Tutt and Mr. Tutt - Arthur Train
"But I don't want him to have my securities!" she retorted.
"Oh, you won't mind! You'll be lucky to get Mr. Badger to take back your
oil stock on any terms. Leave the certificate with me," laughed Mr.
Tutt, rubbing his long thin hands together almost gleefully. "And now as
it is getting rather late perhaps you will do me the honor of letting me
escort you home."
It was midnight before Mr. Tutt went to bed. In the first place he had
felt himself so neglectful of Mrs. Effingham that after he had taken her
home he had sat there a long time talking over the old lady's affairs
and making the acquaintance of the phthisical Jessie, who turned out to
be a wistful little creature with great liquid eyes and a delicate
transparent skin that foretold only too clearly what was to be her
future. There was only one place for her, Mr. Tutt told
himself--Arizona; and by the grace of God she should go there, Badger or
no Badger!
As the old lawyer walked slowly home with his hands clasped behind his
back he pondered upon the seeming mockery and injustice of the law that
forced a lonely, half-demented old fellow with the fixed delusion that
he was a financier behind prison bars and left free the sharp slick
crook who had no bowels or mercies and would snatch away the widow's
mite and leave her and her consumptive daughter to die in the poorhouse.
Yet such was the case, and there they all were! Could you blame people
for being Bolsheviks? And yet old Doc Barrows was as far from a
Bolshevik as anyone could well be.
Mr. Tutt passed a restless night, dreaming, when he slept at all, of
mines from which poured myriads of pieces of yellow gold, of gushers
spouting columns of blood-red oil hundreds of feet into the air, and of
old-fashioned locomotives dragging picturesque trains of cars across
bright green prairies studded with cacti in the shape of dollar signs.
Old Doc Barrows was with him, and from time to time he would lean toward
him and whisper "Listen, Mr. Tutt, I'll tell you a secret! There's a
vein of gold runs right through my daughter's cow pasture!"
When Willie next morning at half past eight reached the office he found
the door already unlocked and Mr. Tutt busy at his desk, up to his
elbows in a great mass of bonds and stock certificates.
"Gee!" he exclaimed to Miss Sondheim, the stenographer, when she made
her appearance at a quarter past nine. "Just peek in the old man's door
if you want to feel rich! Say, he must ha' struck pay dirt! I wonder if
we'll all get a raise?"
But all the securities on Mr. Tutt's desk would not have justified even
the modest advance of five dollars in Miss Sondheim's salary, and their
employer was merely sorting out and making an inventory of Doc Barrows'
imaginary wealth. By the time Mrs. Effingham arrived by appointment at
ten o'clock he had them all arranged and labeled; and in a special
bundle neatly tied with a piece of red tape were what on their face were
securities worth upward of seventy thousand dollars. There were ten of
the beautiful bonds of the Great Lakes and Canadian Southern Railroad
Company with their miniature locomotives and fields of wheat, and ten
equally lovely bits of engraving belonging to the long-since defunct
Bluff Creek and Iowa Central, ten more superb lithographs issued by the
Mohawk and Housatonic in 1867 and paid off in 1882, and a variety of
gorgeous chromos of Indians and buffaloes, and of factories and
steamships spouting clouds of soft-coal smoke; and on the top of all was
a pile of the First Mortgage Gold Six Per Cent obligations of the
Chicago Water Front and Terminal Company--all of them fresh and crisp,
with that faintly acrid smell which though not agreeable to the nostrils
nevertheless delights the banker's soul.
"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 debutante 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 portieres 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."