some old love letters had, as usually happens,
got mixed up with the will instead of having been destroyed as it should
have been. You know, it's astonishing, the junk people keep in their
safe deposit boxes! I'll bet that ninety-nine out of a hundred are half
full of valueless and useless stuff, like old watches, grandpa's jet
cuff buttons, the letters Uncle William wrote from the Holy Land,
outlawed fire insurance and correspondence that nobody will ever
read,--everything always gets mixed up together,--and yet every paper a
man leaves after his death is a possible source of confusion or trouble.
And one can't tell how or why a person at a particular time may come to
express a wish in writing. It would be most dangerous to pay attention
to it. Suppose it was _not_ in writing. Morally, a wish is just as
binding if spoken as if incorporated in a letter. Would you waste any
time on Sadie Burch if she came in here and told you that your father
had expressed the desire that she should have twenty-five thousand
dollars? Not much!"

"I don't suppose so!" admitted Payson.

"Another thing!" said Tutt. "Remember this, the law would not _permit_
you as executor of your father's will to pay over this money, if any
other than yourself were the residuary legatee. You'd have no right to
take twenty-five thousand dollars out of the estate and give it to Miss
Burch at the expense of anybody else!"

"Then you say the law won't let me pay this money to Sadie Burch whether
I am willing to or not?" asked Payson.

"Not as executor. As executor you're absolutely obliged to carry out the
terms of the will and disregard anything else. You must preserve the
estate intact and turn it over unimpaired to the residuary legatee!"
repeated Tutt.

"But I am the residuary legatee!" said Payson.

"As executor you've got to pay it over in full to yourself as residuary
legatee!" repeated Tutt stubbornly, evading the issue.

"Well, where does that leave me?" asked his client.

"It gets you out of your difficulty, doesn't it?" asked Tutt. "Don't
borrow trouble! Don't--if you'll pardon my saying so--be an idiot!"

There was silence for several minutes, finally broken by the lawyer who
came back again to the charge with renewed vigor.

"Why, this sort of thing comes up all the time. Take this sort of a
case, for instance. The law only lets a man will away a certain
proportion of his property to charity--says it isn't right for him to do
so, if he