a doctor named Slausson, who knew everybody in town, and I half suspected that Carter had steered him on me. We got pretty well acquainted.

"But what's the scrap about?" I asked Slausson, as we talked over the Petty case. "I understand this daughter is eighteen. Whoever wins would only get to handle the estate for three years or less. And can't she pick her own guardian?"

"Not in this state." Slausson grinned. "Minors are protected in this state, you bet! But you don't get the idea. Nobody gives a damn about the girl; it's the shake-down. This old maid sister, Tabitha Petty, has the biggest law firm in the West handling her charges. And those boys are slick. Mrs. Petty, the widow, is a frivolous, pleasant, harmless woman who likes a good time and spends her money. When they get her into court, they'll just tear her wide open, see? Misconduct, you bet, real or faked. Probably faked, if you ask me. It'll be red hot, too. She faces newspaper notoriety of the worst kind. She's sure to lose the girl, who adores her, and she'll be branded for life—unless she digs into her wad and settles things. Earl Carter won't let her get into court. He'll settle."

I remembered all Carter had said, and from what else I could gather, realized that Mrs. Petty was the sucker in the case. The trial was set over to September, which was three months away. The sucker was sure to lose. Tabitha and her law firm were utterly respectable, aristocratic, and practically saints; so upright they nearly fell over backward. Most lawyers, up against that firm, just hollered for help and paid up rather than risk themselves in court. But not Earl Carter.

"Like to meet Mrs. Petty?" Slausson said to me one afternoon. "She's giving a din-