Popp & Xeros' Client

As last week began, it seemed as if the comedy was at last over. After a year and a half of arrests, releases, trials and retrials in the U. S. Government's efforts to extradite him, Samuel Insull was ordered out of Greece. The understanding was that Fugitive Insull was leaving on the Orient Express for Paris. The sniveling old man who was charged with fraudulent bankruptcy and embezzlement in the U. S. took to his bed, but doctors certified him well enough to travel.

All at once a mysterious woman began telephoning the London office of the New

York Times from pay stations. "Cease hounding Mr. Insull! Mr. Insull's English friends will help him!" A few days prior the Greek Government had received a telegram of protest signed by a number of Britons. Reporters investigated the address and found a West End apartment house in which every flat was occupied by women.

The day the old runaway was to be deported, Greek detectives called at his apartment, but Samuel Insull was not there. Immediately a storm of rumors broke. From the Cabinet of Premier Tsaldaris to the couscous merchants on the sidewalks every Athenian had a story of his own. Samuel Insull had been smuggled out of the hotel in a bonnet and shawl, disguised as a charwoman. Samuel Insull had been spirited out of the country by a gang of Rumanians. Samuel Insull had been hauled to the top of a cliff in a basket to take refuge with the monks of Mount Athos. Finally from the harbor master of Piraeus, Athens' port seven miles away, came a report that a rusty foul-smelling little tramp steamer known as the Maiotis had cleared for parts unknown with Samuel Insull as its only passenger. Further investigation showed that Samuel Insull had dyed his hair and mustache black, put on nobby Athenian clothes and walked out of his hotel unnoticed. Also he had paid $10.000 to charter the steamer.

The Government was furious. Nobody knew that Samuel Insull still had $10.000, unless, perhaps, it was the Ministry of the Interior. Premier Tsaldaris promptly forced Minister of the Interior M. J. Mountsourides to resign. Greek public opinion was outraged at this slur on the nation's honor, at this insult to a friendly power. Admiral Hadjikyriakos. commander of the Greek navy, radioed the malodorous Maiotis to return to Piraeus instantly. The ship swung round. Samuel Insull, smiling happily under his new black mustache, thought he was bound for Abyssinia, one of the few spots in all the world where he is safe from extradition. Only when the harbor of Piraeus rose before the Maiotis' disreputable bow did he know what had happened. Then he promptly had another seizure.

All this time a wordy battle was going on in Insull's apartment between Mrs. Insull and the spectacular Mme Zahra Couyoumdjoglou, wife of a Bagdad date merchant who has been a bosom friend of Samuel Insull since his arrival in Athens. Mrs. Insull had wanted her husband to surrender and take his chances in the U. S. courts. That seemed too prosaic for Mme Couyoumdjoglou who arranged the Odyssey of the Maiotis.

To the long list of Athenian lawyers who have defended the Insull interests two new ones were added in the persons of George Popp and George Xeros. Popp & Xeros had a lengthy conference with Premier Tsaldaris. Promptly Greek public opinion switched right around. Public opinion, said the Premier, now had the very greatest sympathy for this harassed old gentleman. He would be allowed to proceed as soon as he had acquired a proper police visa for his traveling papers and the ship he had chartered had filed proper clearance papers.

That was quickly done, and once again, like crafty Odysseus, foxy Samouel Insullos sailed the wine-dark ocean past the isles of Greece. The end of adventure was not yet. The Maiotis' wheezy engines broke down outside the harbor and took many hours to repair. Then she ran into a heavy storm, was forced to take shelter in the lee of an island. Never a good sailor, Samuel Insull tossed sickishly about on his little freighter reeking of stale oil and garlic and whimpered that shiploads of U. S. pirates were lying in wait to kidnap him. At the last moment the French Government decided to forbid his landing at Djibouti, French Somaliland, chief port of entry for Abyssinia.

In Toronto last week the Appeal Court of Ontario held Brother Martin Insull extraditable on two of the three charges of theft for which the U. S. is asking his return, locked him in the city jail to await the arrival of Chicago detectives.

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.