was no understanding this stuff, Peewee decided. . . . "All as now upon file in records of the coroner's office. Deponent further states that the above Helen Lampert, upon whose body he performed this autopsy, had never borne a child."
Peewee stared at Beman in perplexity. The words of the last sentence, taken just as words, were plain; their meaning he could not at first make out. His mother, the words said, had not had a child. But here was Peewee and Lampert, he saw, was as perplexed as himself.
"Why look at him!" Lampert exclaimed. "Don't he look just like his father?"
"But not like your daughter," Beman returned.
Peewee commenced to understand. Lampert—what was it Beman had called it?—forged, Lampert had forged a marriage, and Beman had forged to beat him. He had fooled the lawyer, who stood with his hands hanging limply at his sides. He had, Peewee could perceive by Lampert's manner, fooled Lampert too. They did not know the truth so well as he
