Arthur Train

“ Tutt carefully ignited the attenuated stogy which he had excavated from its stratified brethren.
“A lawyer has to be faithful to his retainer—even if sometimes he doesn’t get it,” he announced, exhaling a poisonous cloud of greenish-gray smoke. “It is the duty of the attorney to be loyal to the interests of the person who employs him and to carry out his wishes to the best of his ability, just as it is the duty of the client to compensate him for his services. ”

“ Tutt shook his head.
“She’s not our client.”
“Who is, then?”
“Her husband.”
“It’s all the same thing,” affirmed the lesser Tutt. “You can soak her a thousand or fifteen hundred just for drawing a codicil like that! And think of the fight we’ll have on our hands when the old boy dies! Makes no difference to us which way the cat jumps. If she gets him to execute your codicil we’ll have to defend it against the heirs on the ground of mental incapacity; and if he won’t execute it she’ll have us attacking all his prior wills in her behalf on the same ground. Coming and going! ”

“ Mr. Tutt did not invite her to sit down. Coldly he replied: “Mrs. Baldwin, I cannot undertake any business for you.”
“What’s the matter?” she demanded acidly. “Isn’t my money as good as anybody else’s?”
He shook his shaggy head.
“No,” he returned shortly, “it isn’t. A lawyer has some choice in the matter of clients, and I want no business of yours.”
“That’s pretty good!” she cried, flushing. “You were ready enough to act as my attorney the last time I called on you and asked you to draw the codicil. What’s the matter? Are you scared of anything? ”

“ Philbrick, in his capacity of chief of staff, in an ingratiating voice, “this is the contested probate of the codicil to the last will and testament, offered coincidently, of the late Cabel Baldwin, a distinguished resident of this city, under which he gives a large percentage of his property to various public institutions, of which I represent one.”
“Who appears in opposition?” inquired the surrogate over his spectacles. “I may as well get this straight from the beginning. There are so many of you!” ”

“ You’re scared they’ll show Cabel had senile dementia or something—wasn’t legally fit to make a codicil. Well, you might as well stick! Be as well hung for a sheep as a lamb. It would look fine, wouldn’t it, for Ephraim Tutt to admit in court that he allowed a senile old man to execute a codicil when he didn’t know what he was doing? Why, it would ruin you forever! All right, coward! There are plenty of lawyers who’ve got courage as well as brains. Some day when I’ve got millions in the bank you’ll wish you had your share! ”

“ From being a handsome, vigorous, upstanding old gentleman he had shrivelled away into a bent, tottering, querulous invalid afraid of his own shadow; at times, when they were alone, responding to her caresses with something of his former affection, but in general furtive, suspicious, cowering before this strange, ugly woman who had in some sinister way secured mastery over him—fearful in her presence to call his soul his own. There seemed to be something hypnotic about the ex-nurse’s influence, for the mere sound of her voice was enough to set his shrunken old limbs trembling. ”

“ Many a testator provides his legatees with a doughty legal champion by leaving a fat legacy to some eleemosynary institution which will lose it if the will is denied probate. But in this instance, it is true, there were other indications that Mrs. Baldwin was engaged in feathering her nest in an expert manner and safely anchoring said nest against the assaults of outraged heirs and next of kin.
Now, Mr. Tutt practised law largely for the fun of it, for he really didn’t need the money, and he scented in the visit of Mrs. Alfreda Baldwin a plot almost as exciting as a detective story. ”

“ He could be a raving maniac and there’d be nobody to prove it. No doctor—that is, no ‘bug doctor’—is going to admit that any patient of his can have senile dementia who has sense enough to leave him fifteen thousand dollars! We ought to take Alfreda into partnership!”
“But you haven’t covered it all yet!” said Mr. Tutt. “I’ll wager that if we looked into it we’d find she’s not only given herself a quarter of a million and the residuary, but in order to prevent any possible slip-up she’s salted a quarter million around where she can get hold of it afterward if she misses out on her own legacy. ”

“ Tutt took a turn up and down his office, then he amputated another stogy, lit the remains, leaned back in his swivel chair, crossed his congress boots upon his desk and folded his hands behind his head.
“Simply because that’s the artistic way to do it,” said he. “Don’t you remember the Blodgett case? Blodgett was ninety-one and dead at the top; he’d had senile dementia for fifteen years. A woman got hold of him—only that time it was a young one—and induced him to make a will in her favor. ”

“ Baldwin, I drew the will which you have just admitted to probate and in which, as you have observed, after a provision for his widow in lieu of dower, he left all his property to his only daughter, my present client. She is here. Please stand up, Mrs. Holborn.”
There was a rustle to the right on the lower seat of the jury box as Lydia arose, pale as a ghost in her black dress. With her stood up a tall young man, as if to protect her from the stares of the spectators. The woman in the witness chair shot in their direction a single venomous shaft.
“Thank you,” went on Mr. Tutt. “That will do. ”

“ He believes in being liberal with servants.”
“So I see!” observed Mr. Tutt. “And with the medical profession as well!”
“Oh. he’s very fond of both Doctor Woodman and Doctor Aspinall!” she assured him. “They have been lifelong friends!”
“Anything more?”
“Only his legacy to me—two hundred and fifty thousand—and, of course, I’m also to be the residuary legatee,” said Mrs. Baldwin, folding up her notes. “You’ll continue as executor. How soon can you have the codicil ready?” ”

“ Philbrick pompously, “they—the realty is more than sufficient to pay them all; and under the principles governing equitable conversion——”
“Oh, no!” contradicted the surrogate briskly. “Even if the codicil is probated it will not affect the real estate devised to the daughter under the will.” ”

“ She has a husband living—a railroad brakeman from whom she has never been legally divorced. I have here affidavits showing that he was never served in the divorce proceedings brought by her and upon which she must rely to establish the validity of her subsequent marriages. I say ‘marriages,’ for this is not her only matrimonial experience. She was wedded to two others of her patients who subsequently died; and, I may add, she inherited property from both.”
The ex-nurse had half started from her seat. Mr. Philbrick had turned a bright pink. ”

“ Baldwin, “if you are all ready we’ll go up-stairs.” She lowered her voice to a whisper, so that Lydia, who had gone into the drawing-room, might not hear. “Have you got the codicil all ready?”
Mr. Tutt nodded and followed her up to the next landing. The woman turned the knob of the door nearest the head of the stairs and pushed it open with a suggestion of stealth. Certain people cannot move without giving the impression of trying to stalk some prey. Usually it is a man trying to stalk a woman. This time it was a woman trying to stalk a man. ”

“ Tutt. “Now all his property—both real and personal—with the exception of a comparatively trifling sum in a Fifth Avenue bank where he kept a checking account—is situated in Massachusetts, the place of his domicile. And his estate consists almost entirely of various parcels of land and office buildings in Fall River, which he specifically bequeathed to his daughter, Lydia, in the will drawn by me, which has three witnesses as required by Massachusetts law. The schedules, which I have prepared, show that his personal estate amounts to less than fifteen thousand dollars.” ”

“ We have no desire at the present writing to enter into a general defense of the conduct of our brethren of the bar, but merely take occasion to point out that in many instances the lawyer is really no more deserving of censure than the layman the product of whose skill is subsequently used by another for an unlawful or immoral purpose. ”

“ There is nothing under the sun that cannot be made subject to the devil’s ingenuity. We have even heard of two murders committed within a single month by means of oyster shells. Yet, shall we be forbidden oysters? ”

“ The surrogate turned to the last page of the codicil, which lay on the desk before him.
“There seem to be two witnesses,” he remarked, “—all the law requires.”
“But one of them is the lady beside you, who under this codicil is made chief beneficiary and sole residuary legatee. As an interested party she cannot qualify—unless, to be sure, she is prepared to waive her legacy, which amounts to a quarter of a million dollars, besides the residue amounting to over a million,” declared Mr. ”

“ Simultaneously the company of the elect before him arose and with military precision presented arms. So did several other rows immediately behind them; a cohort of office boys, clerks, assistants, and junior counsel, carrying bags, books, parcels, and bundles of papers, closed in behind in a compact body.
“Er—if Your Honor please!” began Mr. ”