Wray lowered his eyes, to stare at the surface of the desk for a few moments, then said, “Well, Mr. Mason, that’d be pretty hard to do.You see, this is a personal effort partnership. That is, we don’t have assets of the kind you’d have in a merchandising business, and—”
“I understand all that,” Mason interrupted, “but what I want to know is generally what would be a fair valuation of the partnership assets.”
“Why, whatever our good will’s worth,”
“What’s that worth?”
“Whatever we could count on taking in through our joint efforts.”
“Perhaps,” Mason told him, “I can get at it another way. Would you mind telling me how much you each took out of the business during the last year?”
Wray avoided Mason’s eyes, swung from his office chair and started for the safe. Halfway there, he changed his mind, turned around, came back to the desk, sat down and said, “I think we took out about six thousand apiece.”
“Each of you drew out six thousand dollars?”
“Around that, yes.”
“Then,” Mason said, “Walter Prescott couldn’t have put any money into the business.”