THE MARRIAGE CERTIFICATE
One day after Phrony was removed, Keith was sitting in the office he had
taken in New York, working on the final papers which were to be
exchanged when his deal should be completed, when there was a tap at the
door. A knock at the door is almost as individual as a voice. There was
something about this knock that awakened associations in Keith's mind.
It was not a woman's tap, yet Terpy and Phrony Tripper both sprang into
Keith's mind.
Almost at the same moment the door opened slowly, and pausing on the
threshold stood J. Quincy Plume. But how changed from the Mr. Plume of
yore, the jovial and jocund manager of the Gumbolt _Whistle_, or the
florid and flowery editor of the New Leeds _Clarion_!
The apparition in the door was a shabby representation of what J. Quincy
Plume had been in his palmy days. He bore the last marks of extreme
dissipation; his eyes were dull, his face bloated, and his hair thin and
long. His clothes looked as if they had served him by night as well as
by day for a long time. His shoes were broken, and his hat, once the
emblem of his station and high spirits, was battered and rusty.
"How are you, Mr. Keith?" he began boldly enough. But his assumption of
something of his old air of bravado died out under Keith's icy and
steady gaze, and he stepped only inside of the room, and, taking off his
hat, waited uneasily.
"What do you want of me?" demanded Keith, leaning back in his chair and
looking at him coldly.
"Well, I thought I would like to have a little talk with you about a
matter--"
Keith, without taking his eyes from his face, shook his head slowly.
"About a friend of yours," continued Plume.
Again Keith shook his head very slowly.
"I have a little information that might be of use to you--that you'd
like to have."
"I don't want it."
"You would if you knew what it was."
"No."
"Yes, you would. It's about Squire Rawson's granddaughter--about her
marriage to that man Wickersham."
"How much do you want for it?" demanded Keith.
Plume advanced slowly into the room and looked at a chair.
"Don't sit down. How much do you want for it?" repeated Keith.
"Well, you are a rich man now, and--"
"I thought so." Keith rose. "However rich I am, I will not pay you a
cent." He motioned Plume to the door.
"Oh, well, if that's the way you take it!" Plume drew himself up and
stalked to the door. Keith reseated himself and again took up his pen.
At the door Plume turned and saw that Keith had put him out of his mind
and was at work again.
"Yes, Keith, if you knew what information I have--"
Keith sat up suddenly.
"Go out of here!"
"If you'd only listen--"
Keith stood up, with a sudden flame in his eyes.
"Go on, I say. If you do not, I will put you out. It is as much as I can
do to keep my hands off you. You could not say a word that I would
believe on any subject."
"I will swear to this."
"Your oath would add nothing to it."
Plume waited, and after a moment's reflection began in a different key.
"Mr. Keith, I did not come here to sell you anything--"
"Yes, you did."
"No, I did not. I did not come--only for that. If I could have sold it,
I don't say I wouldn't, for I need money--the Lord knows how much I need
it! I have not a cent in the world to buy me a mouthful to eat--or
drink. I came to tell you something that only _I_ know--"
"I have told you that I would not believe you on oath," began Keith,
impatiently.
"But you will, for it is true; and I tell it not out of love for you
(though I never disliked--I always liked you--would have liked you if
you'd have let me), but out of hate for that--. That man has treated me
shamefully--worse than a yellow dog! I've done for that man what I
wouldn't have done for my brother. You know what I've done for him, Mr.
Keith, and now when he's got no further use for me, he kicks me out into
the street and threatens to give me to the police if I come to
him again."
Keith's expression changed. There was no doubt now that for once Quincy
Plume was sincere. The hate in his bleared eyes and bloated face was
unfeigned.
"Give me to the police! I'll give him to the police!" he broke out in a
sudden flame at Keith's glance of inspection. "He thinks he has been
very smart in taking from me all the papers. He thinks no one will
believe me on my mere word, but I've got a paper he don't know of."
His hand went to the breast of his threadbare coat with an angry clutch.
"I've got the marriage lines of his wife."
One word caught Keith, and his interest awoke.
"What wife?" he asked as indifferently as he could.
"His wife,--his lawful wife,--Squire Rawson's granddaughter, Phrony
Tripper. I was at the weddin'--I was a witness. He thought he could get
out of it, and he was half drunk; but he married her."
"Where? When? You were present?"
"Yes. They were married by a preacher named Rimmon, and he gave me her
certificate, and I swore to her I had lost it: _he_ got me to do it--the
scoundrel! He wanted me to give it to him; but I swore to him I had lost
it, too. I thought it would be of use some of these days." A gleam of
the old craftiness shone in his eyes.
Keith gazed at the man in amazement. His unblushing effrontery staggered
him.
"Would you mind letting me see that certificate?"
Plume hesitated and licked his ups like a dog held back from a bone.
Keith noted it.
"I do not want you to think that I will give you any money for it, for I
will not," he added quietly, his gray eyes on him.
For a moment Plume was so taken aback that his face became a blank.
Then, whether it was that the very frankness of the speech struck home
to him or that he wished to secure a fragment of esteem from Keith, he
recovered himself.
"I don't expect any money for it, Mr. Keith. I don't want any money for
it. I will not only show you this paper, I will give it to you."
"It is not yours to give," said Keith. "It belongs to Mrs. Wickersham. I
will see that she gets it if you deliver it to me."
"That's so," ejaculated Plume, as if the thought had never occurred to
him before. "I want her to have it, but you'd better keep it for her.
That man will get it away from her. You don't know him as I do. You
don't know what he'd do on a pinch. I tell you he is a gambler for life.
I have seen him sit at the board and stake sums that would have made me
rich for life. Besides," he added, as if he needed some other reason for
giving it up, "I am afraid if he knew I had it he'd get it from me in
some way."
He walked forward and handed the paper to Keith, who saw at a glance
that it was what Plume had declared it to be: a marriage certificate,
dirty and worn, but still with signatures that appeared to be genuine.
Keith's eyes flashed with satisfaction as he read the name of the Rev.
William H. Rimmon and Plume's name, evidently written with the same ink
at the same time.
"Now," said Keith, looking up from the paper, "I will see that Mrs.
Wickersham's family is put in possession of this paper."
"Couldn't you lend me a small sum, Mr. Keith," asked Plume, wheedlingly,
"just for old times' sake? I know I have done you wrong and given you
good cause to hate me, but it wasn't my fault, an' I've done you a favor
to-day, anyhow."
Keith looked at him for a second, and put his hand in his pocket.
"I'll pay you back, as sure as I live--" began Plume, cajolingly.
"No, you will not," said Keith, sharply. "You could not if you would,
and would not if you could, and I would not lend you a cent or have a
business transaction with you for all the money in New York. I will give
you this--for the person you have most injured in life. Now, don't thank
me for it, but go."
Plume took, with glistening eyes and profuse thanks, the bills that were
handed out to him, and shambled out of the room.
That night Keith, having shown the signatures to a good expert, who
pronounced them genuine, telegraphed Dr. Balsam to notify Squire Rawson
that he had the proof of Phrony's marriage. The Doctor went over to see
the old squire. He mentioned the matter casually, for he knew his man.
But as well as he knew him, he found himself mistaken in him.
"I know that," he said quietly, "but what I want is to find Phrony." His
deep eyes glowed for a while and suddenly flamed. "I'm a rich man," he
broke out, "but I'd give every dollar I ever owned to get her back, and
to get my hand once on that man."
The deep fire glowed for a while and then grew dull again, and the old
man sank back into his former grim silence.
The Doctor looked at him commiseratingly. Keith had written him fully of
Phrony and her condition, and he had decided to say nothing to the old
grandfather.