By S. Sponte, Esq.
Once upon a time there was a lawyer who was very frustrated and unhappy, and no, this is not about you. “I am very frustrated and unhappy,” he would say to anyone who was handy, “and I don’t want to be an ordinary lawyer any more.”
“What do you want to be, dear?” said his wife who one day was handy but always paid him no never mind.
“I want to be God of the Law,” he said.
“Go see Dr. Tupperman, dear. He has pills for that sort of thing.”
“Do you know what I want?” he told his secretary who intuitively crossed her legs. “I want to be God of the Law.”
“And so you should be,” she said, relaxing and smelling a raise.
“I want to be God of the Law,” he told his bartender even before his first drink.
“I know whatcha mean, pal,” said the bartender. “Me, I always wanted to be the Lone Ranger.”
“How bad do you want to be God of the Law?” said the tall thin stranger who appeared in a puff of smoke and sat down next to him at the bar. He was an odd-looking fellow with a thin angular face of an unusually reddish hue and a pointy beard and he wore a trench coat that fell all the way to the floor.
“You an attorney?” said the lawyer who only vaguely recognized the stranger.
“Let’s just say I’m a sole practitioner,” said the stranger who reached into his coat and pulled out a ten-page typed contract, filled in with names and dates and everything. “Read it if you like, but you’ll find it in order. I have access to the best legal minds in the world.”
The lawyer read the contract and sure enough, it promised to make him God of the Law. It promised to let him win every case he ever took, obtain every remedy he ever sought, collect on every judgment, avoid every debtor’s bankruptcy, persuade every judge and court, collect every fee, and be right all the time, every time for the rest of his life. And in exchange….
“You want my soul?” said the lawyer.
“Only when you’re done with it,” said the stranger,” and remember, you’re a lawyer. You’re promising me nothing that I probably don’t already have.”
“Who the devil are you talking to?” said the bartender.
In the next instant, the deed was done, the contract signed in red ink, and half the lawyers at the local bar dropped dead wherever they were standing, sitting or laying.
From that moment on, the lawyer prospered as he had never prospered before. He won cases that no one had ever won before. He obtained verdicts in amounts never dreamed of. He obtained injunctive relief heretofore unimagined. And he got very rich.
“I believe,” said the Trial Judge, looking directly at the jury, “that you ladies and gentlemen should not be misled by the total lack of evidence in Plaintiff’s case, and therefore I direct you to find in favor of the Plaintiff in ten times the amount prayed for plus 50% for counsel fees, and I enjoin the Defendant from appealing.”
“I believe,” said the Chief Justice, peering down over his glasses at the lawyers arguing before him, “that he is absolutely right in his analysis, and I concur with the judgment of the lower court. The verdict will stand, and in addition, the Defendant and his counsel shall at once be taken out and shot.”
“I got another million dollar verdict today,” the lawyer told his wife who didn’t even drop her emery board.
“That’s nice, dear. Can we go back to the villa in Spain?”
“I got another five hundred thousand dollar fee today,” he told his secretary.
“That’s nice, sweetums. Can we go back to the villa in France?”
“I am God of the Law,” he told his psychiatrist, “but I am still very frustrated and unhappy.”
“See you next time,” said the psychiatrist.
“I am God of the Law, but I am still very frustrated and unhappy,” he told his bartender.
“I know whatcha mean, pal,” said the bartender. “Me, I always wanted to be the Lone Ranger.”
“I want to talk to you, stranger,” said the lawyer, “where are you?”
The stranger appeared in a puff of smoke and sat down next to the lawyer. “Whatsa matter, don’t you like being God of the Law any more?” he said.
“I want to amend the contract. Same terms, same conditions, same consideration, but I want to be the Lone Ranger instead.”
The stranger pulled Amendment No. 1 from his coat, filled in with names and dates and everything and he offered it for signature.
It was signed and in the next instant the lawyer found himself out West, dressed all in white, on a big white horse. His mask was just slightly askew, with the result that he never saw the arrow that struck him just above his navel. He was knocked from his mount, scalped by Indians, his carcass was eaten by red ants and his soul spent forever in eternal damnation.
MORAL: Once you get to be God of the Law, stay the hell out of bars.
Copyright 1983 – S. Sponte, Esq.