"I said to cut the legal rot!"
"Um—um—'why an injunction order should not be issued herein pending the trial of this action and enjoining the defendant from disposing of its assets and for the appointment of a receiver of the assets of the defendant corporation; and why the complainant should not have such other, further and different relief as may be equitable.'"
There was a long pause during which Mr. Elderberry was under a convincing delusion that he could actually hear the thoughts that were rattling round in Mr. Greenbaum's brain.
"You there?" he inquired presently.
"Oh, yes, I'm here!" retorted Greenbaum. "This is the devil of a note! Have you spoken to Chippingham?"
"Yes."
"What does he say?"
"He says it's awkward. They have got hold somewhere of one of our old circulars of 1914 in which the property is described as worth about ten million dollars—that was during the boom, you remember—and they claim we are selling it to ourselves for less than one million and that on its face it's a fraud on the minority stockholders who can't afford to buy stock in the new corporation—as of course it would be if the mine was really worth ten million or anything like it."
"Did we really ever get out any circular like that?" demanded Greenbaum in a protesting voice. "I don't recall any."
"That was when we were making a market for the stock," Elderberry reminded him. "We couldn't say enough. Honestly, to look at the thing now is enough to make you sick!"
"Well, it's just a hold-up—that's what it is. Some crook like this Tutt or this Barrows has found out about Amphalula and is bringing a strike suit. You'll have to call a meeting right away. I'd like to strangle all these shyster lawyers!"
And it never occurred to Mr. Greenbaum that the possible existence of the Amphalula vein was what in fact made the order to show cause justifiable—his actual ground of complaint being that anybody should, as he assumed, have found out about it in defiance of his plans.
"Yeronner," said Attendant Mike Horan as he helped Judge Pollak into his black bombazine gown in his chambers in the old Post-Office Building on the morning of the return day, "there's a great bunch out there in the court room waitin' for ye, an' no mistake!"
"Indeed!" remarked His Honor. "And who are they? What is the case?"
"Hanged if I know," answered Mike, snipping a piece of fluff off his judgeship's shoulder. "There's a white-bearded old guy, two or three swell gents with tall hats, Counselor Tutt and an attorney named Chippingham, besides that pretty Miss Wiggin; and they ain't speakin' none to one another, neither."
"It must be that mining-reorganization case," answered the judge. "Well, it's time to go in."
They walked down the dirty marble corridor and entered the court room, while the clerk rapped on the railing.
"Hear ye! Hear ye! Hear ye! All persons having any business to do with the District Court of the United States draw near, give your attention and you will be heard," he intoned with unctuous authority.
The "bunch" rose and made obeisance.
"Good morning," said the judge pleasantly, sitting down with a side switch of the bombazine. "Barrows against the—er—er—Horse's Neck Mining Company. Do you represent the complainant, Mr. Tutt?"
"I do," answered Mr. Tutt with great dignity. "Your Honor, this is a motion for an order to show cause why an injunction pendente lite should not issue restraining the sale of the assets, of this corporation to another in fraud of its minority stockholders—and for a receiver. My client, an aged man living upon his farm in the northern part of the state, is the owner of one hundred thousand shares in the Horse's Neck Mining Company of the par value of one hundred thousand dollars. He has owned these securities for many years. They represent his entire capital. He is a bona fide stockholder—"
"May I be pardoned for interrupting?" sneered Chippingham, springing to his feet. "I think the court should be informed at the outset that this man, Barrows, is a notorious ex-convict."
Judge Pollak raised his eyebrows.
"This is an outrage!" thundered Mr. Tutt, his form rising ceilingward. "My client—like all of us—has had his misfortunes, but they are happily a thing of the past; he has the same rights as if he were an archbishop, the president of a university or—a judge of this honorable court."
"We are sitting in equity," remarked His Honor. "The question of bona fides is a vital one. Is the complainant an ex-convict?"
"This is the complainant, sir," cried Mr. Tutt, indicating old Doc, now for the first time in his life smartly arrayed in a new checked suit, red tie, patent-leather shoes and suède gloves, and with his beard neatly trimmed. "This is the unfortunate man whose honest savings of a lifetime are being wrested from him by an unscrupulous group of manipulators who—in my opinion—are more deserving of confinement behind prison walls than he ever was."
The gentlemen with the tall hats bit their lips and showed signs of poorly suppressed agitation.
"But is your client an ex-convict, Mr. Tutt?" repeated the judge quietly.
"Yes, Your Honor, he is."
"When and how did he become possessed of his stock?"
Mr. Tutt turned to Doc with an air of ineffectually striving to master his righteous indignation.
"Tell the court, Mr. Barrows," he cried, "in your own words."
Doc Barrows wonderingly rose.
"If you please, sir," he began, "it's quite a long story. You see, I was the owner of all the stock of The Chicago Water Front and Terminal Company—there was a flaw in the title deed which I can explain to you privately if you wish—and when I was—er—visiting—up on the Hudson—I met a man there who was the owner of a hundred thousand shares of Horse's Neck, and we agreed to exchange."
The judge tried to hide a slight smile.
"I see," he replied pleasantly. "And what was the man's name?"
"Oscar Bloom, sir."
The gentlemen with the tall hats exchanged agitated glances.
"Do you know how he got his stock?"
"No, sir."
"That is all. Go on, Mr. Tutt."
Doc sat down while Mr. Tutt again unhooked his lank form.
"To resume where I was interrupted, Your Honor, the directors controlling a majority of the stock of this corporation, the capital of which is ten millions of dollars, have made a contract to sell all of its properties to another corporation, organized by themselves and capitalized for one million, for the sum of one hundred and twenty-five thousand dollars!
"It is true that in their plan of reorganization they offer to permit any stockholder in the old corporation to subscribe for stock in the new at par—thus at first glance placing all upon what seems to be an equality; but any stockholder who does not see fit to subscribe or cannot afford to do so is wiped out, for there will be nothing left in the way of assets in Horse's Neck after the transfer is completed.
"Now these gentlemen have underwritten the stock in the new Lallapaloosa Company at fifty cents upon the dollar, and if this nefarious deal is permitted to go through they will thus acquire a property worth ten millions for five hundred thousand dollars, of which they will use only one hundred and twenty-five thousand in payment of old indebtedness. In effect, they confiscate the equity of all the minority stockholders in Horse's Neck who cannot afford to subscribe for stock in Lallapaloosa." He turned upon the uncomfortable tall hats with an arraigning eye.
"In the criminal courts, Your Honor, such a conspiracy would be properly described as grand larceny; in Wall Street perchance it may be viewed as high finance. But so long as there are courts of equity such a wrong upon a helpless stockholder will not go unrebuked. Have I made myself