The Best Policy

“Yes.”

“Let’s see it.”

“There will be time enough for that,” said Hinse in his most impressive tones, “when we have settled what is to be paid on it.” Hinse was so constituted morally that he could not possibly be frank and straightforward. “It is a policy for a thousand dollars on the life of her late husband, Thomas Moffat. He failed to pay some of the last premiums, but there is a value to it.”

“Is there?”

“There is. Will you look it up and see how the matter stands, or shall I take legal proceedings to force a settlement?”

“Better sue,” said Murray. “Good day.”

“You will regret this interview,” announced Hinse.

“I regret it already,” returned Murray. Then, his professional instinct overcoming his dislike of the man, he added: “If premiums have not been paid, the policy may have lapsed, or it may be non-forfeitable. I must see the policy and know the details. I never heard of Thomas Moffat that I recall. Give me the facts.”

“Ah,” said Hinse, settling himself comfortably in a chair, “I thought you would see the wisdom of being reasonable.”

“Reasonable!” exploded Murray. “Damn it! I’m having trouble enough being patient. Who was he, where did he live, and when did he die?”

There was something in the way this was said that led Hinse to change his tactics, and he partly explained the situation in a confidential way. Premiums had been paid on the policy for at least eight years, he said, but the widow had supposed that everything was forfeited when her husband failed to pay the later premiums: she knew nothing about cash surrender values or non-forfeitable clauses.

“She’ll do what I say,” he said significantly in conclusion. “She’ll compromise for any figure that I say is right.”

He waited for Murray to reach for this bait, but Murray was merely fighting an impulse to throw the man out of the office.

“Oh, she will!” said Murray at last. “Well, you’ll talk more frankly than you have, if you want to do business with me. Where’s the proof of death and the proof of identity? Where’s the policy?”

Hinse ignored the last question. He wished to find out certain things about that policy himself before he admitted that it had been destroyed, and he thought he was handling the matter with consummate skill.

“There will be no trouble about the proof of death,” he said. “In fact, I have that with me. But Moffat and his family moved many times during the years that have elapsed since he stopped paying premiums, living in two or three different cities, and they were not always known to their neighbors.”

“I thought so,” remarked Murray sarcastically. “Somebody died, and you want me to take it on faith that he was the Thomas Moffat who once was insured in this company. Although I haven’t looked it up, I have no doubt that a Thomas Moffat did take out a policy, for I don’t believe even you would have the nerve to come to me without at least that much foundation for your claim. Perhaps it was the same Thomas Moffat who died; perhaps it was a man who was merely given that name in the certificate of death. Perhaps he left a widow; perhaps you are representing that widow, but perhaps you are representing a woman who merely claims to be that widow. She has moved so often that she can’t produce any satisfactory evidence of her identity. Doesn’t it strike you that you are telling a rather fishy story? Doesn’t it occur to you that you ought to have ingenuity enough to concoct something more plausible?”

“This insult, sir – ” Hinse shifted again to his pompous manner, but Murray interrupted him.

“Insult!” exclaimed Murray. “That wasn’t an insult, but I’ll give you one. I think you’re a tricky scoundrel. You have virtually offered to sell out your alleged client. I think you’re a swindler. I don’t believe you have or can produce any such policy.”

“The loss of a policy, sir – ”

“I knew it!” broke in Murray. “Policy lost, of course! In other words, your client hasn’t a policy and never did have one. She’s an impostor! You or she learned that there had been such a man and such a policy, and you thought there was a chance to get some money. You must think insurance companies are easy.”

“I shall take this matter to court!” declared Hinse.

“Do!” advised Murray. “Take it anywhere, so long as you take it out of this office.”

“You shall hear from me again!” said Hinse at the door.

“I’d rather hear from you than see you,” retorted Murray. “You annoy me.”

Nevertheless, when Hinse had departed, Murray had the matter looked up, and found that such a policy actually had been issued, that it was non-forfeitable after three years, and that about four hundred dollars was due on it as a result of the premiums that had been paid. Murray was eminently a just man – he wished to take unfair advantage of no one. There might be merit in the claim advanced, and some woman, entitled to the money, might be in great want. Still, it was not his business to seek for ways of disbursing the company’s funds. He reported the matter to the home office, and was advised to give it no further attention unless suit actually was brought. Then it should be fought. Insurance companies do not like lawsuits, but they like still less to pay out money when there is doubt as to the justice of a claim. When one of them goes into court, however, it fights bitterly. Hinse knew this, and he had not the slightest intention of bringing suit.

If Mrs. Moffat had had any more money, so that there would have been a chance to exact further fees, he might have sued for the mere sake of getting the fees, but she could not even advance court costs. So Murray waited in vain for the threatened suit, but the possibility of it kept the case in his mind. The claim probably was fraudulent, but, if not, the woman unquestionably was poor and unfortunate: the very fact that she had taken the case to such a shyster as Hinse was proof of that. Somehow, the well-to-do people do not get into the hands of shysters. Murray believed it was a fraud, but he always came back to the possibility of being mistaken in this. And injustice – the injustice of passivity as well as of activity – was abhorrent to him.

The day Murray ran across a newspaper item to the effect that a Mrs. Thomas Moffat had been evicted for the non-payment of rent, he disobeyed the instructions from the home office and looked her up. In theory it was all right to wait for a beneficiary to bring in the necessary proofs; in practice it was horrible to think of taking advantage of the ignorance or helplessness of a woman in trouble.

Murray found Mrs. Moffat and her two children in a little back room near the somewhat larger apartment from which she had just been evicted. She was trying to sew and care for the children at the same time. It was evident, however, that she had long since overtaxed her strength and was near the point of physical collapse.

“The neighbors has been good to me,” she explained, “but they got their own troubles an’ they can’t do much.”

Murray had primed himself with such facts as to Thomas Moffat as the books of the company and the old insurance application gave, and, after explaining his errand, he asked when and where Thomas Moffat was born. The weary woman, too long inured to disappointment to be really hopeful now, brought out a little old Bible and showed him the entries relating to birth and marriage. They corresponded with the dates he had. Murray took up the little Bible reverently, and he then and there decided that this woman was the widow of the Thomas Moffat who had been insured in his company. Even her maiden name, as given in the Bible, corresponded with the name he had taken from the books. Nevertheless, he questioned her closely on all the other details that he could verify. She gave the address at which they were living when the policy was taken out, and also told of the various changes of residence during the time that the premiums were being paid.

“He kep’ the big paper with the seals on it for ‘most three years after he quit paying,” she said. “Then he tore it up an’ burned it. He said it wasn’t no more use, for he’d lost it all when he quit paying. It seemed mighty hard, but I thought he knew.”

“There isn’t even a scrap of it left?” queried Murray.

“No, sir. He burned the scraps. I saw him do it.”

“That’s unfortunate,” said Murray. “If there was barely enough to identify the policy it would help. It would be annoying to have it turn up after we had settled the matter, for the custom is to surrender the policy to the company when the payment is made.”

“You needn’t to worry over that,” Mrs. Moffat assured him anxiously. “It was burned to the very last piece. I saw it myself.”

“I don’t doubt it,” returned Murray. “Have you your marriage certificate?”

“Have I!” exclaimed Mrs. Moffat in surprise. “You didn’t never know an honest married woman who would lose that, did you? A man don’t think much of it, but a woman does. It’s the proof she’s respectable.”

Mrs. Moffat produced the certificate, but Murray merely glanced at the names.

“I think you may rely on getting the money, Mrs. Moffat,” he said. “It isn’t much, but – ”

“I got a chance to start a little school store if I had a bit of money,” she interrupted eagerly. “I don’t need only two hundred or two hundred and fifty, an’ it’s better than sewing.”

“I am so confident that this is all right,” said Murray, ignoring the interruption, “that I am going to advance you a little money now. I imagine you need it.”

“Indeed I do!” exclaimed the grateful and now hopeful woman. “The lawyer got most of the rent money.”

“Damn the lawyer!” ejaculated Murray. “If he hears that you’ve got anything he’ll probably put in another claim, but you’re not to pay him a cent. Do you understand that? Send him to me. I’ll settle with him.”

“Yes, sir,” returned Mrs. Moffat meekly. “He helped me – ”

“Helped you! He did more to hurt you than any other ten men could have done. He ought to be made to pay damages.”

Then Murray laughed at his own heat and gave Mrs. Moffat a twenty-dollar bill.

“When we get the matter settled,” he said, “you can repay this.”

“Indeed I will!”

Murray noted that there were tears in her eyes, and, disliking a scene of any description, he picked up his hat and hastily withdrew.