that little shrimp squattin' there behind his
spectacles an' tellin' me what I had to do, the same as if I was a
hoss. I turned on my heel and strode out o' that store head up an' I
was some glad that Hammy had taught me what strodin' was, 'cause the
rest o' the gang opened up a path you could 'a' drove a
street-sprinkler through.

I didn't like the looks o' that lawyer, he reminded me of a rat. I
don't care much for the law anyhow. All the law is fit for is to take
care o' the weak an' the ignorant--an' they can't afford it. I've
noticed that much, the little time I've been penned up in cities. This
lawyer o' mine had full command o' the kind o' talk that bottles up a
man an' keeps him from expressin' himself. He said I had a good case
an' that he would save me my findin's, but that I had to give him half
of it for his services--in advance. If you don't tell a lawyer the
truth he can't fight your case; an' if you do you put yourself in his
power. Course I don't claim to be authority, but I just actually don't
like the law.

When I came away from the law office, a nice friendly feller got into
conversation with me, an' after I'd bought him a couple o' drinks, he
grew confidential an' told me his troubles. He was owner of a whole
block of buildin's an' a lot o' residence houses, but he was stone
broke. He had had a quarrel with the banks, an' couldn't raise a penny,
an' he had lost ten thousand dollars the night before, gamblin'. He
said it would take forty dollars for him to go to Los Angeles, where he
had friends who would lend him any amount. Otherwise they would
foreclose the little mortgage he had on the business block.

He talked along until I couldn't stand it any longer, so I give him the
forty on the condition that I was to be his collecting agent at wages
of two hundred a month, as soon as he got back from Los Angeles.

I went down to the station with him and then I hunted up a place where
I took board and lodging for a week at six dollars in advance. This
left me purt' nigh two dollars to go on until the real estate owner got
back. I called around at my lawyer's every day, an' he told me just to
lay low an' he'd keep me out o' trouble. Then the sixth day passed
without the real estate owner I told the lawyer about it an' asked him
if he thought anything might have happened. He got awful mad an' said
he'd ought to be kicked for not chargin' me ninety-five dollars for his
services in the first place; an' by