"Unfortunately," Andrews continued, "this insurance was only effected
about a fortnight before poor Archy's death, and the office refuses
payment, although, as I have told you, the lad was attended to the very
hour of his death by Dr. Parkinson, a highly-respectable, most
unexceptionable gentleman. Very much so indeed."
"I quite agree in that," I answered after a while. "Dr. Parkinson is a
highly-respectable and eminent man. What reason," I added, "do the
company assign for non-payment?"
"The very recent completion of the policy."
"Nonsense! How can that fact, standing alone, affect your claim?"
"I do not know," Andrews replied; and all this time I had not been able
to look fairly in his face; "but they do refuse; and I am anxious that
your firm should take the matter in hand, and sue them for the amount."
"I must first see Dr. Parkinson," I answered, "and convince myself that
there is no legitimate reason for repudiating the policy."
"Certainly, certainly," he replied.
"I will write to you to-morrow," I said, rising to terminate the
conference, "after I have seen Dr. Parkinson, and state whether we will
or not take proceedings against the insurance company on your behalf."
He thanked me, and hurried off.
Dr. Parkinson confirmed Mr. Jesse Andrews in every particular. He had
attended the boy, a fine, light-haired lad of eleven or twelve years of
age, from not long after his seizure till his death. He suffered
dreadfully, and died unmistakably of Asiatic cholera, and of nothing
else; of which same disease a servant and a female lodger in the same
house had died just previously. "It is of course," Dr. Parkinson remarked
in conclusion, "as unfortunate for the company as it is strangely lucky
for Andrews; but there is no valid reason for refusing payment."
Upon this representation we wrote the next day to the assurance people,
threatening proceedings on behalf of Mr. Jesse Andrews.
Early on the morrow one of the managing-directors called on us, to state
the reasons which induced the company to hesitate at recognizing the
plaintiff's claim. In addition to the doubts suggested by the brief time
which had elapsed from the date of the policy to the death of the child,
there were several other slight circumstances of corroborative suspicion.
The chief of these was, that a neighbor had declared he heard the father
indulging in obstreperous mirth in a room adjoining that in which the
corpse lay only about two hours after his son had expired. This unseemly,
scandalous hilarity of her husband, the wife appeared to faintly
remonstrate against. The directors had consequently resolved _non
obstante_ Dr. Parkinson's declaration, who might, they argued, have been
deceived, to have the body exhumed in order to a post-mortem examination
as to the true cause of death. If the parents voluntarily agreed to this
course, a judicial application to enforce it would be unnecessary, and
all doubts on the matter could be quietly set at rest. I thought the
proposal, under the circumstances, reasonable, and called on Mr. and Mrs.
Andrews to obtain their concurrence. Mrs. Andrews was, I found, absent
in the country, but her husband was at home; and he, on hearing the
proposal, was, I thought, a good deal startled--shocked rather--a natural
emotion perhaps.
"Who--who," he said, after a few moments' silent reflection--"who is to
conduct this painful, revolting inquiry?"
"Dr. Parkinson will be present, with Mr. Humphrey the surgeon, and Dr.
Curtis the newly-appointed physician to the assurance office, in place of
Dr. Morgan who died, as you are aware, a short time since of cholera."
"True. Ah, well, then," he answered almost with alacrity, "be it as they
wish. Dr. Parkinson will see fair-play."
The examination was effected, and the result was a confirmation, beyond
doubt or quibble, that death, as Dr. Parkinson had declared, had been
solely occasioned by cholera. The assurance company still hesitated; but
as this conduct could now only be looked upon as perverse obstinacy, we
served them with a writ at once. They gave in; and the money was handed
over to Mr. Jesse Andrews, whose joy at his sudden riches did not, I was
forced to admit, appear to be in the slightest degree damped by any
feeling of sadness for the loss of an only child.
We wrote to inform Mr. Archibald Andrews of these occurrences, and to
request further instructions with regard to the annuity hitherto paid to
his cousin. A considerable time would necessarily elapse before an
answer could be received, and in the meantime Mr. Jesse Andrews plunged
headlong into the speculation he had been long hankering to engage in,
and was as he informed me a few weeks afterwards, on the royal road to a
magnificent fortune.
Clouds soon gathered over this brilliant prospect. The partner, whose
persuasive tongue and brilliant imagination had induced Mr. Andrews to
join him with his four thousand pounds, proved to be an arrant cheat and
swindler; and Mr. Andrews's application to us for legal help and redress
was just too late to prevent the accomplished dealer in moonshine and
delusion from embarking at Liverpool for America, with every penny of the
partnership funds in his pockets!
A favorable reply from Mr. Archibald Andrews had now become a question of
vital importance to his cousin, who very impatiently awaited its arrival.
It came at last. Mr. Andrews had died rather suddenly at Bombay a short
time before my letter arrived there, after executing in triplicate a
will, of which one of the copies was forwarded to me. By this instrument
his property--about thirty-five thousand pounds, the greatest portion of
which had been remitted from time to time for investment in the British
funds--was disposed of as follows:--Five thousand pounds to his cousin
Jesse Andrews, for the purpose of educating and maintaining Archibald
Andrews, the testator's godson, till he should have attained the age of
twentyone, and the whole of the remaining thirty thousand pounds to be
then paid over to Archibald with accumulated interest. In the event,
however, of the death of his godson, the entire property was devised to
another more distant and wealthier cousin, Mr. Newton, and his son
Charles, on precisely similar conditions, with the exception that an
annuity of seventy pounds, payable to Jesse Andrews and his wife during
their lives, was charged upon it.
Two letters were dispatched the same evening--one to the fortunate
cousin, Mr. Newton, who lived within what was then known as the twopenny
post delivery, and another to Mr. Jesse Andrews, who had taken up his
temporary abode in a cottage near St. Alban's, Hertfordshire. These
missives informed both gentlemen of the arrival of the Indian mail, and
the, to them, important dispatches it contained.
Mr. Newton was early at the office on the following morning, and perused
the will with huge content. He was really quite sorry, though, for poor
Cousin Jesse: the loss of his son was a sad stroke, much worse than this
of a fortune which he might have expected to follow as a matter of
course. And the annuity, Mr. Newton thoughtfully observed, was, after
all, no contemptible provision for two persons, without family, and of
modest requirements.
A very different scene was enacted when, late in the evening, and just as
I was about to leave the office, Mr. Jesse Andrews rushed in, white as a
sheet, haggard, and wild with passion. "What devil's fables are these you
write me?" he, burst forth the instant he had gained the threshold of the
room. "How dare you," he went on, almost shrieking with fury--"how dare
you attempt to palm off these accursed lies on me? Archy rich--rich--and
I--. But it is a lie!--an infernal device got up to torture me--to
drive me wild, distracted--mad!" The excited man literally foamed with
rage, and so astonished was I, that it was a minute or two before I could
speak or move.
At last I rose, closed the door, (for the clerks in the outer office were
hearers and witnesses of this outbreak,) and led the way to an inner and
more private apartment. "Come with me, Mr. Andrews," I said, "and let us
talk this matter calmly over."
He mechanically followed, threw himself into a chair, and listened with
frenzied impatience to the reading of the will.
"A curse is upon me," he shouted, jumping up as I concluded, "the curse
of God--a judgment upon the crime I but the other day committed--a crime
as I thought--dolt, idiot that I was--so cunningly contrived, so cleverly
executed! Fool, villain, madman that I have been; for now, when fortune
is tendered for my acceptance, I dare not put forth my hand to grasp it;
fortune, too, not only for me, but--. O God, it will kill us both, Martha
as well as me, though I alone am to blame for this infernal chance!"
This outburst appeared to relieve him, and he sank back into his chair
somewhat calmer. I could understand nothing of all that rhapsody,
knowing, as I did, that his son Archibald had died from natural causes.
"It _is_ a severe blow," I said, in as soothing a tone as I could
assume--"a very great disappointment; still, you are secured from extreme
poverty--from anything like absolute want"--
"It is not that--it is not that!" he broke in, though not quite so wildly
as before. "Look you, Mr. Sharp, I will tell you all! There may be some
mode of extrication from this terrible predicament, and I must have your
advice professionally upon it."
"Go on; I will advise you to the best of my ability."
"Here it is, then: Archy, my son Archy, is alive!--alive! and well in
health as either you or I!"