“Exactly!” sneered the younger man. “But I never knew until I got this letter”—he drew the letter from his pocket—“just how you came to buy a house which cost $50,000 for so trifling a sum of money.”
“Who wrote that letter?” interrupted the Judge eagerly.
“Evidently a friend of yours, once high in your councils, who has grown of late to love you as passionately as I do. And I think he could put a knife into your ribs with as much pleasure.”
The Judge winced and glanced nervously into the galleries.
“Don’t worry, your Honour. If you take the medicine I prescribe, amputation will not be necessary. Let me read the letter. It’s brief but to the point:”
To John Graham, Esq.
Dear Sir: The secret of Butler’s possession of your estate is simple. Under his authority as United States Judge, he ordered its confiscation, forced his wife to buy it for $2,800, at a fake sale, which had not been advertised, and later had it reconveyed to him. His wife refused to live in the house, sent her daughter to school in Washington, and died two years later from the conscious dishonour she had been obliged at least in secret to share. A suit brought before the United States Supreme Court will restore your property, hurl a scoundrel from the bench, and cover him with everlasting infamy.
A Former Pal of His Honour.
“An anonymous slanderer!” snorted the judge.
“Yet he expresses himself with vigour and accuracy, and his words are backed by circumstantial evidence.”