FORTY MINUTES LATE
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."