When Thomas Bingle made his inspired visit to Geoffrey Hooper in the interest of peace, he took it upon himself to advise his wealthy cousin to read "The Christmas Carol" before it was too late, and formed a permanent and irradicable opinion of the pauper's son when that individual curtly informed him that he was not in the habit of reading "trash." Mr. Bingle was patient enough to inquire if he knew anything about "The Christmas Carol" and Geoffrey in turn asked "who wrote the words for it," although it really didn't matter, he added by way of cutting off the reply of his astonished visitor, who naturally could not have expected to know that his cousin was a consistent church-goer and knew a great deal about Christmas carols. If it had been in his power to hate any one, Mr. Bingle would have hated his solitary male cousin for that stupendous insult to literature. As it was, he could only pity him for his ignorance, and at the same time blame Uncle Joseph for bringing up his son in such a slip-shod manner.
It all went to show the trend of the world, however, in this callous age of ours; it went to show that the right sort of missionary work was not being performed. Mr. Bingle never forgave Geoffrey for calling "The Christmas Carol" trash. In the light of what took place afterwards, he felt that he was completely justified in an opinion formed almost on the instant the abominable word was uttered.
Christmas fell on a Wednesday. Three days out of each year Mr. Bingle slept late of a morning: Christmas, Easter Sunday and Labour Day. On this particular Christmas morning he slept much later than usual; the little clock in the parlour was striking eight when he awoke and scrambled out of bed.
Mrs. Bingle always had her coffee in bed. She adhered strictly to that pleasant custom for the somewhat pathetic reason that it afforded a distinct exemplification of the superiority of mistress over maid. By no manner of means could Melissa have arrived at this expression of luxury.
"Merry Christmas," said Mr. Bingle, crimping his toes on the cold carpet and bending over to kiss his companion's cheek. She responded with unwonted vigour, proving that she had been wide awake for some time.
"I shall get up, Thomas," she declared, much to his surprise.
"It's pretty cold," said he. "Better stay where you are."
"I thought I heard Uncle Joe moving about in the sitting-room quite a while ago," she said. "Do you suppose he needed a hot-water bottle?"
Mr. Bingle sighed. "If he did, you may be quite sure he would have got the whole house up with his roars, Mary."
"You will take cold, Thomas, standing around without your—"
"I'll just run in and see if Uncle Joe needs anything," he interrupted, a note of anxiety in his voice. Pausing at the bedroom door, with his hand on the knob, he turned toward her with a merry grin on his deeply-seamed face. His sparse hair was as tousled and his eyes as full of mischief as any child's. "Maybe it was old Santa you heard out there, Mary—filling the stockings."
She was too matter-of-fact for anything like that. "If you knew what was good for you, Tom Bingle, you'd fill that pair of stockings lying at the foot of the bed instead of running around in your bare feet," she said, pulling the covers up about her chin. "I think I'll have my breakfast in bed, after all."
"That's right," said he, and hurried nimbly out of the room so that she would not hear the chattering of his teeth. Mrs. Single was enjoying the paroxysm of a luxurious, comfortable yawn when she heard a shout of alarm from the sitting-room. She sat straight up in bed.
"Mary! Oh, my goodness! I say, Melissa!"
Then came the pattering of Mr. Bingle's feet across the floor, followed by the intrusion of an excited face through the half-open door.
"Wha—what IS the matter?" she quavered.
"He—he's gone!"
"Dead?" she shrieked.
"No! Gone, I said—left the house. Out in the cold. Freezing. Wandering about in the streets—"
"In—in his night clothes?" gasped his wife. "Don't tell me he has gone into the street without—"
"Get up!" cried Mr. Bingle, making a dash for his own garments. "We must do something. Let me think—give me time. Now what is the first thing to do? Notify the police or—"
"IS HE DRESSED?" she demanded.
"Of course," he replied. "At least he took his clothes with him. They're not in his bedroom."
"Well, ask the elevator boy. He'll know when he went out. Hurry up, Thomas. Don't stop to put on a collar. Do hurry—"
"I'm not putting on a collar," came in smothered tones. "I'm putting on a shirt."
He didn't quite have it on when Melissa appeared in the doorway, wide-eyed and excited.
"Uncle Joe has disappeared, ma'am," she chattered. "I can't find hide or hair of him. Did you call, Mr. Bingle, or was it—"
"I called," said Mr. Bingle, getting behind the foot-board of the bed. "Where is he? Did you—"
"I heard him moving about the kitchen about six or half-past. I peeked out of my door, and there he was, all dressed, putting the coffee pot on the stove. I says to him: 'What are you doing there?' and he says: 'I'm getting breakfast, you lazy lummix,' and I says: 'Well, get it, you old bear, 'cause I won't, you can bet on that,'—and went back to bed. Oh, goodness—goodness! I wouldn't ha' said that to him if I'd knowed he—"
"Don't blubber, Melissa," cried Mrs. Bingle. "Ask the elevator boy what time it was when—"
"Hand me my trousers, Mary," shivered Mr. Bingle, "or send Melissa out of the room. I can't—"
"He made himself some coffee and—"
"Call the elevator boy, as I tell you—No, wait! Dress yourself first, you silly thing," commanded Mrs. Bingle, and Melissa fled.
The old man was gone, there could be no doubt about that. Investigations proved that he had left the building at precisely sixteen minutes of seven, the janitor declaring that he had looked at his watch the instant the old man appeared on the sidewalk where he was shovelling away the snow. He admitted that nothing short of a miracle could have caused him to go to the trouble of getting out his watch on a morning as cold as this one happened to be, and so he regarded old Mr. Hooper's exit as a most astonishing occurrence. Further investigation showed that he had walked down the six tortuous flights of stairs instead of ringing for the elevator, and that he was clad in Mr. Bingle's best overcoat, an ulster of five winters, to say nothing of his arctics, gloves and muffler.
No one, not even Mr. Bingle, could deny that it was a very shabby thing to do on a Christmas morning, and for once the gentle bookkeeper lost faith in his fellow-man. In all probability he would have excused Uncle Joe's early morning stroll in garments that did not belong to him had it not been for the fact that the old gentleman also took away with him all of his own scanty belongings neatly wrapped in the morning newspaper, an almost priceless breakfast possession from Mr. Bingle's way of looking at it.
At first Mrs. Bingle insisted on having the police notified. It was so evident that Uncle Joe had departed without even contemplating an early return that she couldn't see why her husband shouldn't at least recover what belonged to him before the old ingrate could get to a pawn-shop, notwithstanding the family shame that would attend an actual arrest.
"He is an old scamp, Tom, and I don't see why you should put up with the scurvy trick he has played on you," she protested, almost in tears. "After all we've done for him, it really seems—"
"I swear to goodness, Mary, I believe I'd do it if—if it wasn't Christmas," groaned Mr. Bingle, who sat dejectedly over the fire, his hands jammed deep into his pockets, his chin on his breast. "But really, my dear, I—I can't—I just can't set the police after him on Christmas Day. Besides, he may come back of his own accord."
"He can't go very far on what he will get for your overcoat," she said ironically. "He'll be back, never fear, when he gets good and hungry, and he'll not bring your overcoat with him, either."
"My dear, whatever else Uncle Joe may have been, he is not a thief," said Mr. Bingle stiffly.
"How do you know?" she demanded. "He may have been in the penitentiary, for all we know about him. At any rate, he HAS stolen your overcoat, and your rubbers, and—and—"
"My ear-muffs," supplied Mr. Bingle, seeing that she was taxing her memory.
"I suppose you regard all that as the act of an honest man," she said irritably. "I DO wish, Tom Bingle, that you had a little more backbone when it comes to—"
"Tut, tut!" interposed Mr. Bingle, uncomfortably. He resented her occasional references to his backbone, or rather to the lack of it.
"—being put upon," she concluded. "Oh, just to think of the old scamp doing this to you on Christmas Day!" she wailed. "No wonder his children despise him."
"Well, we'll see what—" he began and then cleared his throat in some confusion. His wife's appraising eye was upon him.
"What are we going to see?" she inquired, after a moment.
"We'll see what turns up," said he, somewhat defiantly, "I don't believe in condemning a man unheard. I have a feeling that he—"
"What do you expect to wear when you go down to the bank in the morning?" she demanded, still eyeing him severely. "Your spring overcoat? People will think you're crazy. It's below zero."
"Oh, I'll get along all right," said he stoutly. "Don't you worry about me, Mary. By hokey, I wish he'd come back this afternoon, just to prove to you that it isn't safe to form an opinion without—"
"There you go, Tom Bingle, wishing as you always do that somebody would do something good just to show me that no one ever does anything bad. You dear old goose! Only the meanest man in the world could have the heart to rob you. That's what Uncle Joe is, my dear—the meanest man in the world."
Mr. Bingle sighed. He was in no position to argue the point. Uncle Joe had not left him very much to stand upon in the shape of a theory. There was nothing to do but to concede her the sigh of admission.
"It's possible," he said hopefully, "that the poor old man is—is out of his head. Let us hope so, at any rate." And with this somewhat doubtful sop to the family honour, he lapsed into the silence of one who realizes that he has uttered a foolish remark and shrinks from the consequences.
Mrs. Bingle said "Humph," and no more, but there is no word in any vocabulary that represents as much in the way of sustained argument as that homely, unspellable ejaculation.
Mr. Hooper DID return, but not until the Saturday following Christmas Day. He justified Mr. Bingle's faith in mankind to some extent by restoring the overcoat and the arctics, but failed to bring back the ear-muffs and the newspaper. He also failed to account for his own scanty belongings which he had taken away from the flat wrapped up in the newspaper. As a matter of fact, he did not feel called upon to account for anything that had transpired since a quarter before seven on Christmas morning. He merely walked in upon Mrs. Bingle at noon and told her to send for Dr. Fiddler at once. Then he got into bed and shivered so violently that the poor lady quite forgot her intention to berate him for all the worry and trouble he had caused. She proceeded at once to dose him with quinine, hot whisky and other notable remedies while Melissa telephoned for the doctor and Mr. Bingle.
"Don't you think I'd better send for Dr. Smith, on the first floor, Uncle Joe?" said Mrs. Bingle nervously.
"I want Dr. Fiddler," growled the old man. "I won't have anybody else, Mary. He's the only doctor in New York. Well, why are you standing there like a fence-post? Can't you see I'm sick? Can't you see I need a doctor? Can't—"
"I only thought that perhaps Dr. Smith could do something to relieve you before Dr. Fiddler arrives. You should not forget that Dr. Fiddler is a great man and a—a busy one. He may not be able to come at once, and in that case—"
"He'll come the minute you send for him," argued the sick man. "Didn't he say he would? Do you want me to die like a dog? Where's Tom?"
"He is at the bank, Uncle Joe," said Mrs. Bingle patiently. "Now, try to be quiet, we'll have the doctor here as quickly as possible."
"I don't want any of your half-grown doctors, Mary, understand that. I want a real one. I'm a mighty sick man, and—"
"You'll be all right in a day or two, Uncle Joe," said she soothingly. "Don't worry, you poor old dear. Drink this."
"What is it?"
"Never mind. It's good for you. Take it right down."
Uncle Joe surprised himself by swallowing the hot drink without further remonstrance. His own docility convinced him beyond all doubt that he was a very sick man.
"Send for Tom," he sputtered. "Send for him at once. He ought to be here. I am his uncle—his only uncle, and he—"
"Now, do be quiet, Uncle Joe. Tom will be here before long. It's Saturday, you know—a half holiday at the bank."
She sat down on the edge of the bed and gently stroked his hot forehead. For a short time he growled about the delay in getting the doctor to the apartment; then he became quietly watchful. His gaze settled upon the comely, troubled face of Tom Bingle's wife and, as he looked, his fierce old eyes softened.
"Mary," he said at last, and his voice was gentle, almost plaintive; "you are a real angel. I just want you to know that I love you and Tom, and I want you to tell me now that you forgive me for—for—"
"Sh! See if you can't go to sleep, Uncle Joe."
"I'd just like to hear you say that you don't hate me, Mary."
"Of course, I don't hate you. How can you ask such a question?"
"I've been a dreadful—"
"Hush, now. Here's Melissa. Did you get Dr. Fiddler, Melissa?"
"Yes, ma'am," said the little maid-of-all-work, appearing in the doorway with a couple of blankets that she had been warming behind the kitchen range. "He's coming at once, ma'am, and—" her eyes were expressive of an immense pity for her mistress—"he says he's prepared to stay all night if necessary, and he's sent for TWO nurses, night and day. Besides all that, his assistant is coming with him."
"That's the kind of a doctor to have," said Uncle Joe, with a vast satisfaction. "None of your cheap, dollar-a-visit incompetents for me, Mary. If a man's life is worth anything at all, it's worth more than a couple of one dollar visits from these—What's the matter with you, Melissa? Don't glare at me like that. Haven't I the right to live? Can't I ask for a doctor—a mere doctor—without being—"
"Oh, I ain't begrudgin' you a doctor, Uncle Joe," said Melissa shortly. "It's none of my business. You can have all the doctors in New York if you want 'em."
"I don't want 'em, confound you," exclaimed Uncle Joe. "I only want a fighting chance, that's all. I—"
"Nobody's fighting you, is they?" demanded Melissa, whipping a blanket across the bed with more energy than seemed necessary. She began tucking in the edges. "I guess we've always been pretty nice to you, Uncle Joe—every one of us—and I guess we'll keep on being nice to you, so don't growl."
"That's right, Melissa," said the sick man humbly. "You've been a jewel, my girl. I—I shall never forget you."
"I'm a soft-hearted fool or I'd ha'—" began Melissa, somewhat ominously, but checked herself after a quick glance at her mistress's face. "Try to go to sleep, Uncle Joe," she substituted. "I'll have some toast and tea for you when you wake up. You—you look as if you hadn't eat anything since you left, you poor old thing."
"I hope Tom didn't need his overcoat while I was away, Mary," said Uncle Joe, abruptly changing the topic of conversation.
"He has another coat," said Mrs. Bingle, evasively. "When you feel better you must tell us what you have been doing for the past—"
"I'm not going to feel any better," said Uncle Joe, quite cheerfully. "I may hang on for a long time but I'm not going to be any better. This is the finish for me, Mary. And I'd like you to know that I didn't come back here to die on your hands without first giving my children a chance to take me in. I—I tried them once more."
"You—you went to them again?" she cried. Melissa laid the second blanket across the bed more gently than the first.
"Yes," said Mr. Hooper, his thick eyebrows meeting in a scowl of anger. "Yes, I talked with all three of them this morning before I came here. I told them that I was sick and—and—" He choked up suddenly as Mrs. Bingle began to pat his lean old knuckles with her soft, warm hand.
"I wouldn't talk about it if I were you, Uncle Joe."
"But I—I want to talk about it," he said, with an effort. "First I wrote a nice, kind letter to each one of them. Then I called them up on the telephone and told them all how sick I was, that I couldn't last much longer, that I didn't want to die in the street, or a charity hospital, or—the police station. That confounded Christmas Carol of yours made me relent. I read the thing the other night after you went to bed. They all asked me where I was and said they would send an ambulance to take me to Bellevue, and that was the best they could do for me. After the holidays, when they had a little more time, they might possibly send me to a sanitarium if I—if I showed any signs of improvement. That was all there was to it, Mary. I told them—each one of 'em—that I washed my hands of them, and they could all go to the devil. They won't do it, of course. People like that never go to the devil for the simple reason that the devil hasn't anything to offer them that they don't already possess. And so, Mary, I came back here to see if you'd take me in. You and Tom have been my best, my only real friends, and I—I thought you'd give me another chance. If you feel even now that I am going to be too much bother and expense, I'll get out. I'll go to a hospital and—"
"Not another word, Uncle Joe," said Mary Bingle, and she kissed his grim old cheek. "Not another word."
"Thank you, Mary, thank you for that. I—I was just wondering whether you could stand all of the expense and—"
Melissa broke in sharply: "Of course, we can. My wages can go over till—"
"And you will not turn me out?" whispered Uncle Joe, his eyes shining.
"Never!" said Mrs. Bingle.
"Never!" said the maid-of-all-work.
Mr. Hooper turned over on his side and was strangely quiet after that. His nephew came home at three and found himself confronted by two nurses, two doctors and a cabman who was waiting in the hallway for his fare. It seemed that Uncle Joe had driven home in a cab, and being somewhat uncertain as to the duration of his stay in the apartment of his nephew, instructed the fellow to wait, which the fellow did for a matter of more than three hours and was prepared to wait a good while longer unless he got his pay. Uncle Joe's forgetfulness cost Mr. Bingle six dollars and fifty cents, and he entered the sitting-room with a heart doubly sore. Of one thing he was uncomfortably certain: the nurses would cost fifty dollars a week and they would have to be paid on the dot. They were not like doctors, who could afford to wait. They were working for a living.
Mr. Bingle's salary at the bank was one hundred dollars a month. He was an expert accountant, but it did not require the intelligence of an expert to do the "sum" that presented itself for his hasty consideration. His small, jealously guarded account in the savings bank would be wiped out like a flash. And yet he entered the sick-room with a cheerful countenance and an unfaltering faith in the fitness of all things. He greeted his repentant Sindbad with such profound gladness and relief that one might well have believed him to be happy in having the burden restored to his frail shoulders.
"Well, well, here you are!" he cried, rubbing his cold hands vigorously before offering to grasp the bony old fingers that were extended to him. "Glad to see you back, Uncle Joe. Comfortable? Well, well, how are you?" He shook his uncle's hand warmly. "Sorry to see you laid up again, sir, but we'll have you as good as new in no time. Eh, doctor? As good as new, eh?"
Uncle Joe had nothing to say. He clung to his nephew's hand and smiled faintly.
Mr. Bingle looked puzzled. This was not like the Uncle Joe he had known. He sent a questioning glance toward the sober-faced doctor, and then sat down beside the bed, very much shaken by the news that came to him in the significant shake of Dr. Fiddler's head.
After many minutes had passed, Uncle Joe began to speak to his nephew. His voice was weak and the words came haltingly.
"Tom, you are a good boy—as good as gold. No, that isn't fair to you. You're better than gold. I honestly believe you like me, wretched and troublesome as I am. Your mother loved me, Tom. No one ever had a sister who loved a brother more than she loved me. Thank God, she died long before I came to this dreadful pass. She was spared seeing me as I am now. Well, I want to ask a last favour of you, nephew. I want you to see that I am buried beside your mother up at Syracuse. Just have a simple funeral, my boy. No fuss, no flowers, no singing. Then take me up to the old burying ground and—and I won't bother any one after that. I suppose it will cost you something to do it, but—but if you knew how much it will mean to me now if I have your promise to—"
"Sh!" whispered Mr. Bingle. "Don't talk of dying, Uncle Joe. Don't speak of graveyards while—"
"Will you promise? That's the question," said Uncle Joe stubbornly.
"Yes," said Mr. Bingle painfully; "when the time comes I'll lay you beside my mother. Don't worry about it, Uncle Joe."
"I hate to put you to the expense of—"
"Pooh!" said Mr. Bingle, as if the cost of the thing was the merest trifle to him.
"If I were to live for a thousand years, Tom, I could never find the means to adequately compensate you and Mary for the joy and comfort you have given me at so great a cost to yourselves. By dying, I may be able to make your load lighter, so I am going to die as quickly as the doctor will allow me to do so."
He died at nine o'clock that night. The next day Mr. Bingle notified his three children that he was taking their father to Syracuse for burial, and that if they chose to do so they could come to the apartment late that afternoon for the brief funeral service. Geoffrey, speaking for his sisters as well as for himself, expressed regret that poor Tom had been saddled with certain annoyances and inconvenience in connection with the late Joseph Hooper, and that they, as a family, would be pleased to assume the cost of his funeral, provided Tom would present an itemized statement on his return from Syracuse, covering all legitimate expenses not only in connection with the funeral but also anything that may have arisen during his most recent illness.
And Mr. Bingle, without consulting his wife, informed Geoffrey that he was quite able to meet all of the expenses without aid from "the family" and that he preferred to have nothing more said about the matter. Whereupon Geoffrey told him to go ahead and do as he pleased about it, and hung up the telephone receiver.
Greatly to the amazement and relief of the Bingles, Dr. Fiddler insisted on paying all of the funeral expenses, including the railroad fare of the two mourners to and from Syracuse. Moreover, he calmly announced that he would not accept a penny from Mr. Bingle for services rendered the sick man.
"Mary," said Mr. Bingle, on the way back to New York after the interment in Syracuse, "if everybody in this world was as good as Dr. Fiddler, what a happy place it would be. Just think of it! He gave all of his time, all of his experience—everything—and now refuses to take a cent from me. It isn't everybody who is as easy on the poor as that man is, my dear. He is a—a real nobleman."
Mrs. Bingle had been thinking too. "Well, I dare say he makes up for it by being a little harder on the rich every time he finds it necessary to be easy on the poor," she said cryptically.
"What do you mean?"
"Nothing," she said, ashamed of her estimate of the good doctor. "I shouldn't have said that."
"I insist on an explanation."
"Well, if you must have it, I'll bet he gets even somehow. I'd hate to be his next patient if I was rich enough to call him in to attend me."
"I am surprised at you, Mary," said Mr. Bingle, and his expression convinced her that he really was.
Mr. Bingle was late at the bank the morning after their return from the North. Not in all the years of his connection with the institution had such a thing happened to him—or to the bank, for that matter. He made it a point to be punctual. In his opinion, a man was taking something that did not belong to him when he failed his employer in the matter of promptness. Working AFTER hours to make up the lost time was, in his estimation, a rather cowardly form of penance; it was simply a confession that the delinquent had robbed his master of a certain number of fresh minutes earlier in the day, and was trying to restore them at the end of the day, when he was in no condition to give as good as he had taken.
One could set his watch by Thomas Bingle. All of the clocks, and all of the watches, and all of the clerks in the bank might be late, but NEVER Thomas Bingle. He kept absolutely perfect time, year in and year out. And so, when he came dashing into the bank on this particular morning nearly forty minutes late, every man in the long counting-room jerked out his watch and glanced at its face with an expression of alarm in his eyes, absolutely convinced that he had made the heart-breaking mistake of getting down to work forty minutes too soon. Such a thing as Mr. Bingle getting down forty minutes too late was infinitely more improbable than that all the rest of them should have reported that much too early.
The tardy one was conscious of the concentrated stare of sixty eyes as he slid onto the stool in front of his desk and began to fumble with the pens and blotters. The man at his left elbow said "well, well!" and the man at his right elbow said "st! st! st!" with his tongue in a most reproachful manner. They could understand Mr. Bingle's absence for three whole days, having got wind of a death in the family, but, for the life of them, they couldn't see what he meant by spoiling a perfectly clean record for punctuality when he might have remained away for the entire day, just as well as not, instead of upsetting a hallowed tradition in the bank by coming in forty minutes late.
Moreover, Mr. Bingle was confident that all of the high officials in the bank, from the president down to the seventh assistant cashier, had noticed his tremendous shortcoming, and that they were even now whispering among themselves that he ought to be discharged forthwith. He could feel people glaring at him from behind; he could feel the president's eyes, and the four vice-presidents' eyes, and the chairman of the board's eyes and all of the directors' eyes boring holes through the partitions to fix their accusing gaze upon him as he bent nervously over the huge ledger and tried to shrink into invisibility. He had committed a heinous, inexcusable, unpardonable offence. He would have to pay the penalty. After all these years of faithful service, he would be kicked out in disgrace; some one else would be sitting in his place after luncheon and some one else would be hanging his coat and hat in the locker he had used for fifteen years without—His eyes grew misty as he bent a little closer to the page and tried to focus his thoughts on what was actually before him.
What difference would it make to these heartless plutocrats and overlords when he told them that his wife was ill and that he could not leave his home until the doctor had come to reassure him? What did they know about connubial happiness and connubial obligations? They would stare at him coldly—or perhaps laugh in his face—and say that the fate of a great banking institution could not be put in jeopardy just because Mrs. Bingle happened to be critically ill. Mr. Bingle, for the first time in his life, began to appreciate his own importance. He began to realise that in all likelihood the bank would go to pieces as the result of his failure to appear at his desk at the appointed minute. He recalled having seen the first vice-president and the cashier in close conversation as he slunk through the little passage behind the latter's office, and he remembered also with sickening clearness that they stopped talking and stared at him as he hurried by. And, now that he thought of it, the first vice-president had smiled pleasantly and had said something that sounded like "good morning, Mr. Bingle," although it certainly couldn't have been that. It was regarded as especially ominous when an official of the bank said good-morning to a clerk or a bookkeeper. It meant, according to tradition, that his days were numbered. It was a sort of preliminary sentence. Later on, there would come a summons to appear at the "office."
Mr. Bingle sat on his stool, his feet hooked rigidly in the stretchers as if prepared to resist any effort to yank him out of the place he had held for fifteen years, and all the while he was listening for the voice of the messenger at his shoulder, ordering him to step into Mr. Force's room.
The trip to Syracuse had been too much for Mrs. Bingle. The railway coaches were cold; she shivered nearly all the way up and all the way back, notwithstanding Melissa's furs and the extra suit of flannels she had donned at Mr. Bingle's suggestion. She came home with a frightful cold and a temperature that frightened her husband almost out of his boots.
She was not in the habit of taking long journeys by train. As a matter of fact, she had never been farther away from Manhattan Island than Hartford, Connecticut, and that experience befell her in the middle of an extremely torrid June. Perhaps a half-dozen times in the fifteen years of her married life she had gone to Peekskill to visit her mother and a married sister, but always in warm weather. Not that she was too poor to make the trip to Peekskill as often as she liked, but her mother and sister made it unnecessary by coming to New York for frequent and sometimes protracted visits at the Bingle apartment, and usually without first inquiring whether it would be convenient or otherwise. She very sensibly realised that Mr. Bingle saw quite enough of his wife's relatives in this way, and refused to drag him into the country to see more of them. He had better use for his Sundays, and as for his vacations, they were always spent at home in the laudable effort to save a little money against the rainy day that people are always talking about. So Mrs. Bingle stayed at home, and contrived to love her good little husband more and more as each narrow day went by, winter and summer, year in and year out, and not once did the iron of discontent enter her soul. Some day, when they could really afford it, they were going away for a month's fishing-trip in the wilds of Maine, but all that could wait. It was something to look forward to, and there is a lot in that.
Neither of them had ever dreamed that Syracuse was so near to the North Pole, nor had they the remotest idea that the weather could be so cold anywhere on earth as it was in the upper part of New York State. The coldest days they had ever known in New York City—and they had always believed that nothing could be colder—were balmy when compared with that awful day on the outskirts of Syracuse—that bleak, blighting day in the wind-swept graveyard where the mother of Thomas Bingle slept.
They fairly shrivelled in their skins as they stood beside the open grave and saw, through blurred eyes, the last of Uncle Joe. Both of Mr. Bingle's ears were frozen quite stiff. A much be-furred undertaker's assistant rubbed snow on them with what seemed to be unnecessary vigour and told him to have 'em looked after when he got back to New York. They were ugly things, those ears of his, and Mr. Bingle was acutely conscious of their size and colour as he sat at his desk and waited for word to come to "the office." A sudden and almost insupportable itching of his heels filled him with fresh alarm, and for one ghastly moment he forgot his ears and his crime. Were his heels frost-bitten? If so—then, what was to become of him?
"Get your uncle buried all right?" inquired his left-hand neighbour, suddenly speaking out of the void. Mr. Bingle's reply was a guilty, bewildered start. The man went on: "What did he die of?"
"Oh," said Mr. Bingle hazily, "most assuredly."
"I said, what ailed him?"
"Why, he was dead," said Mr. Bingle, vaguely surprised by the other's obtuseness. "That's why we buried him."
"I see," said the questioner, after staring hard for a moment. He edged a little farther away from Mr. Bingle and shot a swift glance of apprehension in the direction of the door.
"I couldn't help being late," ventured Mr. Bingle, his first apology in fifteen years. "My wife is sick, Jenkins—mighty sick. The doctor couldn't come at once, so I had to wait. She—"
"Say," said Jenkins nervously, "the old man didn't die of anything catching, did he?"
"Catching?"
"I mean contagious. Your wife hasn't caught anything from him, has she? If she has, you oughtn't to come around here carrying—"
"He died of old age," said Mr. Single stiffly.
"Sure?"
"Of course."
"Well, we all catch that if we live long enough," said Jenkins, considerably relieved. "How old was he?"
"Seventy-three."
"Leave anything?"
Mr. Bingle was suddenly bereft of all power of speech. Three men were standing just outside the long bronze caging that enclosed the bookkeeping-department, and they were looking at him with a directness that was even more pronounced than the stare of utter dismay with which he favoured them. There could be no mistake: they were discussing him—Thomas Bingle! And they were discussing him with unquestionable seriousness. His heart flopped down to his heels and his poor ears burned with a fierceness that caused him to fear that they were on the point of bursting into flames. The first vice-president was pointing him out to the president, there could be no doubt about that; and the pompous president was bobbing his head in a most extraordinary manner, there could be no doubt about that either. The third man of the trio was the chief watchman, and he was looking at Mr. Bingle as a cat looks at a captured mouse. It was all over! They were about to arrest him for embezzlement or murder or something equally as heinous. Mr. Bingle turned colder than he had been at any time during his stay in the ice-bound city of Syracuse.
Then the trio abruptly turned away and left him sitting there, frozen to the marrow. He tried to swallow, but his throat was paralysed.
"Gee, that looks bad, Bingle," whispered Jenkins, pityingly. "That was the old man. What—what the dickens have you been up to?"
Mr. Bingle's stiff lips moved but no sound came forth. He was to be discharged! In fifteen years he had been late at his desk but once, and he was to be discharged! What would Mary say? What would become of Mary? What would become of Melissa, now that they couldn't afford to keep a servant?
"You been here longer than any one, too," went on Jenkins. "How long has it been, Bingle?"
"Fifteen years," gulped Mr. Bingle, in a strange, unnatural voice.
"That's longer than the old man himself," said Jenkins. "He's been president less'n twelve years. Say, Bingle, I'm all broke up over it. I—I hope it ain't as bad as we think. Maybe—oh, I say, it's your EARS! That's what it is. Mr. Force was showing him your ears. And say, take it from me, Bingle, they're worth going a long way to see, too. Good Lord, what a relief!" Mr. Bingle actually took hope. Could it be possible? Were frozen ears so rare a sight that the president of a great bank—But even as he grasped at the straw he became convinced that it was very likely to prove his salvation, for, to his amazement and confusion, the cashier and the fourth vice-president strolled up to the caging and regarded him with the gravest interest. He bent his head to the task before him, hoping against hope that it WAS his ears and not his tardiness. And, when he looked up again many minutes afterward, other officials of the bank were looking at him from various points of vantage, and all of them were staring with the most amazing intentness, quite as if they had never seen anything so strange as the man who had sat unnoticed in this very spot for fifteen years and more. Messengers took a peep at him as they circled from window to window; patrons of the bank sauntered past and squinted vaguely in his direction.
Vice-president Force came back a second time and actually pointed him out to an utter stranger, at the same time waving his hand at Mr. Bingle in a most friendly and engaging manner!
The poor bookkeeper reeled on his stool. He laid his pen down, removed the green shade from over his eyes, placed his blotters neatly in the rack, and turning to Jenkins, said:
"I can't stand it, Jenkins. I've—I've just got to know the worst. I'm going to the office."
"With—without being sent for?" gasped Jenkins.
"There's no use putting it off. I—"
A dapper little page appeared at Mr. Bingle's elbow, interrupting him with the curt remark that Mr. Force wanted to see him when it was convenient.
"Convenient?" murmured Mr. Bingle, his eyes bulging.
"Well, great—" began Jenkins.
"That's what he said: convenient," said the page loftily. "Gee, where did you get them ears?"
Mr. Bingle got down from his stool slowly, painfully.
"I guess I'll go now," he said. "It's just as convenient for me to get out now as—"
"I can't understand that 'convenient' business," broke in Jenkins, wrinkling his brow. "Well, good luck, Bingle. I'm sorry."
Sixty wistful, sympathetic eyes followed Mr. Bingle as he made his way out to the passage. The word had gone 'round that "old Bingy" was to get the sack, and every one was saying to himself that if they discharged a man like Bingle for being late it wouldn't be safe for any one to transgress for even the tiniest fraction of an instant.
Half-way down the narrow aisle leading to the offices, Mr. Bingle stopped to wipe his brow and to pull himself together for the coming ordeal. A high-and-mighty young man who had been elevated from a clerkship to the post of third assistant foreign teller, and who no longer deemed it proper to associate with his erstwhile companions in the "galleys," emerged from his cage and, coming abruptly upon the shivering bookkeeper, blinked uncertainly for a moment and then said in what was unmistakably a polite and even respectful tone:
"Good morning, Mr. Bingle. Pleasant day, sir, isn't it?"
If Mr. Bingle had been in a condition to notice such things as miracles, he might have been struck by this one, but he merely said it WAS a pleasant day and resumed his way, utterly oblivious to the fact that a human being had been completely transformed before his very eyes. A few steps farther on he encountered an even mightier force than the third assistant foreign teller: the bank detective.
"Good morning, Mr. Bingle. Nice day, sir," said the bank detective, somewhat eagerly, and stood aside to let the lowly bookkeeper pass without being jostled—as was the custom.
"Morning," said Mr. Bingle, still unimpressed. It seemed to him that every one was evincing a singular interest in the fact that he was about to be discharged on a pleasant day.
Mr. Force was seated at his desk when Bingle entered the room and found himself in the presence of the man who was certain to become president when "the old man" died—an event that would have to occur if the first vice-president's dream of elevation ever came true, for there wasn't the remotest likelihood that he would have the sense of decency to resign, no matter how old or how senile he became in the course of time.
Now, Mr. Force took himself very seriously. Having married an exceedingly wealthy woman after a career in which liveliness had meant more to him than livelihood, he assumed that if he treated the world at large with extreme aloofness it would soon forget—and overlook—the fact that he had never amounted to a row of pins in the estimation of those who knew him as a harvester in Broadway. Shortly before his marriage—at forty-three—he abandoned an extensive crop of wild oats in the very heart of New York City—announcing that he intended to retire from active business and go to work.
Going to work meant stepping into a bank as its third vice-president the week after his return from a honeymoon spent with a bride who held, in her own right, something over one-half of the entire capital stock of the institution. Her wedding present to him was the third vice-presidency and the everlasting enmity of every director and official in the bank. He accepted both in the spirit in which they were given. To the surprise of his enemies and the scorn of his friends, he promptly settled down and made himself so valuable to the bank that even his wife was vindicated. He managed in one way or another to increase her holdings and soon was in a position to dictate to those officially above him. He dictated so effectually in the case of the first and second vice-president that they preferred to resign rather than to continue the struggle to keep him in his place. Before he had been in the bank a year, he was its first vice-president.
It was generally conceded that the president himself would have been in jeopardy but for the fact that he was the father of Mrs. Force and therefore exempt. In order to clarify the situation, it is necessary to state that the bride inherited her extensive holdings from a former husband, who, it appears, died of old age when she was but twenty-six. It would also appear that her father owed his position as president to the influence of Mr. Force's predecessor, or rather to the influence that his daughter exercised over an old gentleman in his dotage. Be that as it may, the present chief executive of the bank was immune for life. To quote the directorate, he couldn't be FORCED out of office. His son-in-law would be obliged to wait. He could afford to wait. He was forty-four.
It has been said that Mr. Sydney Force was seated at his desk when Thomas Bingle sidled into the luxurious office. It must now be added that he did not retain his seat for more than a second after Mr. Bingle's entrance. In fact, he fairly leaped to his feet, frightening his visitor into a sudden, spasmodic movement of the hand in search of the door-knob and a backward shuffle of both feet at once. The little bookkeeper's alarm was groundless. Mr. Force came forward, beaming, his hand extended.
"How are you, Mr. Bingle? Come right in. Well, well, this is splendid. Too good to be true, 'pon my word it is." He was wringing the little man's hand violently. "I confess that I am surprised that you considered it worth while to come down to the bank at all, sir."
Mr. Bingle was batting his eyes furiously. He was also having a great deal of difficulty with his knees.
"I—I couldn't help it, Mr. Force," he stammered. "I really couldn't. It is the first time in all the years of my connection with—"
"I beg your pardon, Mr. Bingle," interrupted Mr. Force, with a somewhat sweeping wave of the hand that took in practically all of the office and yet no spot in particular; "this is Mr. Sigsbee." He then stood aside and permitted Mr. Bingle to discover Mr. Sigsbee, who came hastily out of the whirling background.
"Glad to meet you, sir," said Mr. Sigsbee, giving Mr. Bingle's hand a tremendous squeeze. "I should have known you, Mr. Bingle, anywhere on earth from the description given to me."
Description! Poor Bingle's blood congealed. Description? That dreadful word could have but one application. It was never used except in connection with people who were wanted for crime. The man was a detective!
"Sit down, Mr. Bingle," said Force, with shocking amiability. "Will you smoke?"
"No, thank you," said Mr. Bingle, doing his best to pull himself together and failing completely. "As I was saying, Mr. Force, my wife—"
At this juncture, the door to an adjoining room was thrown open and the bank's president stood revealed. At his back was the chairman of the board and also the cashier, while somewhat indistinctly associated with the sombre elegance of the room beyond were the figures of a peeping stenographer and an open-mouthed secretary whose neck was gallantly stretched almost to the point of dislocation because he was too much of a gentleman to push the little stenographer out of his line of vision.
"Well, well, Bingle!" exclaimed the president, somewhat gustily as he hastened forward. "How are you? That this should happen to you! It is unbelievable!" He was pumping Mr. Bingle's arm. "I don't see how in the world we are to get along without you. You ought to be ashamed of yourself. Why don't you—"
"Wha—what in the name of heaven am I accused of doing?" blurted out Mr. Bingle abjectly. "This is some awful mistake. I—"
"Accused of doing?" exclaimed Mr. Force, frowning perplexedly.
"What say, Bingle?" inquired the president, who wasn't quite certain that his hearing was what it used to be. "What say?"
Mr. Sigsbee interposed, staring hard at the little man. "Haven't you been notified of—Oh, I say, you have at least seen the morning papers?"
"Have they printed anything about me?" gasped Mr. Bingle, sitting down very suddenly. "It's a lie, gentlemen—a lie, I tell you! I haven't done a thing—"
"Do you mean to say—" began Mr. Force, glaring at the shivering little man.
"I'll bring an action against 'em," shouted Mr. Bingle from the depths of the huge chair. "I'll sue 'em for all they're worth if they've—"
"Haven't you seen the newspapers?" demanded Mr. Sigsbee, bending over the occupant of the chair in what that individual mistook for a menacing attitude.
"I—I didn't have time to look at the paper," mumbled Mr. Bingle. "My wife was so miserable that—"
"Well, by Jove!" exclaimed Mr. Force, and then, to Bingle's astonishment, the five other occupants of the room were overtaken by a simultaneous impulse to shout at the top of their voices, all of them crowding close about him and barking unintelligible exclamations into his very teeth, so to speak.
The strangest part of it all was that they were in high good humour and laughed like maniacs. He hadn't the faintest notion what it was all about, but he began to laugh shrilly. He couldn't help it. He certainly didn't feel like laughing. The president was slapping Mr. Force on the back and shouting things that fell upon deaf ears, for Mr. Force was shouting manfully on his own account. The cashier stumbled over a chair in trying to get at Mr. Bingle to grasp his hand, and the chairman of the board began pounding the helpless bookkeeper on the shoulder with a hand that had all of the weight and some of the resilience of a sledge hammer.
It was Mr. Sigsbee who finally settled down to a succinct, intelligent question, and at once had Mr. Bingle's attention.
"Didn't you receive my letter in the morning post?" he demanded.
Mr. Bingle no doubt intended to repeat the word "letter," being vaguely impressed by its significance, but what he uttered was a mystified, syllable-less "le'r?"
"I wrote to say that if it suited your convenience to come to our offices this afternoon at three, I would see to it that the other heirs were present, Mr. Bingle."
"My wife's illness—" began Mr. Bingle hazily, and then brought himself up with a jerk. Heirs? What in the world was the man talking about? "I—I beg pardon, sir. I didn't quite catch that. What—"
Mr. Sigsbee held up his hand, silencing him. Then he turned to the other gentlemen and said in a strained, excited voice:
"I suspect, gentlemen, that it would be better if I were to have a few minutes alone with Mr. Bingle."
"Right!" exclaimed Mr. Force, regarding the bookkeeper with what seemed to be infinite compassion in his eyes. "Stay right where you are, Sigsbee. We'll get out," and he literally shoved the others out of the office, closing the president's door behind him.
"Now, Mr. Bingle," said Sigsbee, drawing a chair up close to the little man's knee, "I want the truth. Have you no—"
"Before heaven, Mr. Sigsbee, I—I swear I am innocent of—"
"Have you no inkling of what has befallen you?" concluded the other.
"No, sir, I haven't," declared Mr. Bingle with conviction.
"Well, my dear sir," said Sigsbee, laying his hand upon Bingle's knee and speaking with grave impressiveness, "your late and lamented uncle, Joseph Hooper, in his will, devises that you are his principal—I might almost say, his sole heir. He has left practically everything to you, sir. I—I pray you, be calm. Do not allow this astonishing, this prodigious—"
"Oh," exclaimed Mr. Bingle, with a huge sigh of relief and a sudden relaxing of all his taut nerves, "I know all about THAT, Mr. Sigsbee. Is that all?"
"All?" with a stare of amazement.
"We often joked about it, poor old Uncle Joe and I. He seemed to enjoy a chuckle once in awhile, in spite of the way the world had used him."
"I now realise that you are quite ignorant about the whole matter, Mr. Bingle. My letter would have enlightened you, of course, but as you did not receive it, I fear that—"
"I didn't open my letters this morning. Quite forgot 'em, sir. You see, Mrs. Bingle came down with a fearful—"
"Yes, yes," interrupted Mr. Sigsbee. "Perhaps it would be well for me to describe myself a little more clearly to you, Mr. Bingle. I am of the firm of Bradlee, Sigsbee & Oppenheim, lawyers. We have been acting for Mr. Hooper for the past six months, or, in other words, since his return to New York City. Our relations were or a—er—a somewhat Secret nature, I may say. He made the somewhat Extraordinary demand upon us, at the time we were Retained, that we should conduct his affairs with the Utmost secrecy. Especially, ser, were we required to Keep you in the dark as to the real—"
"Just a moment, sir," interrupted Mr. Bingle, sitting up very straight, and staring. "May I ask one questions? Are you sure you haven't got my Uncle Joe confused with another Joseph Hooper? To my certain knowledge, he had no transactions with lawyers while staying at my house. You've got the wrong man, sir, I—" "I've got the right man, Mr. Bingle," said the lawyer, with a smile. "Your uncle was a strange man. Have you never heard of Joseph H. Grimwell?"
"Certainly. Every one has heard of him."
"Well, your uncle was Joseph H. Grimwell, the millionaire mine-owner and lumber king. For fifteen years the name of Joseph Grimwell took the place of—I beg your pardon! I did not mean to put it so abruptly, sir. Calm yourself! I—"
"All right," said Mr. Bingle, suddenly collapsing into the chair after struggling to his feet, his eyes bulging. "All right. I'm—I'm calm. Go on with the story. You can't expect me to believe it, however. How on earth could poor old Uncle Joe Hooper, who was actually starving when he came to me last—"
"That is the best part of the story, Mr. Bingle," said Sigsbee, settling back in his chair and linking his plump hands benevolently across his expansive and somewhat overhanging waistcoat. "That is the best part of the story, sir."