note before the lawyer.

Mr. Tutt indorsed it in his strange, humpbacked chirography.

"Here are your bonds," said Mr. McKeever, handing Mrs. Effingham a small
package in a manila envelope. She took them in a half-frightened way, as
if she thought she was doing something wrong.

"And now," said Mr. Tutt, "the lady would like a box in your
safe-deposit vaults; a small one--about five dollars a year--will do.
She has quite a bundle of securities with her, which I am looking into.
Most if not all of them are of little or no value, but I have told her
she might just as well leave them as security for what they are worth,
in addition to my indorsement. Really it's just a slick game of ours to
get the bank to look after them for nothing. Isn't it, Mrs. Effingham?"

"Ye-es!" stammered Mrs. Effingham, not understanding what he was talking
about.

"Well," answered Mr. McKeever, "we never refuse collateral. I'll put the
bonds with the note--" His eye caught the edges of the bundle. "Great
Scott, Tutt! What are you leaving all these bonds here for against that
note? There must be nearly a hundred thousand dol--"

"I thought you never refused collateral, Mr. McKeever!" challenged Mr.
Tutt sternly.

Twenty minutes later the exquisite blonde that acted as Mr. Badger's
financial accomplice learned from Mrs. Effingham's faltering lips that
the widow would like to see the great man in regard to further
investments.

"How does it look, Mabel?" inquired the financier from behind his
massive mahogany desk covered with a six by five sheet of plate glass.
"Is it a squeal or a fall?"

"Easy money," answered Mabel with confidence. "She wants to put a
mortgage on the farm."

"Keep her about fourteen minutes, tell her the story of my
philanthropies, and then shoot her in," directed Badger.

So Mrs. Effingham listened politely while Mabel showed her the
photographs of Mr. Badger's home for consumptives out in Tyrone, New
Mexico, and of his wife and children, taken on the porch of his summer
home at Seabright, New Jersey; and then, exactly fourteen minutes having
elapsed, she was shot in.

"Ah! Mrs. Effingham! Delighted! Do be seated!" Mr. Badger's smile was
like that of the boa constrictor about to swallow the rabbit.

"About my oil stock," hesitated Mrs. Effingham.

"Well, what about it?" demanded Badger sharply. "Are you dissatisfied
with your twenty per cent?"

"Oh, no!" stammered the old lady. "Not at all! I just thought if