Kitabı oku: «Tutt and Mr. Tutt», sayfa 10
"Ah! Good morning to you, Mrs. Effingham!" Mr. Tutt cried, waving her in when that lady was announced. "You are not the only millionaire, you see! In fact, I've stumbled into a few barrels of securities myself—only I didn't pay anything for them."
"Gracious!" cried Mrs. Effingham, her eyes lighting with astonishment. "Wherever did you get them? And such exquisite pictures! Look at that lamb!"
"It ought to have been a wolf!" muttered Mr. Tutt. "Well, Mrs. Effingham, I've decided to make you a present—just a few pounds of Chicago Water Front and Canadian Southern—those over there in that pile; and now if you say so we'll just go along to your bank."
"Give them to me!" she protested. "What on earth for? You're joking, Mr. Tutt."
"Not a bit of it!" he retorted. "I don't make any pretensions as to the value of my gift, but they're yours for whatever they're worth."
He wrapped them carefully in a piece of paper and returned the balance to Doc Barrows' dress-suit case.
"Aren't you afraid to leave them that way?" she asked, surprised.
"Not at all! Not at all!" he laughed. "You see there are fortunes lying all about us everywhere if we only know where to look. Now the first thing to do is to get your bonds back from the bank."
Mr. Thomas McKeever, the popular loan clerk of the Mustardseed National, was just getting ready for the annual visit of the state bank examiner when Mr. Tutt, followed by Mrs. Effingham, entered the exquisitely furnished boudoir where lady clients were induced by all modern conveniences except manicures and shower baths to become depositors. Mr. Tutt and Mr. McKeever belonged to the same Saturday evening poker game at the Colophon Club, familiarly known as The Bible Class.
"Morning, Tom," said Mr. Tutt. "This is my client, Mrs. Effingham. You hold her note, I believe, for ten thousand dollars secured by some government bonds. She has a use for those bonds and I thought that you might be willing to take my indorsement instead. You know I'm good for the money."
"Why, I guess we can accommodate her, Mr. Tutt!" answered the Chesterfieldian Mr. McKeever. "Certainly we can. Sit down, Mrs. Effingham, while I send for your bonds. See the morning paper?"
Mrs. Effingham blushingly acknowledged that she had not seen the paper. In fact, she was much too excited to see anything.
"Sign here!" said the loan clerk, placing the note before the lawyer.
Mr. Tutt indorsed it in his strange, humpbacked chirography.
"Here are your bonds," said Mr. McKeever, handing Mrs. Effingham a small package in a manila envelope. She took them in a half-frightened way, as if she thought she was doing something wrong.
"And now," said Mr. Tutt, "the lady would like a box in your safe-deposit vaults; a small one—about five dollars a year—will do. She has quite a bundle of securities with her, which I am looking into. Most if not all of them are of little or no value, but I have told her she might just as well leave them as security for what they are worth, in addition to my indorsement. Really it's just a slick game of ours to get the bank to look after them for nothing. Isn't it, Mrs. Effingham?"
"Ye-es!" stammered Mrs. Effingham, not understanding what he was talking about.
"Well," answered Mr. McKeever, "we never refuse collateral. I'll put the bonds with the note—" His eye caught the edges of the bundle. "Great Scott, Tutt! What are you leaving all these bonds here for against that note? There must be nearly a hundred thousand dol—"
"I thought you never refused collateral, Mr. McKeever!" challenged Mr. Tutt sternly.
Twenty minutes later the exquisite blonde that acted as Mr. Badger's financial accomplice learned from Mrs. Effingham's faltering lips that the widow would like to see the great man in regard to further investments.
"How does it look, Mabel?" inquired the financier from behind his massive mahogany desk covered with a six by five sheet of plate glass. "Is it a squeal or a fall?"
"Easy money," answered Mabel with confidence. "She wants to put a mortgage on the farm."
"Keep her about fourteen minutes, tell her the story of my philanthropies, and then shoot her in," directed Badger.
So Mrs. Effingham listened politely while Mabel showed her the photographs of Mr. Badger's home for consumptives out in Tyrone, New Mexico, and of his wife and children, taken on the porch of his summer home at Seabright, New Jersey; and then, exactly fourteen minutes having elapsed, she was shot in.
"Ah! Mrs. Effingham! Delighted! Do be seated!" Mr. Badger's smile was like that of the boa constrictor about to swallow the rabbit.
"About my oil stock," hesitated Mrs. Effingham.
"Well, what about it?" demanded Badger sharply. "Are you dissatisfied with your twenty per cent?"
"Oh, no!" stammered the old lady. "Not at all! I just thought if I could only get the note paid off at the Mustardseed Bank I might ask you to sell the collateral and invest the proceeds in your gusher."
"Oh!" Mr. Badger beamed with pleasure. "Do you really wish to have me dispose of your securities for you?"
He did not regard it as necessary to inquire into the nature of the collateral. If it was satisfactory to the Mustardseed National it must of course exceed considerably the amount of the note.
"Yes," answered Mrs. Effingham timidly; and she handed him the letter dictated by Mr. Tutt.
"Well," replied Mr. Badger thoughtfully, after reading it, "what you ask is rather unusual—quite unusual, I may say, but I think I may be able to attend to the matter for you. Leave it in my hands and think no more about it. How have you been, my dear Mrs. Effingham? You're looking extraordinarily well!"
Mr. McKeever had about concluded his arrangements for welcoming the state bank examiner when the telephone on his desk buzzed, and on taking up the receiver he heard the ingratiating voice of Alfred Haynes Badger.
"Is this the Loan Department of the Mustardseed National?"
"It is," he answered shortly.
"I understand you hold a note of a certain Mrs. Effingham for ten thousand dollars. May I ask if it is secured?"
"Who is this?" snapped McKeever.
"One of her friends," replied Mr. Badger amicably.
"Well, we don't discuss our clients' affairs over the telephone. You had better come in here if you have any inquiries to make."
"But I want to pay the note," expostulated Mr. Badger.
"Oh! Well, anybody can pay the note who wants to."
"And of course in that case you would turn over whatever collateral is on deposit to secure the note?"
"If we were so directed."
"May I ask what collateral there is?"
"I don't know."
"There is some collateral, I suppose?"
"Yes."
"Well, I have an order from Mrs. Effingham directing the bank to turn over whatever securities she has on deposit as collateral, on my payment of the note."
"In that case you'll get 'em," said Mr. McKeever gruffly. "I'll get them out and have 'em ready for you."
"Here is my certified check for ten thousand; dollars," announced Alfred Haynes Badger a few minutes later. "And here is the order from Mrs. Effingham. Now will you kindly turn over to me all the securities?"
Mr. McKeever, knowing something of the reputation of Mr. Badger, first called up the bank which had certified the latter's check, and having ascertained that the certification was genuine he marked Mrs. Effingham's note as paid and then took down from the top of his roll-top desk the bundle of beautifully engraved securities given him by Mr. Tutt. Badger watched him greedily.
"Thank you," he gurgled, stuffing them into his pocket. "Much obliged for your courtesy. Perhaps you would like me to open an account here?"
"Oh, anybody can open an account who wants to," remarked Mr. McKeever dryly, turning away from him to something else.
Mr. Badger fairly flew back to his office. The exquisite blonde had hardly ever before seen him exhibit so much agitation.
"What have you pulled this time?" she inquired dreamily. "Father's daguerreotype and the bracelet of mother's hair?"
"I've grabbed off the whole bag of tricks!" he cried. "Look at 'em! We've not seen so much of the real stuff in six months.
"Ten—twenty—thirty—forty—fifty—By gad!—sixty—seventy!"
"What are they?" asked Mabel curiously. "Some bonds—what?"
"I should say so!" he retorted gaily. "Say, girlie, I'll give you the swellest meal of your young life to-night! Chicago Water Front and Terminal, Great Lakes and Canadian Southern, Mohawk and Housatonic, Bluff Creek and Iowa Central. 'Oh, Mabel!'"
It was at just about this period of the celebration that Mr. Tutt entered the outer office and sent in his name; and as Mr. Badger was at the height of his good humor he condescended to see him.
"I have called," said Mr. Tutt, "in regard to the bonds belonging to my client, Mrs. Effingham. I see you have them on the desk there in front of you. Unfortunately she has changed her mind. She has decided not to have you dispose of her securities."
Mr. Badger's expression instantly became hostile and defiant.
"It's too late!" he replied. "I have paid off her note and I am going to carry out the rest of the arrangement."
"Oh," said Mr. Tutt, "so you are going to sell all her securities and put the proceeds into your bogus oil company—whether she wishes it or not? If you do the district attorney will get after you."
"I stand on my rights," snarled Badger. "Anyhow I can sell enough of the securities to pay myself back my ten thousand dollars."
"And then you'll steal the rest?" inquired Mr. Tutt. "Be careful, my dear sir! Remember there is such a thing as equity, and such a place as Sing Sing."
Badger gave a cynical laugh.
"You're too late, my friend! I've got a written order—a written order—from your client, as you call her. She can't go back on it now. I've got the bonds and I'm going to dispose of them."
"Very well," said Mr. Tutt tolerantly. "You can do as you see fit. But"—and he produced ten genuine one-thousand-dollar bills and exhibited them to Mr. Badger at a safe distance—"I now on behalf of Mrs. Effingham make you a legal tender of the ten thousand dollars you have just paid out to cancel her note, and I demand the return of the securities. Incidentally I beg to inform you that they are not worth the paper they are printed on."
"Indeed!" sneered Badger. "Well, my dear! old friend, you might have saved yourself the trouble of coming round here. You and your client can go straight to hell. You can keep the money; I'll keep the bonds. See?"
Mr. Tutt sighed and shook his head hopelessly.
Then he put the bills back into his pocket and started slowly for the door.
"You absolutely and finally decline to give up the securities?" he asked plaintively.
"Absolutely and finally?" mocked Mr. Badger with a sweeping bow.
"Dear! Dear!" almost moaned Mr. Tutt. "I'd heard of you a great many times but I never realized before what an unscrupulous man you were! Anyhow, I'm glad to have had a look at you. By the way, if you take the trouble to dig through all that junk you'll find the certificate of stock in the Great Jehoshaphat Oil Company you used to flim flam Mrs. Effingham with out of her ten thousand dollars. Maybe you can use it on someone else! Anyhow, she's about two thousand dollars to the good. It isn't every widow who can get twenty per cent and then get her money back in full."
The Hepplewhite Tramp
"No freeman shall be taken, or imprisoned, or disseized or outlawed, or exiled, or in any way harmed—nor will we go upon or send upon him—save by the lawful judgment of his peers or by the law of the land."—MAGNA CHARTA, Sec. 39.
"'Somebody has been lying in my bed—and here she is,' cried the Little, Small, Wee Bear, in his little, small, wee voice."—THE THREE BEARS.
One of the nicest men in New York was Mr. John De Puyster Hepplewhite. The chief reason for his niceness was his entire satisfaction with himself and the padded world in which he dwelt, where he was as protected from all shocking, rough or otherwise unpleasant things as a shrinking débutante from the coarse universe of fact. Being thus shielded from every annoyance and irritation by a host of sycophants he lived serenely in an atmosphere of unruffled calm, gazing down benignly and with a certain condescension from the rarefied altitude of his Fifth Avenue windows, pleased with the prospect of life as it appeared to him to be and only slightly conscious of the vileness of his fellow man.
Certainly he was not conscious at all of the existence of the celebrated law firm of Tutt & Tutt. Such vulgar persons were not of his sphere. His own lawyers were gray-headed, dignified, rather smart attorneys who moved only in the best social circles and practised their profession with an air of elegance. When Mr. Hepplewhite needed advice he sent for them and they came, chatted a while in subdued easy accents, and went away—like cheerful undertakers. Nobody ever spoke in loud tones near Mr. Hepplewhite because Mr. Hepplewhite did not like anything loud—not even clothes. He was, as we have said, quite one of the nicest men in New York.
At the moment when Mrs. Witherspoon made her appearance he was sitting in his library reading a copy of "Sainte-Beuve" and waiting for Bibby, the butler, to announce tea. It was eight minutes to five and there was still eight minutes to wait; so Mr. Hepplewhite went on reading "Sainte-Beuve."
Then "Mrs. Witherspoon!" intoned Bibby, and Mr. Hepplewhite rose quickly, adjusted his eye-glass and came punctiliously forward.
"My dear Mrs. Witherspoon!" he exclaimed crisply. "I am really delighted to see you. It was quite charming of you to give me this week-end."
"Adorable of you to ask me Mr. Hepplewhite!" returned the lady. "I've been looking forward to this visit for weeks. What a sweet room? Is that a Corot?"
"Yes—yes!" murmured her host modestly. "Rather nice, I think, eh? I'll show you my few belongings after tea. Now will you go upstairs first or have tea first?"
"Just as you say," beamed Mrs. Witherspoon. "Perhaps I had better run up and take off my veil."
"Whichever you prefer," he replied chivalrously. "Do exactly as you like. Tea will be ready in a couple of minutes."
"Then I think I'll run up."
"Very well. Bibby, show Mrs. Witherspoon—"
"Very good, sir. This way, please, madam. Stockin', fetch Mrs. Witherspoon's bag from the hall."
Mr. Hepplewhite stood rubbing his delicate hands in front of the fire, telling himself what a really great pleasure it was to have Mrs. Witherspoon staying with him over the week-end. He was having a dinner party for her that evening—of forty-eight. All that it had been necessary for him to do to have the party was to tell Mr. Sadducee, his secretary, that he wished to have it and direct him to send the invitations from List Number One and then to tell Bibby the same thing and to order the chef to serve Dinner Number Four—only to have Johannisberger Cabinet instead of Niersteiner.
All these things were highly important to Mr. Hepplewhite, for upon the absolute smoothness with which tea and dinner were served and the accuracy with which his valet selected socks to match his tie his entire happiness, to say nothing of his peace of mind, depended. His daily life consisted of a series of subdued and nicely adjusted social events. They were forecast for months ahead. Nothing was ever done on the spur of the moment at Mr. Hepplewhite's. He could tell to within a couple of seconds just exactly what was going to occur during the balance of the day, the remainder of Mrs. Witherspoon's stay and the rest of the month. It would have upset him very much not to know exactly what was going to happen, for he was a meticulously careful host and being a creature of habit the unexpected was apt to agitate him extremely.
So now as he stood rubbing his hands it was in the absolute certainty that in just a few more seconds one of the footmen would appear between the tapestry portières bearing aloft a silver tray with the tea things, and then Bibby would come in with the paper, and presently Mrs. Witherspoon would come down and she would make tea for him and they would talk about tea, and Aiken, and whether the Abner Fullertons were going to get a domestic or foreign divorce, and how his bridge was these days. It would be very nice, and he rubbed his hands very gently and waited for the Dresden clock to strike five in the subdued and decorous way that it had. But he did not hear it strike.
Instead a shriek rang out from the hall above, followed by yells and feet pounding down the stairs. Mr. Hepplewhite turned cold and something hard rose up in his throat. His sight dimmed. And then Bibby burst in, pale and with protruding eyes.
"There was a man in the guest room!" he gasped. "Stockin's got him. What shall we do?"
At that moment Mrs. Witherspoon followed.
"Oh, Mr. Hepplewhite! Oh, Mr. Hepplewhite!" she gasped, staggering toward him.
Mr. Hepplewhite would have taken her in his arms and attempted to comfort her only it was not done in Mr. Hepplewhite's set unless under extreme provocation. So he pressed an armchair upon her; or, rather, pressed her into an armchair; and leaned against the bookcase feeling very faint. He was extremely agitated.
"S-send for the police! S-s-send for B-burk!" he stuttered. Burk was a husky watchman who also acted as a personal guard for Mr. Hepplewhite.
An alarm began to beat a deafening staccato in the hall outside the library. Bibby rushed gurgling from the room. Several tall men in knee breeches and silk stockings dashed excitedly up and down stairs using expressions such as had never before been heard by Mr. Hepplewhite, and the clanging gong of a police wagon was audible as it clattered up the Avenue.
"Oh, Mr. Hepplewhite," whispered Mrs. Witherspoon, unconsciously seeking his hand. "I never was so frightened in my life!"
Then the gong stopped and the police poured into the house and up the stairs. There were muffled noises and suppressed ejaculations of "Aw, come on there, now! I've got him, Mike! No funny business now, you! Come along quiet!"
The whole house seemed blue with policemen, and Mr. Hepplewhite became aware of a very fat man in a blue cap marked Captain, who removed the cap deferentially and otherwise indicated that he was making obeisance. Behind the fat man stood three other equally fat men, who held between them with grim firmness, by arm, neck and shoulder, a much smaller—in fact, quite a small—man shabby, unkempt, and with a desperate look upon his unshaven face.
"We've got him, all right, Mr. Hepplewhite!" exulted the captain, obviously grateful that God had vouchsafed to deliver the criminal into his and not into other hands. "Shall I take him to the house—or do you want to examine him?"
"I?" ejaculated Mr. Hepplewhite. "Mercy, no! Take him away as quickly as possible!"
"As you say, sir," wheezed the captain. "Come along, boys! Take him over to court and arraign him!"
"Yes, do!" urged Mrs. Witherspoon. "And arraign him as hard as you can; for he really frightened me nearly to death, the terrible man!"
"Leave him to me, ma'am!" adjured the captain "Will you have your butler act as complainant sir?" he asked.
"Why—yes—Bibby will do whatever is proper," agreed Mr. Hepplewhite. "It will not be necessary for me to go to court, will it?"
"Oh, no!" answered the captain. "Mr. Bibby will do all right. I suppose we had better make the charge burglary, sir?"
"I suppose so," replied Mr. Hepplewhite vaguely.
"Get on, boys," ordered the captain. "Good evening, sir. Good evening, ma'am. Step lively, you!"
The blue cloud faded away, bearing with it both Bibby and the burglar. Then the third footman brought the belated tea.
"What a frightful thing to have happen!" grieved Mrs. Witherspoon as she poured out the tea for Mr. Hepplewhite. "You don't take cream, do you?"
"No, thanks," he answered. "I find too much cream hard to digest. I have to be rather careful, you know. By the way, you haven't told me where the burglar was or what he was doing when you went into the room."
"He was in the bed," said Mrs. Witherspoon.
"In the 'Decay of Lying,' Mr. Tutt," said Tutt thoughtfully, as he dropped in for a moment's chat after lunch, "Oscar Wilde says, 'There is no essential incongruity between crime and culture.'"
The senior partner removed his horn-rimmed spectacles and carefully polished the lenses with a bit of chamois, which he produced from his watch pocket, meanwhile resting the muscles of his forehead by elevating his eyebrows until he somewhat resembled an inquiring but good-natured owl.
"That's plain enough," he replied. "The most highly cultivated people are often the most unscrupulous. I go Oscar one better and declare that there is a distinct relationship between crime and progress!"
"You don't say, now!" ejaculated Tutt. "How do you make that out?"
Mr. Tutt readjusted his spectacles and slowly selected a stogy from the bundle in the dusty old cigar box.
"Crime," he announced, "is the violation of the will of the majority as expressed in the statutes. The law is wholly arbitrary and depends upon public opinion. Acts which are crimes in one century or country become virtues in another, and vice versa. Moreover, there is no difference, except one of degree, between infractions of etiquette and of law, each of which expresses the feelings and ideas of society at a given moment. Violations of good taste, manners, morals, illegalities, wrongs, crimes—they are all fundamentally the same thing, the insistence on one's own will in defiance of society as a whole. The man who keeps his hat on in a drawing-room is essentially a criminal because he prefers his own way of doing things to that adopted by his fellows."
"That's all right," answered Tutt. "But how about progress?"
"Why, that is simple," replied his partner. "The man who refuses to bow to habit, tradition, law—who thinks for himself and acts for himself, who evolves new theories, who has the courage of his convictions and stakes his life and liberty upon them—that man is either a statesman, a prophet or a criminal. And in the end he is either hailed as a hero and a liberator or is burned, cast into prison or crucified."
Tutt looked interested.
"Well, now," he returned, helping himself from the box, "I never thought of it, but, of course, it's true. Your proposition is that progress depends on development and development depends on new ideas. If the new idea is contrary to those of society it is probably criminal. If its inventor puts it across, gets away with it, and persuades society that he is right he is a leader in the march of progress. If he fails he goes to jail. Hence the relationship between crime and progress. Why not say that crime is progress?"
"If successful it is," answered Mr. Tutt. "But the moment it is successful it ceases to be crime."
"I get you," nodded Tutt. "Here to-day it is a crime to kill one's grandmother; but I recall reading that among certain savage tribes to do so is regarded as a highly virtuous act. Now if I convince society that to kill one's grandmother is a good thing it ceases to be a crime. Society has progressed. I am a public benefactor."
"And if you don't persuade society you go to the chair," remarked Mr. Tutt laconically.
"To use another illustration," exclaimed Tutt, warming to the subject, "the private ownership of property at the present time is recognized and protected by the law, but if we had a Bolshevik government it might be a crime to refuse to share one's property with others."
"In that case if you took your share of another's property by force, instead of being a thief you would be a Progressive," smiled his partner.
Tutt robbed his forehead.
"Looking at it that way, you know," said he, "makes it seem as if criminals were rather to be admired."
"Well, some of them are, and a great multitude of them certainly were," answered Mr. Tutt. "All the early Christian martyrs were criminals in the sense that they were law-breakers."
"And Martin Luther," suggested Tutt.
"And Garibaldi," added Mr. Tutt.
"And George Washington—maybe?" hazarded the junior partner.
Mr. Tutt shrugged his high shoulders.
"You press the analogy a long way, but—in a sense every successful revolutionist was in the beginning a criminal—as every rebel is and perforce must be," he replied.
"So," said Tutt, "if you're a big enough criminal you cease to be a criminal at all. If you're going to be a crook, don't be a piker—it's too risky. Grab everything in sight. Exterminate a whole nation, if possible. Don't be a common garden highwayman or pirate; be a Napoleon or a Willy Hohenzollern."
"You have the idea," replied Mr. Tutt. "Crime is unsuccessful defiance of the existing order of things. Once rebellion rises to the dignity of revolution murder becomes execution and the murderers become belligerents. Therefore, as all real progress involves a change in or defiance of existing law, those who advocate progress are essentially criminally minded, and if they attempt to secure progress by openly refusing to obey the law they are actual criminals. Then if they prevail, and from being in the minority come into power, they are taken out of jail, banquets are given in their honor, and they are called patriots and heroes. Hence the close connection between crime and progress."
Tutt scratched his chin doubtfully.
"That sounds pretty good," he admitted, "but"—and he shook his head—"there's something the matter with it. It doesn't work except in the case of crimes involving personal rights and liberties. I see your point that all progressives are criminals in the sense that they are 'agin the law' as it is, but—I also see the hole in your argument, which is that the fact that all progressives are criminals doesn't make all criminals progressive. Your proposition is only a half truth."
"You're quite wrong about my theory being a half truth," retorted Mr. Tutt. "It is fundamentally sound. The fellow who steals a razor or a few dollars is regarded as a mean thief, but if he loots a trust company or takes a million he's a financier. The criminal law, I maintain, is administered for the purpose of protecting the strong from the weak, the successful from the unsuccessful the rich from the poor. And, sir"—Mr. Tutt here shook his fist at an imaginary jury—"the man who wears a red necktie in violation of the taste of his community or eats peas with his knife is just as much a criminal as a man who spits on the floor when there's a law against it. Don't you agree with me?"
"I do not!" replied Tutt. "But that makes no difference. Nevertheless what you say about the criminal law being devised to protect the rich from the poor interests me very much—very much indeed But I think there's a flaw in that argument too, isn't there? Your proposition is true only to the extent that the criminal law is invoked to protect property rights—and not life and liberty. Naturally the laws that protect property are chiefly of benefit to those who have it—the rich."
"However that may be," declared Mr. Tutt fiercely, "I claim that the criminal laws are administered, interpreted and construed in favor of the rich as against the liberties of the poor, for the simple reason that the administrators of the criminal law desire to curry favor with the powers that be."
"The moral of which all is," retorted the other, "that the law ought to be very careful about locking up people."
"At any rate those who have violated laws upon which there can be a legitimate difference of opinion," agreed Mr. Tutt.
"That's where we come in," said Tutt. "We make the difference—even if there never was any before."
Mr. Tutt chuckled.
"We perform a dual service to society," he declared. "We prevent the law from making mistakes and so keep it from falling into disrepute, and we show up its weak points and thus enable it to be improved."
"And incidentally we keep many a future statesman and prophet from going to prison," said Tutt. "The name of the last one was Solomon Rabinovitch—and he was charged with stealing a second-hand razor from a colored person described in the papers as one Morris Cohen."
How long this specious philosophic discussion would have continued is problematical had it not been interrupted by the entry of a young gentleman dressed with a somewhat ostentatious elegance, whose wizened face bore an expression at once of vast good nature and of a deep and subtle wisdom.
It was clear that he held an intimate relationship to Tutt & Tutt from the familiar way in which he returned their cordial, if casual, salutations.
"Well, here we are again," remarked Mr. Doon pleasantly, seating himself upon the corner of Mr. Tutt's desk and spinning his bowler hat upon the forefinger of his left hand. "The hospitals are empty. The Tombs is as dry as a bone. Everybody's good and every day'll be Sunday by and by."
"How about that man who stole a razor?" asked Tutt.
"Discharged on the ground that the fact that he had a full beard created a reasonable doubt," replied Doon. "Honestly there's nothing doing in my line—unless you want a tramp case."
"A tramp case!" exclaimed Tutt & Tutt.
"I suppose you'd call it that," he answered blandly. "I don't think he was a burglar. Anyhow he's in the Tombs now, shouting for a lawyer. I listened to him and made a note of the case."
Mr. Tutt pushed over the box of stogies and leaned back attentively.
"You know the Hepplewhite house up on Fifth Avenue—that great stone one with the driveway?"
The Tutts nodded.
"Well, it appears that the prisoner—our prospective client—was snooping round looking for something to eat and found that the butler had left the front door slightly ajar. Filled with a natural curiosity to observe how the other half lived, he thrust his way cautiously in and found himself in the main hall—hung with tapestry and lined with stands of armor. No one was to be seen. Can't you imagine him standing there in his rags—the Weary Willy of the comic supplements—gazing about him at the objets d'art, the old masters, the onyx tables, the statuary—wondering where the pantry was and whether the housekeeper would be more likely to feed him or kick him out?"
