The Best Policy

It was six months later that he was notified of the sudden death at the Sixty-fourth Street flat of Elmer Harkness, who had a policy in his company. Instantly the details of the case, and his misgivings at the time, returned to him. Yet the proof of death, signed by a reputable and well-known physician, was flawless. A latent heart trouble had developed suddenly, and Harkness had died within forty-eight hours after he was stricken. The physician who had attended him never had been called for Harkness before, but he had been at the flat a number of times to prescribe for the trifling ailments of Mrs. Harkness, and he had become well acquainted with the husband. They had moved into the neighborhood about six months before.

“It all fits in with what we know of the case,” commented Murray, “except the heart trouble. That sounds like the mysterious Harkness. Could you have possibly made any mistake in your examination, Doctor?”

“Certainly I could,” admitted the company’s physician ruefully. “None of us is infallible, but I’ll swear there were no indications of any heart trouble when I examined him. Still, the heart is a mighty deceptive organ. There may be trouble without any indications of it and there may be indications without any trouble. I once knew of a man whose heart seemed to skip a beat once in so often, but the best of medical talent was unable to discover the cause of it, and the man lived to a good old age. I don’t claim infallibility, but I never examined a man who seemed freer from any indications of heart trouble.”

“I wonder,” said Murray thoughtfully, “if Harkness’ employer has heard of his death.”

An insurance company is merciless in following up evidence of attempted fraud, but, lacking such evidence, it is wise to conduct investigations with extreme delicacy. A reputation for unnecessary intrusion or harshness, for a lack of sympathy with the bereaved, for any action that implies a suspicion of dishonesty when the proof is lacking, may do a great deal of harm. Every reputable company is anxious to pay all honest claims with as little inconvenience to the beneficiaries as is compatible with safety. Such investigation as may be necessary in some exceptional case is conducted as unobtrusively as possible.

In this instance, the ordinary proof of death would have been accepted without question were it not for the mystery of the “heart trouble” that was supposed not to exist. This, combined with the report on the other Harkness, was annoying, and, to satisfy himself, Murray sent a man to the wholesale house where Harkness had been employed. The result was reassuring, so far as any question of fraud was concerned. The other clerks were then taking up a subscription to send some flowers to the funeral, and his illness and death had been reported promptly to the head of the department in which Harkness had worked. Furthermore, he was registered as living at the Sixty-fourth Street flat, to which place he had moved from 2313 Wesson Street.

“It seems to be all right,” remarked Murray. “This is the man we insured on the strength of your report, Doctor, and I guess the only thing we can do is to charge you up with an error of judgment. Fortunately, it’s only a three-thousand-dollar policy.”

“I don’t understand it,” said the doctor gloomily. “I wish we could demand an autopsy.”

“Hardly justifiable, in view of the circumstances,” returned Murray. “We have the affidavit of a first-class physician, and we know that it’s the same man, so the autopsy would be only to satisfy your curiosity. My own curiosity deals with the Wabash Avenue man who was refused. I wish we could locate him, although I don’t see that it would have any bearing on this case. He seems to have disappeared utterly. Perhaps he’s dead.”

Before dismissing the matter from his mind, Murray reviewed the facts carefully. There had been an application to another company from a man living at 1176 Wabash Avenue, which had been refused because of heart trouble, but the city directory for that year gave no Harkness at that address. It did give an Elmer Harkness at another address, however, which coincided with the story told by the Harkness he had insured.

“Somebody,” mused Murray, “must have been trying to beat the other company. That’s the best I can make out of it, although I can’t see why he should have assumed this Elmer’s name and antecedents. It’s a most extraordinary case.”

The latest city directory gave Elmer Harkness as living at 2313 Wesson Street, which certainly was his address at the time the directory was issued. So much Murray had looked up before. Now, further to satisfy himself, he went through all the directories for the interval between the two years, and he was rewarded by finding the name of Elmer Harkness twice in one of them. Both were clerks, the addresses of the employers not being given, and the residence of one of them was put down as the address of the Harkness who had secured insurance.

“Then there are, or at least there were, two,” thought Murray, “but only one came from Madison. And what has become of the missing Harkness? Why is he in only one directory? The fact that there were two helps to clear up the record of the one I insured, so far as that Wabash Avenue address is concerned, but how did both happen to give the same place and date of birth? And did both have heart trouble?”

Murray straightened up suddenly and sent for the clerk who had made the previous inquiries for him.

“Harry,” he said, “I want you to go to the funeral of Elmer Harkness to-morrow. Go early, and get a look at him, if possible. If not, get a description of him from some of the neighbors.”

Murray reproached himself for not having searched all the directories before, although it would have made little difference. The fact that another Harkness had lived in Chicago would have had no bearing on the case, so long as the record of the one who applied for insurance was clear. In fact, it would have explained everything, except the coincidence of the alleged birth records. Still, it would have given a new line of investigation, which might have cleared up the mystery.

Harry reported promptly the next day, and almost his first words aroused Murray.

“I couldn’t get a glimpse of the late lamented,” he said flippantly, “for the casket was closed, but I learned that he had hair slightly tinged with gray and – ”

“Gray!” exclaimed Murray. “Does a man get gray hair in six months? The man we insured hadn’t a gray hair in his head.”

“He was rather stout – ”

“Our man was not.”

“I couldn’t learn much else – ”

“You’ve learned enough.”

“ – except that when he was stricken his wife’s first thought seemed to be to get a message to some mysterious man, who responded in person, had a short talk with the wife, and then disappeared. A neighbor who had come in was somewhat impressed by this, because she called him ‘Elmer,’ which was her husband’s name.”

“What!” cried Murray, startled out of his usual imperturbability by the evidence thus unexpectedly accumulating. Then, more calmly, “Harry, you didn’t get the address to which she sent, did you?”

“The messenger,” said Harry, proud of his success, “was a neighbor’s boy. I found him. Here is the address.”

Murray took the slip of paper, looked at the address, and then sent for the company’s physician.

“We’ll make identification sure,” he said, “for we both know the man, and we’ll take an officer and a warrant along with us.”

Elmer Harkness was sitting on his trunk, waiting for an expressman, when the party appeared at the door of his room in a little out-of-the-way boarding-house.

“I thought you were dead,” said Murray.

“I wish I was,” said Harkness. He had almost fainted at the first sight of Murray, but had recovered himself quickly, and, having once decided that the case was hopeless, he resigned himself to the inevitable and spoke with a frank carelessness that had been entirely lacking when he was playing a part and trying to stick to the details of a prepared story.

“Any weapons?” asked the policeman, making a quick search.

“No weapons,” replied Harkness. “I’m not that kind.”

“I don’t see,” said Murray, “why you waited here to be arrested.”

“Why, I had a little interest in that insurance,” explained Harkness, “and I rather wanted to get it before leaving. However, waiting here was a little trying to the nerves, even if everything did seem to be going all right, and I was just about to slip up to Milwaukee until the case was settled. I ought to have gone the day Elmer was stricken.”

“What Elmer?” demanded Murray.

“Elmer Harkness, my cousin,” the other replied promptly.

“And who are you?”

“I’m Elmer Harkness, his cousin,” he returned with equal promptness.

“Which of you was born at Madison, Indiana?” pursued Murray.

“He was,” replied Harkness, and added, “I was born at Matteson, Illinois.”

“There’s a nice pair of names for a tangle,” commented Murray as the possibilities of the situation began to dawn on him. “No wonder my inquiries failed to untangle it. Would you mind telling me how you happened to try this thing?”

“No trouble at all,” returned Harkness. “It was my cousin’s scheme. He had tried to get insurance when he was living on Wabash Avenue and had failed. He had a heart trouble that was likely to culminate fatally almost any time. Still, I don’t think it occurred to him to try to beat an insurance company until we happened to be thrown together about a year ago. We were cousins, although we never had met before, and the similarity of names seemed to make a great impression on him. He had just returned to Chicago after a year or more in St. Louis, and he already had had one heart attack, with a warning from his doctor that the next would almost certainly be fatal. He was also told that the next was not likely to be long delayed. Now, I suppose you’ll think I’m lying, but I did not take kindly to his scheme, and the money alone would not have tempted me to go into it. I was sorry for his wife. He had been able to make only a bare living; he could leave her absolutely nothing. She never had had to support herself and there seemed to be mighty little chance that she could do it. I finally agreed to go into it for her sake. It looked easy and I was glad to make the try on her account.”

“But you wouldn’t refuse a little something for yourself on the side, so to speak,” suggested Murray sarcastically.

“No, I wouldn’t,” Harkness frankly admitted. “To carry out the plan it would be necessary for me to give up my job, change my name and make a fresh start somewhere else. The job was not such an all-fired good one, but it might be some time before I got another as good, and I would need something for expenses while I was losing myself. I was to get five hundred of the three thousand dollars insurance. The rest was to go to the widow.”

“That wouldn’t last her very long,” remarked Murray.

“It would help a little,” said Harkness, “and we thought we would stand a better chance if we didn’t ask for too big a sum.”

“An insurance company,” said Murray, “has to be as particular with a small risk as with a large one, and it will follow up a suspicious case as closely in one instance as in the other. It’s a matter of principle.”

“I think I understand that now,” remarked Harkness regretfully.

“But I am curious to know,” persisted Murray, “how in the world you arranged such a mystifying record.”