Seventeen men shook their heads.
"Is there a man among us that has one microscopic shred of evidence to the fact that Wanniston is dishonest?"
There was not.
"O.K.—so how do we go about it?"
No one knew.
Conan sat down. "We can't squeeze him out, is that it?"
"We can not do anything at all," snarled another man. "No matter what we try, he betters us. He's a sharper. If we try something legal, he's our better. If we get dirty, he cleans us anyway—but the devil does it legally. You can't win."
"There were once twenty-three of us," said Peter Wilks. "Three are in jail—for crimes they did not commit. One is in jail for a crime that he did commit, the crime of trying to frame Wanniston. Two are dead—suicides because they could no longer take defeat after defeat at Wanniston's fine Machiavellian hand. He's a menace."
"We're like the mice that decided to hang a bell on the cat," laughed Conan bitterly. "Six of us have tried and failed. Must we try separately? Can he read minds?"
Wilks jumped to his feet. "I say he can!"