don’t want to do anything to thwart father’s wishes,” she said, “but I don’t think he would have approved of Mr. Gobbet, and I’m sure he wouldn’t have wished me to go to the almshouse. I’m not so very old yet and I’m really quite strong. Couldn’t the corporation keep the property, turn it into a real old ladies’ home, just as he intended, and let me run it as resident manager? Of course, I should want to make a clean sweep of everyone that’s here now—all except Mrs. Liscomb. I’d like her to stay. She’s really a dear old thing.”
Mr. Hepplewhite blew his nose. Then he put his handkerchief carefully back in his pocket, walked over to Grandma Benton, bowed and raised her wrinkled hand to his lips.
“May I be permitted to say the same of you?” he asked.
One evening a month later, Grandma Benton stood with Mr. Tutt on the terrace, watching the electric signs as they flashed on and off, making paths of red and yellow across the blue-black river; behind them rose the glittering escarpments of the city, dominated by the spire of the Chrysler Building; a steamer bedecked with lights swam gleaming beneath the festoons of the Queensborough Bridge.
The old lady was very happy. Mr. Tutt had arranged that part of the property should be sold and a trust fund created for her benefit; Mr. and Mrs. Gobbet, their daughters and the two secretaries had moved out, bag and baggage, several weeks before; the entire former executive staff had been dismissed, including Mr. Carson and the investigators, four of whom were discovered to be related by marriage to the former superintendent; an additional wing to accommodate fifty inmates was already in contemplation at Coverdale, which Mr. Hepplewhite now visited so frequently that his collection of porcelains was almost neglected; and Grandma Benton herself had been duly installed as matron of the new Wadsworth Home, with old Mrs. Liscomb as her assistant, and Leila and Richard to keep her company.
It was dark before Grandma Benton had shown Mr. Tutt all the favorite spots of her childhood, the greenhouses and the stable with its dovecotes, from whose eaves came drowsy cooings. Then the moon thrust itself in a golden haze above the roofs on the opposite shore and drowned the lawn in a fairy mist. It might, she thought, have been that night fifty years ago, the very night that Lawrence had taken her in his arms, and told her that he loved her. As they rounded the corner of the house, Leila and Richard were standing together under the cedar of Lebanon.
“When are they going to be married?” asked Mr. Tutt.
“Next week,” said Grandma. “They’re young and can’t afford to wait.”
Tit, Tat, Tutt
Mr. Ephraim Tutt, on his annual fishing trip to the Mohawk Valley, dropped off the train at Pottsville one early May morning to find the station deserted.
“What’s happened to this town?” he demanded of the station agent. “Where’s the taxi man?”
“Up to the courthouse with all the rest of the folks. Want me to help ye?”
“No, thanks,” answered the old lawyer. “I guess I can manage to toddle as far as the Phœnix Hotel.”
So Mr. Tutt, with an ancient leather rod case under each arm, and carrying a valise in either hand, staggered across the village square. Although only half after nine o’clock, the crowd milling around the Brick Block resembled that on Fair Day. As he reached the courthouse, a motor drew to the curb beside him and a young woman, accompanied by a decrepit old man, got out. Though Mr. Tutt knew most of the local inhabitants, he did not recognize her—one of those new summer people, he decided, from Rochester or Utica, probably. Certainly she was unusual both in looks and distinction. Mr. Tutt liked dark girls, especially trim girls with black curly mops and eager eyes, like this one. A girl of spirit, evidently, and in any event, whether native or imported, an acquisition to Pottsville.
Arriving exhausted at the Phœnix Hotel, where he was affectionately greeted by Ma Best, he sensed at once that the old lady had something on her mind.
“What’s happened?” he inquired, dumping his paraphernalia on the rickety piazza. “Has anyone dynamited the bank? Or has Squire Mason been up to his old tricks?”
“I’ll say he has!” she fumed. “Wait till you’ve swallered your vittles, an’ I’ll give you an earful about him.”
Mr. Tutt, who was hungry, followed her into the little dining room and obediently “swallowed his vittles,” as ordered.
“Now,” he said, lighting a stogie, “unfold your harrowing tale.”
Ma seated herself in the chair at the end of the table. “Remember Judge Gamage?”
“Sure! Married the late Mrs. Tarleton, didn’t he? I thought he was Pottsville’s leading citizen.”
“Leading scalawag! You knew her daughter by her first husband, Dorothy Tarleton? ... No? Well, I guess she always was away at boarding school when you were here. She’s just about the sweetest and prettiest girl in town. How she ever could abide that old potato bag for a stepfather, I never did see! Anyhow, she fell in love with Doctor Alan Kellogg, a young surgeon that moved here last summer. A fine fellow he was, and doin’ well too. Her mother was on her deathbed at the time, but when Dorothy and Alan told her they were engaged, it bucked her up considerable and she give ’em her blessing an’ said as how at last she could die in peace.”
“A pleasant romance,” nodded Mr. Tutt. “Where does Squire Mason bob up?”
“Right now! No sooner had Dorothy’s mother died and her will been probated than it appeared Squire Mason had pulled a more-than-ordinary fast one. Mrs. Gamage had signed her will when she first got ill, long before she knew that Dorothy and Alan were interested in each other. Mason had put it away in his strongbox and, naturally, she’d forgot all about it.”
“What was in it?” asked Mr. Tutt, with interest.
“That’s what I’m goin’ to tell you. It seems the Squire and Gamage had from the very start been tryin’ to wangle things so that she would leave the Judge all her property, but while she’d been willin’ to give Gamage her money, she wanted the homestead to go to Dorothy, because it had belonged to her father. Mason had done his best to persuade her out of it, but she wouldn’t budge. So the sly old fox pretended he thought she was quite right, but suggested that Dorothy—without her mother’s guidance—ought to be protected against makin’ an improper marriage. Said some rascally fortune hunter might marry her and get it! So he induced her—after he’d writ in the clause leavin’ the homestead to Dorothy—to let him put in another providin’ that, if she married before she was twenty-five without her stepfather’s consent, the property should go to him.”
“Well, what was the harm in that?”
“Harm!” snorted Ma, kicking the table leg in her wrath. “Why, not satisfied with gettin’ a lot of money for nuthin’, and in spite of his knowin’ that his dead wife had approved of Dorothy’s marryin’ Doctor Kellogg, that old rascal, Gamage, refused to give his consent. He was her guardian under the will, with full charge of her property, and he wouldn’t even let Alan come into the house. So there was nuthin’ fer ’em to do but to run away.”
“And the girl, knowing the consequences, was satisfied to sacrifice her inheritance?”
“Sure!
