HKB
"Three weeks ago," was the reply. "He died of cholera."
"Of cholera!" This occurred, I should state, in 1830.
"Yes: he was very assiduously attended throughout his sufferings, which were protracted and severe, by the eminent Dr. Parkinson, a highly-respectable and skilled practitioner, as you doubtless, sir, are aware."
I could not comprehend the man. This dry, unconcerned, business-sort of gabble was not the language of a suddenly-bereaved parent, and one, too, who had lost a considerable annuity by his son's death. What could it mean? I was in truth fairly puzzled.
After a considerable interval of silence, which Mr. Andrews, whose eyes continued to wander in every direction except that of mine, showed no inclination to break, I said--"It will be necessary for me to write immediately to your cousin, Mr. Archibald Andrews. I trust, for your sake, the annuity will be continued; but of course, till I hear from him, the half-yearly payments must be suspended."
"Certainly, certainly: I naturally expected that would be the case," said Andrews, still in the same quick, hurried tone. "Quite so."
"You have nothing further to say, I suppose?" I remarked, after another dead pause, during which it was very apparent that he was laboring with something to which he nervously hesitated to give utterance.
"No--yes--that is, I wished to consult you upon a matter of business--connected with--with a life-assurance office."
"A life-assurance office?"
"Yes." The man's pale face flushed crimson, and his speech became more and more hurried as he went on. "Yes; fearing, Mr. Sharp, that should Archy die, we might be left without resource, I resolved, after mature deliberation, to effect an insurance on his life for four thousand pounds."
"Four thousand pounds!"
"Yes. All necessary preliminaries were gone through. The medical gentleman--since dead of the cholera, by the way--examined the boy of course, and the insurance was legally effected for four thousand pounds, payable at his death."
I did not speak; a suspicion too horrible to be hinted at held me dumb.
"Unfortunately," Andrews continued, "this insurance was only effected about a fortnight before poor Archy's death, and the office refuses payment, although, as I have told you, the lad was attended to the very hour of his death by Dr. Parkinson, a highly-respectable, most unexceptionable gentleman. Very much so indeed."
"I quite agree in that," I answered after a while. "Dr. Parkinson is a highly-respectable and eminent man. What reason," I added, "do the company assign for non-payment?"
"The very recent completion of the policy."
"Nonsense! How can that fact, standing alone, affect your claim?"
"I do not know," Andrews replied; and all this time I had not been able to look fairly in his face; "but they do refuse; and I am anxious that your firm should take the matter in hand, and sue them for the amount."
"I must first see Dr. Parkinson," I answered, "and convince myself that there is no legitimate reason for repudiating the policy."
"Certainly, certainly," he replied.
"I will write to you to-morrow," I said, rising to terminate the conference, "after I have seen Dr. Parkinson, and state whether we will or not take proceedings against the insurance company on your behalf."
He thanked me, and hurried off.
Dr. Parkinson confirmed Mr. Jesse Andrews in every particular. He had attended the boy, a fine, light-haired lad of eleven or twelve years of age, from not long after his seizure till his death. He suffered dreadfully, and died unmistakably of Asiatic cholera, and of nothing else; of which same disease a servant and a female lodger in the same house had died just previously. "It is of course," Dr. Parkinson remarked in conclusion, "as unfortunate for the company as it is strangely lucky for Andrews; but there is no valid reason for refusing payment."
Upon this representation we wrote the next day to the assurance people, threatening proceedings on behalf of Mr. Jesse Andrews.