Page:Train - Tutt and Mr Tutt (Scribner, 1922).djvu/212

 action against the Lake Shore or the New York Central based on these bonds. Yes, sir! They're all right!"

He pawed them over, picking out favorites here and there and excitedly extolling the merits of the imaginary properties they represented. There were the repudiated bonds of Southern states and municipalities of railroads upon whose tracks no wheel had ever turned; of factories never built except in Doc Barrows' addled brain; of companies which had defaulted and given stock for their worthless obligations; certificates of oil, mining and land companies; deeds to tracts now covered with sky scrapers in Pittsburgh, St. Louis and New York—each and every one of them not worth the paper they were printed on except to some crook who dealt in high finance. But they were exquisitely engraved, quite lovely to look at, and Doc Barrows gloated upon them with scintillating eyes.

"Ain't they beauties?" he sighed. "Some day—yes sir!—some day they'll be worth real money. I paid it for some of 'em. But they're yours—all yours."

He gathered them up with care and returned them to the suitcase, then fastened the clasps and patted the leather cover with his hand.

"They are yours, sir!" he exclaimed dramatically.