The San Francisco call., 1896-03-25

began to feel great respect for the pencil
will. 1t might be that it would be de-
clared the real will, and they, as trustees,
be left without occupation.
1t remained for them to appeal from the
decision of Judge Slack. They did not
have to do SO. however. If they accepted
the Judgment of the Superior Court that
would end the matter. All their interests
apparently lay i'll appealing.
But they did not do so. Both sides had
been thinking right along, and the trus-
tees did not appeal.
They sat together in row before the
court-a most distinguished company
and gave their assent on Monday of last
week to the probate of the earlier will.
+ 1t will not have been forgotten. of
course, that Charles L. Fair and Mrs.
Oeirichs and Virginia Fair had. upon their
oaths, declared their belief that the latter
will was the 'last will and testament of
James Fair, executed and dated on the
oath of September, 1894, which will was
entirely written, dated and signed by the
said James G. Fair himself" and that this
statement was subscribed to by their
attorneys. knight & Heggerty, Lloyd e.
Wood, CARRIER, Boalt & Bishop and Will
son & Wilson. But, as stated, these are
the gentlemen who had been thinking.
And yet with it all there was one factor
that had been quite forgotten. Its name
was DIR. Marc Levingston.
e DR.. Marc Levingston had been named
in the pencil will as an executor. He had
not been consulted in the matter. He
knew nothing about the will until it was
brought forward by the Fair children and
the attorneys just named. He announced
his willingness to accept the trust and
waited patiently until the efforts of the
great legal army should secure the probate
of the will to enter upon his duties.
But now he saw them asserting to the
probate of another will which lately they
had been stigmatizing as false and
spurious.
So he sought counsel.
When all these legal gentlemen-this
most distinguished company, who had
been opposing each other SO bitterly for
months-were gathered together in peace
before the tribunal, their law books closed,
smiling assent to a cessation of hostiIities
and the probate of the will, trust will-now
trustless-and when the court was about
to grant their petition. for very lack of
any objection, his counsel walked in upon
them in the persons of Messrs. Delmas d
Shortride.
And now there is CONSERVATION.
Delmas d Shortridge as representing the
executor, DR.. Levingston, take up the fight
for the pencil will where the attorneys for
the children left it. They say that If DR.
Levingston was executor of bona fde
will in the first instance, while the chill
dren had reason to fear the trust will, he
is still executor of such will and the court
should admit it to probate, as it bears the
later date.
And the army of lawyers are thinking
nightly and wondering how it was they
overlooked Marc Levingston. just how
the Fair children and their lawyers can re-
fuse to support the pencil will, which they
belief in, is not clear-except on the basis
of its being above $500 600.
In the meantime. by asserting to the
right of the minor children to contest the
probate, Delmas d. Shortridge have secured
the right to submit the question to a jury
for Judgment, and the matter comes up
for trial in Judge Slack's court on Friday
morning.
As pretty thing in law as man might
wish to see.