The earnest young man behind the counter in the office of Cabot,
Bancroft and Cabot--the young man who had so definitely classified
Galusha Bangs as a “nut”--was extremely surprised when that individual
reappeared before his window and, producing the very check which he had
obtained there so short a time before, politely requested to exchange
it for eighty-two hundred dollars in cash and another check for the
balance.
“Why--why--but--!” exclaimed the young man.
“Thank you. Yes, if--ah--if you will be so good,” said Galusha.
The young man himself asked questions, and then called Mr. Minor into
consultation, and Mr. Minor asked more. The answers they received were
not illuminating, but in the end the transaction was made as requested.
“But, Bangs,” said Minor, laughing, “what I can't understand is why you
want to bother with the check for eleven hundred and odd--whatever it
is. Why not take the whole amount in cash and be done with it?”
Galusha shook his head. “I prefer it the--ah--other way. If you don't
mind,” he added, politely.
“Oh, we don't mind. But--well, it seems rather funny, that's all. Ha,
ha!”
“Does it? Yes, I--ah--dare say it does.”
“Ha, ha! Yes, rather. Of course, it is your business, you know, but--”
He laughed again. The harassed Galusha waited until the laugh was over.
Then he said, gently, “Yes, I was under that impression.”
“Eh? What impression?”
“That it was, as you say, my--ah--business.”
“Yes. Why... Eh? Oh!... Humph!... Why, yes, surely, certainly. Here,”
turning briskly to the clerk, “give Mr. Bangs what he wishes at once.”
He walked away, pulling thoughtfully at his mustache. Galusha, rubbing
his chin, looked gravely after him. The clerk began making out the
check. This done and the check entrusted to a messenger to be taken to
the private office for signing, the next business was the counting of
the money.
“Eighty-two hundred, you said?” asked the clerk.
“Eighty-two hundred--ah--yes,” said Galusha.
Eight thousand was, of course, the price at par of Jethro Hallett's
four hundred shares of Wellmouth Development stock. The additional two
hundred was a premium paid, so to speak, to the departed spirit of the
late Mrs. Jethro Hallett. She, by or through the Chinese control of Miss
Marietta Hoag, had notified her husband that he was destined to sell his
Development shares at a profit, a small profit perhaps, but a profit,
nevertheless.
So, when at that point of their conversation in the lantern room of the
Gould's Bluffs light, Galusha, recognizing his helpless position and the
alternative of buying the Hallett holdings or being exposed to Cousin
Gussie as a sentimental and idiotic spendthrift and to Martha Phipps as
a liar and criminal--when Galusha, facing this alternative, stammered a
willingness to go to Boston and see if he could not dispose of Jethro's
stock as he had Martha's, the captain added an additional clause.
“I won't sell for par,” he declared stubbornly. “Julia revealed to me
that I wouldn't, and so I sha'n't. I'll sell for fifty cents a share
extry, but I won't sell for twenty flat. Rather than do that I'll go
to them Cabot folks myself and see if I can't find out who's buyin' and
why. Then I'll go to the real buyers and make the best trade I can with
them. If they really want to get hold of that stock, fifty cents a share
won't stand in their way, I'll bet you.”
It did not stand in Galusha's way, either. In his desperate position he
would have paid any amount obtainable rather than have the light keeper
go to Boston on such an errand.
Leaving the clerk's window with his pocket bulging with bank notes, Mr.
Bangs proceeded sadly, but with determination, to the private office
of Mr. Barbour, his cousin's “second secretary.” There, producing from
another pocket a huge envelope, portentously daubed and sealed with red
wax, he handed it to Barbour. It contained the two stock certificates,
each signed in blank, Martha's for two hundred and fifty shares, Captain
Jethro's for four hundred. The envelope and the wax he had procured at a
stationer's near the South Station. The obliging salesman had permitted
him to do the sealing on the premises.
“Mr. Barbour,” he faltered, “I should like to leave this with you,
if--if quite convenient, that is to say.”
Barbour turned the big envelope over.
“Yes, Mr. Bangs, surely,” he said, but he looked puzzled. “What is it?”
Galusha blushed and stammered. “Why--why--” he began; “I--ah--you
see--it is--ah--something of mine.”
“Something you wish me to take care of?” asked Barbour, still looking at
the envelope.
His caller grasped at the straw.
“Yes--yes, that is it,” he said, eagerly. “Dear me, yes. If you will be
so kind.”
“Yes, indeed, Mr. Bangs. No trouble at all. I'll put it--”
But the little man stopped the sentence in the middle.
“If--if you please,” he protested. “Ah--please don't. I don't wish to
know where you put it. Really, I don't, not in the least. I very much
prefer not to know where it is.... Ah--good-day, Mr. Barbour. Thank you
very much.”
The general opinion in the office of Cabot, Bancroft and Cabot
concerning the senior partner's queer cousin was strengthened by this
visit. The surmise that Galusha Bangs was a “nut” became a conviction.
But, for the “nut” himself, life during the coming weeks and months
became a much less worrisome struggle. Returning to East Wellmouth,
for the second time laden with legal tender, he delivered his burden to
Captain Jethro, who, in return, promised faithfully never to reveal a
word concerning the sale of his Development stock or drop a hint which
might help to locate its purchasers.
“Course I won't say nothin',” vowed the captain. “I realize that
business men don't want their business talked about. And if them Cabot,
Bancroft and Cabot folks are tryin' to buy in the stock, whether it's
for themselves or somebody else, they'll want it kept dark. No, I ain't
told a soul on this earth and I WON'T tell one. That is satisfactory,
ain't it?”
The shadow of a smile passed across Galusha's face. “Quite, quite,” he
replied. “Nothing could be more so unless--”
“Well, unless what?”
“Oh, nothing, nothing. Thank you--ah--thank you very much.”
It had occurred to him that, considering the light keeper's
peculiarities, the promise not to tell a soul on earth might be
stretched to include those elsewhere; but he kept the thought to
himself. Captain Jethro did not press his question. The shrewd
old captain was so thoroughly delighted at having sold, and at the
prophesied profit, his troublesome holdings in the Wellmouth Development
Company, that his mood was neither combative nor inquisitive.
Galusha did not tell Miss Phipps of his business deal with the light
keeper. In the first place, his telling her would involve more deception
and, also, might lead to more possibilities of discovery. The average,
well-meaning person, having been driven by relentless fate to the
committing of murder, could scarcely have felt more conscience-stricken
and depraved than did little Galusha Bangs at having lied to Martha
Phipps. Of course, the lies and deceit had resulted in a distinct
benefit to her and had been perpetrated solely with that idea, but this
fact he ignored entirely. And no murderer could have been more anxious
to hide his guilty secret than was he. So, for the first few days
after his return with the light keeper's money, he was inclined to be
thoughtful and nervous, to fall into troubled trances at table or in
the middle of a conversation, and to start rather violently when aroused
from those trances. Primmie was disposed to attribute these lapses to
disease. She confided her fears to her employer.
“You know what I think 'tis makes him act so, Miss Martha?” she asked,
on one occasion.
“Makes who act how?”
“Makes Mr. Bangs set there and go moonin' off and not pay no attention
and then jump when you wake him up as if you'd stuck a pin in him. You
know what I think 'tis? I think maybe it's dropsy.”
“WHAT?”
“Um-hm. I had a great-aunt once; had a slew of 'em, fur's that goes,
'cause my grandmother on the starboard side--”
“WHAT side?”
“Eh! Oh, that's what pa used to call his side of the family, the
starboard side. All ma's folks was port side, 'cordin' to his tell.
He'd worked aboard vessels, pa had; that is, as much as he ever worked
anywheres. Well, anyhow, his grandmother she had eight sisters and three
brothers, so I had great-aunts thicker'n miskeeters in a swamp hole--my
savin' soul, yes! Well, anyhow, one of 'em, Aunt Lucifer 'twas--”
“PRIMMIE! WHAT was her name?”
“Lucifer. Ma and us children always called her Aunt Lucy, though; she
liked it better.”
“Heavens and earth! I should think she might. WHAT possessed anybody to
name a child Lucifer? And a girl-child at that!”
“Does sound kind of funny, don't it? Folks 'most always used to laugh
when they heard what her name was. That is, fust along they did; but
they never laughed but once when she was around. Talk about makin'
anybody mad! And temper--my Lord of Isrul! Why, if they laughed at
her name she was li'ble to grab hold of the fust thing come to hand,
flatiron or frying pan or chunk of stove wood or anything, and let 'em
have it rattlety-bang-jing. _I_ never seen her do it, of course--all
that was afore MY time--but pa used to say it never made no difference
whether 'twas the man come tryin' to collect the store bill or the
minister or anybody, she'd up and flatten him just the same. Course pa
said 'twas a whole lot more li'ble to be the bill man than the minister
'cause there was precious few ministers ever--”
“There, there, Primmie! I can't stop to listen any longer, I'm busy. But
do tell me why they named the poor thing Lucifer? How did they ever hear
the name, anyway; way over in those Mashpaug woods?”
“Oh, there was a story about that, kind of a pretty story 'twas,
too. 'Cordin' to pa's tell, the fust time Aunt Lucy's ma--my great
grandmother, and the land knows what HER name was, _I_ don't--the fust
time she went out after the baby was born she went to camp meetin'. And
one of the ministers there he talked some consider'ble about a critter
name of Lucifer that was a fallen-down angel, whatever that is. Well, my
great-grandmother she didn't understand much about what he was talkin'
about--I cal'late none of 'em did fur's that goes, and no wonder--but
the name of Lucifer sort of stuck in her head 'cause she thought 'twas
kind of pretty. And when she got back home they told her the baby had
fetched loose from the bed where it had been asleep and fell onto the
floor and pretty nigh busted itself in two. And it never hardly cried
at all--was a reg'lar angel they said--and that made her think about the
fallen-down angel she'd just heard tell of to camp meetin' and its name
was Lucifer. And they hadn't named the baby yet, so--”
“I see. Ha, ha! Primmie, you are--well, there aren't many like you, I'm
sure. Now I must go. Well, what is it?”
“Oh, nothin', only I ain't told you why I think Mr. Bangs may be comin'
down with dropsy. You see, Aunt Lucy--this Lucifer one I've been tellin'
you about--she had it. I only remember her 'long towards her last. She
wan't heavin' any teakittles at folks then; my savin' soul, no! She used
to set in a big rockin'-chair over by the stove and was all puffed-up
like--like a featherbed, you might say; and she'd kind of doze along and
doze along and you could holler your head off and she wouldn't pay no
attention, and then she'd kind of wake up, as you might say, and sing
out, 'Hey? What say?' just like Mr. Bangs, for all the world. And 'twas
dropsy she had, so now you see, don't you, Miss Martha?”
“Yes, yes, Primmie, I see. Tut, tut, tut! You certainly have a great
imagination, of its kind. I shouldn't worry about Mr. Bangs' disease, if
I were you. The poor man isn't really strong yet and he has been runnin'
back and forth to Boston lately altogether too much for his own good. He
is tired and his nerves are tired, too; so we must make it as easy as we
can for him, Primmie, you and I.”
“Yes'm. He's a good man, ain't he?”
“Indeed he is!”
“Yes'm. Even if he is so kind of--of funny.”
Often, in earlier conversations with her housemaid, Miss Phipps had
agreed that her lodger was, to say the least, “funny”; but now she
seemed to resent the word.
“Humph!” she observed, crisply, “if he is, I presume likely he has the
right to be. And I know this, if there were more 'funny' people like
him in this world it would be a big improvement. Primmie, go and do your
sweepin'.”