first time realised what an overbearing, disagreeable visitor he had
been and departed, but without the slightest ill-feeling toward his
benefactors. Indeed, he was deeply repentant, deeply apologetic. He
ruefully announced that it would never be in his power to repay them
for all they had done for him, but, resorting to a sudden whim,
declared that he would make them his heirs if they didn't mind being
used as a means to convey his final word of defiance to the children
who had cast him off. Not that he would ever have a dollar to leave to
them, but for the satisfaction it would give him to cut the traitors
off with the proverbial shilling. Beset with the notion that this was
an ideal way to show his contempt for his offspring, he went to the
safety deposit vault and took there from the worthless document known
as his last will and testament and in the presence of witnesses
destroyed the thing, thereby disinheriting the erstwhile wife and her
children as effectually as if he had really possessed the estate set
forth in the instrument.

"I'll make a will in your favour, Tom," he said at the time, with a
mocking grin, "and in it I will include this miserable carcass of
mine, so that you may at least have something to sell to the doctors.
And who knows? I may scrape together a few hundred dollars before I
die, provided I don't die too soon."

"We will give you a decent burial, Uncle Joe," said Thomas Bingle,
revolting against the specific. "Do you suppose I would sell my uncle
to a--"

"Haven't you a ray of humour in that head of yours?" demanded his
uncle. "Can't you SEE a joke?"