y initiated."

"Hold on, Mr. Gottlieb!" remonstrated Dillingham. "You want to go
easy there. After Hawkins was served he retained a lawyer. I know
that, dammit, because it cost me twenty-five hundred dollars to
get rid of him."

"What was his name?" asked Gottlieb sharply.

"Crookshank--Walter E. Crookshank--down on Nassau Street."

Gottlieb gave a short, dry laugh.

"Luck's with you, Dillingham. Crookshank died three years ago."

None of us broke silence for the space of about two minutes.

"You see now why this sort of thing costs money?" finally remarked
my partner.

Dillingham wiped his forehead with his handkerchief nervously.

"Say," he began, "isn't that taking a pretty long chance? I--"

"It is taking no chance at all," retorted Gottlieb, his little eyes
glistening like a snake's. "You have simply retained us to see if
your wife's original divorce was regular--not to see if it was
irregular--catch on? You tell us nothing. We ask you nothing.
We make our investigation. Much to our surprise and horror, we
discover that the defendant never was served--perhaps that he never
even knew of the proceeding until years afterward. We don't know
what you know. We simply advise you the divorce is N. G. and you
ask no questions. We'll attend to all that--for our thirty-five
thousand dollars."

"Well, you know your business," responded Dillingham hesitantly,
"and I leave the matter in your hands. How long will it take?"

"Everything now depends on our friend Hawkins," replied Gottlieb.
"We may be able to hand you your manumission papers in three
months."

When Dillingham had written out his check and bade us good day I
no longer made any pretence of concealing from my partner my
perturbation. I had, of course, known that from time to time we
had skated on thin ice; but this was the first occasion upon which
Gottlieb had deliberately acknowledged to a client that he would
resort to perjury to accomplish his ends.

"Don't you think we're running entirely too close to the wind?" I
asked, pacing up and down the office.

"My dear Quib," answered Gottlieb soothingly, "don't agitate yourself
over so trifling a matter. The only living man who can prove that
Hawkins was served is Bunce--and Bunce is a fool. At best it would
simply be one swearing against the other. We have a perfect right
to believe Hawkins in preference to Bunce if we choose. Anyhow,
we're not the judge. All we have to do is to pr