A Legal Slip ‘Twixt Cup and Lip

by Judge Clark

Anson Thorndyke, like many another rich man, “died and was buried.”

“What a pity it should end there,” was the pensive reflection of more than one “legal mind,” accustomed to regard a squabble of some sort over a dead man’s money as essential to the repose of his soul, or at least as a mark of decent respect to his memory. But the handsome estate of the deceased bachelor—for such no one doubted him to be—passed so smoothly to his only known relative, an only sister’s only daughter, that there was nothing left for the “legal mind” but to console itself by anticipating that a proceeding so irregular “was not, and it could not come to good.”

There was one “legal mind” that went a step beyond. It not only reflected, but resolved: reflected that the next best thing to the possession of wealth, was the possession of its possessor; resolved to govern itself accordingly.

The owner of this legal mind was Sydney Hopkins, a union of Quirk, Gammon, & Snap in one person, Snap being the person. No sooner had fortune smiled on the fair orphan, than Mr. Hopkins began to smile also. While she had only prospects, he smiled contingently; when the prospects became reality, he smiled unconditionally. Finally he made an unconditional offer of himself, which she as unconditionally rejected. Hopkins plead hard for a dismissal “without prejudice,” but the young lady declared her decision to be “on the merits” and “final.”

“It’s a long lane that has no turn,” said Sydney Hopkins to himself after bowing out of his office, at the end of a lengthened consultation, a dilapidated young man with the look of a prodigal whose “portion of goods” was pretty well used up.

What the “turn” was which Mr. Hopkins had just discovered, or in what “lane” he had discovered it, was as yet a professional secret. Whether or not… Read More