"Well, I do," retorted Wilkinson positively. "As a matter of fact, I like him because I can't get along without him. He's a wonder!" he went on enthusiastically. "Any time you want a thing put through, and don't care how it's done, you hire my man Flomerfelt. In this whole crisis, Flomerfelt, in my opinion, is worth his weight in gold. Why, the man has a hold on nearly everybody that I know." "Well, he hasn't one on me," returned the lawyer. "He has on me, then," said his client, "but I don't mind. He gets good pay from me; and he can make any given man do almost anything he wants him to do--that's Flomerfelt. I never stop thanking my good fortune that I've got him on my side. He's the kingpin in this mix-up, let me tell you, Morehead." The Colonel laughed. "I was inclined to think, Peter, that I might be some pumpkins myself," he suggested. "I may be, before we're through." "No use of talking," protested his client, "Flomerfelt can do things that you can't do, and never thought of doing. If I get out of this scrape, it will be Flomerfelt's doing...." The lawyer leaned back in his revolving chair. He was a lean personage, all bone and gristle, with a lean nose and shrewd, sharp eyes. "Peter," he said, "a bunch of indictments for perjury, larceny and forgery are dangerous things." He looked at his watch. "Confound it!" he went on. "Why the dickens couldn't the Court agree to take our plea at ten this morning. By eleven everybody in town will know about it, everybody that can will be there. If the papers hadn't got on to it early this morning we'd have had no trouble. We could have slipped in and out--done the trick, and nobody the wiser. But now.... By the way," he added, "that reminds me--I want that man Beekman over here. I'll call him up." Eliot Beekman's office said he was out--said he was not in New York--that he'd left that morning on the Empire State Express for Buffalo. "Well, where is he in Buffalo?" asked Morehead. They told him--at the Iroquois Hotel. "Tell him that Colonel Morehead called him up," said the Colonel; "and that I want to see him the minute he returns." Wilkinson nervously tapped his foot upon the floor. "I can't see what you want of Beekman?" he said. Morehead's eyes narrowed. "I want him to defend you, if these indictments come to trial, as probably they shall." "What! That young fellow who calls at my house to see Leslie!" returned Wilkinson. "Why, we want the highest-priced counsel we can get. I want you, and Patrick Durand, but not one of the submerged like Beekman." "I want to tell you that Beekman isn't one of the submerged, as you say. He's got a practice here that yields him at least seventy-five hundred a year, which means that he's a wonderful man, because he's only thirty, or a little under, with no political pull. He makes his living out of the law pure and simple, not out of Wall Street, or real estate deals, or the criminal classes, either."