“Huey and I had signature cards on file at the Riggs bank in Washington and the National Bank of Commerce in New Orleans,” Christenberry explained. “The only checks he wrote were the ones he issued in New York, and the first I would know of it was when the cancelled check came with the monthly statement, or a call from the bank that the account was overdrawn.” Many persons were under the impression that Long also had a large financial interest in a Win-or-Lose Oil Company but, says Christenberry, “to my knowledge as secretary-treasurer of the company, he had no interest in this corporation, and I so testified in federal court. Months after Huey’s death one of the stockholders testified that one certificate issued in his name in reality represented Huey’s holdings, but if he received dividends they were paid to him in cash by the holder of that stock certificate, by whom the canceled checks were endorsed and cashed.” Earle reached Baton Rouge some time before noon, and prepared to go over all the papers with his friend and employer. But within a short time, the work being little more than well begun, Long threw up his hands in a characteristic gesture, as though brushing a distasteful matter out of existence. “He said to me,” reported Mr. Christenberry, “‘You know what this is all about, don’t you?’ and I said I did. ‘Well, all right then,’ he told me, ‘you take all this stuff back to New Orleans with you and fill out the forms, and then bring the whole thing back Monday or Tuesday, and I’ll sign the damn papers and we’ll be rid of them. Look, I’m not even going to stay here till the end of this session. I’ll leave Tuesday, maybe even tomorrow, right after the House passes the bills, and come down to New Orleans and sign them there. And you know what we’ll do then? We’ll go on a vacation together, just you and me, no bodyguards or anything. We’ll get in your car and go wherever we want to go without making one single, slivery plan in advance.’ “After that, he and I went down to the cafeteria and had lunch. Naturally, there was the same steady procession as always of people coming to the table to say hello, but not so many as there would have been any other time except Sunday noon. Most of the legislators and out-of-town politicians would not be in till later that evening because the Senate was to be in recess till Monday and the House wasn’t going to meet till eight, and it was going to be just a short session to order the bills put on the calendar for the next morning.” * * * * * John Fournet was one of the out-of-town notables whose arrival that evening was expected. He had been a member of the Long peerage for years, but had refrained from political activity of that sort ever since his elevation to the state Supreme Court a year or so earlier.