"Also currently reported to be true, my infant," nodded Dave sagely.
"But the witnesses against the elder Bayliss skipped, and the
district attorney never brought the case to trial. Case was quashed
a year later, and so now the Baylisses belong to the Distinguished
Order of Unconvicted Boodlers. That trolley stock jumped to six
times its par value right after the case against Bayliss was dropped,
you know."

"And, from what I've heard Mr. Pollock say at 'The Blade' office,"
Dick threw in, "the fathers of one or two of the other soreheads
got their money in devious ways."

"Why, there's Whitney's father," laughed Dan Dalzell. "Did you
ever hear how he got his start thirty years ago? Whitney's
brother-in-law got into financial difficulties, and transferred to
the elder Whitney property worth a hundred and twenty-five thousand
dollars. When the financial storm blew over the brother-in-law wanted
the property transferred back again, but the elder Whitney didn't
see it that way. The elder Whitney kept the transferred property,
and has since increased it to a half million or more."

"Oh, well," Dick interrupted, "let us admit that some of the fellows
on the sorehead list have never been in jail, and have never been
threatened with it. But I am sure that Dave has guessed my meaning
right. The soreheads, who number a dozen of rather valuable pigskin
men, are on strike just because some of us poorer fellows are
in it."

"What nonsense!" ejaculated Greg Holmes disgustedly. "Why, Purcell