Proof of the Pudding by Taylor Phoebe Atwood

Proof of the Pudding by Taylor Phoebe Atwood

Author:Taylor, Phoebe Atwood [Taylor, Phoebe Atwood]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Mystery
ISBN: 9780881501933
Google: gbchHAAACAAJ
Amazon: 0860150089
Goodreads: 1562697
Publisher: Detective Novels Magazine
Published: 1946-11-07T06:00:00+00:00


HE should have wasted his time and tired his brain thinking about flaws, Asey told himself! Flaws, indeed! The Tinsbury lawyers would be taking everything over and running it, all right, but apparently they would be running it for the sole benefit of the Steward family!

“But,” Elsie said, “suppose the lawyers ask us what we know?”

“My dear, they knew Ann. They knew King. And his whims. And hers. We don’t have to make any explanations for Ann, or for what Ann should have done, and didn’t. We will simply be dazed to discover that Ann made no new will, as she was sharply and repeatedly advised to, and that through a series of extraordinary situations and mischances and what not, the bulk of her estate—which now of course includes, King’s—reverts to us.”

“It really is extraordinary, isn’t it?” Elsie said slowly.

“Not particularly,” Steward answered. “For an otherwise intelligent man, King made rather an unimaginative will. I always wondered in my heart if he thought himself immortal. And, of course, Ann was young. Ann spent the last four years of her life watching people die under the most frightful circumstances, but it never seemed to occur to her that it could happen to her, too. The ramifications of a will that interlocked with King’s were far more important to the lawyers than to her. She had forty years more to live, according to the tables. No, we don’t need to worry about a thing, Elsie. Except that damned paper hanger!”

“You don’t think we should try to shut him up—just,” she added hurriedly, “in some small way? Couldn’t we set him up in a store, or some little business, perhaps? Don’t you suppose he longs for a store of his own? King always said people did.”

“Regretfully,” Steward said, “he doesn’t need a store, my dear. If you had troubled to listen to him, you would have learned that skill alone is what counts in his infernal trade, and that he can carry all his tools in his hip pocket. He is also strongly against business, and he particularly dislikes little businesses, and little businessmen.”

“What?” Elsie sounded shocked. “He’s against business?”

“He’s anti-business and pro-skill, as far as I could make out,” Steward said. “There’s quite a dash of William Morris in him. He’s also a devout single-taxer and suffers terribly from migraine—his symptoms are very much like yours. We’ll simply have to keep our hands off him, Elsie, and let him firmly alone—and hope that Hanson won’t choose to take him very seriously. I really feel it’s fate that we should be faced in this situation with such an incredibly honest individual.”

“But King always said that every man had his—” Elsie began.

“Yes, yes, I know. His price. It’s also fate, however,” Steward said, “that the other person we’re faced with is the only person on earth whom King was really unable to buy.”

“That Mayo man?”

“Yes,” Steward said briefly.

In the silence that followed, something like the point of a razor-sharp knife jabbed itself into Asey’s left ankle.



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