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Chapter 01
Auditing and Assurance Services
Multiple Choice Questions
1. The audit objective that all transactions and accounts that should be presented in the financial
statements are in fact included is related to which of the PCAOB assertions?
A. Existence
B. Rights and obligations
C. Completeness
D. Valuation
2. Cutoff tests designed to detect purchases made before the end of the year that have been
recorded in the subsequent year provide assurance about management's assertion of
A. presentation and Disclosure.
B. completeness.
C. rights and obligations.
D. existence.
3. During an audit of an entity's stockholders' equity accounts, the auditor determines whether there
are restrictions on retained earnings resulting from loans, agreements or state law. This audit
procedure most likely is intended to verify management's assertion of
A. existence or occurrence.
B. completeness.
C. valuation or allocation.
D. presentation and disclosure.
1-2
4. The confirmation of an account payable balance selected from the general ledger provides
primary evidence regarding which management assertion?
A. Completeness
B. Valuation
C. Allocation
D. Existence
5. What type of evidence would provide the highest level of assurance in an attestation
engagement?
A. Evidence secured solely from within the entity.
B. Evidence obtained from independent sources.
C. Evidence obtained indirectly.
D. Evidence obtained from multiple internal inquiries.
6. Which of the following management assertions is an auditor most likely testing if the audit
objective states that all inventory on hand is reflected in the ending inventory balance?
A. The entity has rights to the inventory.
B. Inventory is properly valued.
C. Inventory is properly presented in the financial statements.
D. Inventory is complete.
7. An auditor traces the serial numbers on equipment to a nonissuer's sub-ledger. Which of the
following management assertions is supported by this test?
A. Valuation and allocation.
B. Completeness.
C. Rights and obligations.
D. Presentation and disclosure.
8. An auditor has substantial doubt about the entity's ability to continue as a going concern for a
reasonable period of time because of negative cash flows and working capital deficiencies. Under
these circumstances, the auditor would be most concerned about the
A. control environment factors that affect the organizational structure.
B. correlation of detection risk and inherent risk.
C. effectiveness of the entity's internal control activities.
D. possible effects on the entity's financial statements.
9. Which of the following types of audit evidence provides the least assurance of reliability?
A. Receivable confirmations received from the client's customers.
B. Prenumbered receiving reports completed by the client's employees.
C. Prior months' bank statements obtained from the client.
D. Municipal property tax bills prepared in the client's name.
1-3
10. Which of the following is a management assertion regarding account balances at the period end?
A. Transactions and events that have been recorded have occurred and pertain to the entity.
B. Transactions and events have been recorded in the proper accounts.
C. The entity holds or controls the rights to assets, and liabilities are obligations of the entity.
D. Amounts and other data related to the transactions and events have been recorded
appropriately.
11. A practitioner is engaged to express an opinion on management's assertion that the square
footage of a warehouse offered for sale is 150,000 square feet. The practitioner should refer to
which of the following sources for professional guidance?
A. Statement of Auditing Standards.
B. Statements on Standards for Attestation Engagements.
C. Statements on Standards for Accounting and Review Services.
D. Statements on Standards for Consulting Services.
12. In auditing the long term debt account, an auditor's procedures most likely would focus primarily
on management's assertion of
A. existence.
B. completeness.
C. allocation.
D. rights and obligations.
13. An auditor selected items for test counts from the client's warehouse during the physical inventory
observation. The auditor then traced these test counts into the detailed inventory listing that
ultimately agreed to the financial statements. This procedure most likely provided evidence
concerning management's assertion of
A. completeness.
B. valuation.
C. presentation and disclosure.
D. existence.
E. rights and obligations.
14. An auditor selected items from the client's detailed inventory listing (that agreed to the financial
statements). During the physical inventory observation, the auditor then found each item selected
and counted the number of units on hand. Assuming that the amount on hand was the same as
the amount in the client's detailed inventory listing, this procedure most likely would provide
evidence concerning management's assertion of
A. completeness.
B. valuation.
C. presentation and disclosure.
D. existence.
E. rights and obligations.
1-4
15. According to PCAOB Auditing Standard No. 5 (AS 5), the auditor should identify significant
accounts and disclosures and their relevant assertions. Which of the following financial statement
assertions is not explicitly identified in AS 5?
A. Completeness
B. Valuation or Allocation
C. Accuracy
D. Existence or Occurrence
E. All of these are assertions identified in AS 5.
16. When testing the completeness assertion for a liability account, an auditor ordinarily works from
the
A. financial statements to the potentially unrecorded items.
B. potentially unrecorded items to the financial statements.
C. accounting records to the supporting evidence.
D. trial balance to the subsidiary ledger.
17. If an auditor is performing procedures related to the information that is contained in the client's
pension footnote, he/she is most likely obtain evidence concerning management's assertion
about
A. rights and obligations.
B. existence.
C. valuation.
D. presentation and disclosure.
18. Which of the following questions would be inappropriate for an auditor to ask a client when
exhibiting an appropriate level of professional skepticism while completing an audit procedure
related to the internal control system?
A. What can go wrong in this process?
B. Which of your employees is a fraudster?
C. What else is important to know about this process?
D. What happens when a key employees goes on vacation?
19. To be proficient as an auditor, a person must first be able to accomplish which of these tasks in a
decision-making process?
A. Identify audit evidence relevant to the verification of assertions management makes in its
unaudited financial statements and notes.
B. Formulate evidence-gathering procedures (audit plan) designed to obtain sufficient, competent
evidence about assertions management makes in financial statements and notes.
C. Recognize the financial assertions made in management's financial statements and footnotes.
D. Evaluate the evidence produced by the performance of procedures and decide whether
management's assertions conform to generally accepted accounting principles and reality.
1-5
20. Which of the following is an underlying condition that in part creates the demand by users for
reliable information?
A. Economic transactions that are numerous and complex
B. Decisions are time-sensitive
C. Users separated from accounting records by distance and time
D. Financial decisions that are important to investors and users
E. All of these
21. Which of the following is not included in The American Accounting Association (AAA) definition of
auditing?
A. Potential conflict of interest
B. Systematic process
C. Assertions about economic actions
D. Established criteria
22. What is the term used to identify the risk that the client's financial statements may be materially
false and misleading?
A. Business risk
B. Information risk
C. Client risk
D. Risk assessment
23. Which of the following is not a recommendation usually made following the completion of an
operational audit?
A. Economic and efficient use of resources
B. Effective achievement of business objectives
C. Attesting to the fairness of the financial statements
D. Compliance with company policies
24. In order to be considered as external auditors with respect to government agencies, GAO
auditors must be
A. organizationally independent.
B. empowered as the accounting and auditing agency by the U.S. Congress.
C. funded by the federal government.
D. guided by standards similar to GAAS.
1-6
25. Which of the following is the essential purpose of the audit function?
A. Detection of fraud
B. Examination of individual transactions to certify as to their validity
C. Determination of whether the client's financial statement assertions are fairly state
D. Assurance of the consistent application of correct accounting procedures
26. The audit objective that all the transactions and accounts presented in the financial statements
represent real assets, liabilities, revenues, and expenses is related most closely to which of the
PCAOB assertions?
A. Existence or occurrence
B. Rights and obligations
C. Completeness
D. Presentation and disclosure
27. The audit objective that all transactions are recorded in the proper period is related most closely
to which of the Audit Standards Board (ASB) transaction assertions?
A. Occurrence
B. Completeness
C. Cutoff
D. Accuracy
28. The audit objective that all transactions are recorded in the proper account is related most closely
to which one of the ASB transaction assertions?
A. Occurrence
B. Completeness
C. Accuracy
D. Classification
29. The audit objective that all balances include items owned by the client is related most closely to
which one of the ASB balance assertions?
A. Existence
B. Rights and obligations
C. Completeness
D. Valuation
30. The audit objective that all balances include all items that should be recorded in that account is
related most closely to which one of the ASB balance assertions?
A. Existence
B. Rights and obligations
C. Completeness
D. Valuation
1-7
31. The audit objective that footnotes in the financial statements should be clear and expressed such
that the information is easily conveyed to the readers of the financial statements is related most
closely with which of the ASB presentation and disclosure assertions?
A. Occurrence
B. Rights and obligations
C. Comprehensibility
D. Understandability
32. The engineering department at Omni Company built a piece of equipment in the company's own
shop for use in the company's operations. The auditor reviewed all work orders that were
capitalized as part of the equipment costs. Which of the following is the ASB transaction assertion
most closely related to the auditor's testing?
A. Occurrence
B. Completeness
C. Accuracy
D. Classification
33. The engineering department at Omni Company built a piece of equipment in the company's own
shop for use in the company's operations. When looking at the ending balance for the fixed asset
account the auditor examined all work orders, purchased materials, labor cost reports, and
applied overhead that were capitalized as part of the equipment costs. Which of the following is
the ASB balance assertion most closely related to the auditor's testing?
A. Existence
B. Completeness
C. Rights and obligations
D. Valuation
34. Which of the following best describes the primary role and responsibility of independent external
auditor?
A. Produce a company's annual financial statements and notes.
B. Express an opinion on the fairness of a company's annual financial statements and footnotes.
C. Provide business consulting advice to audit clients.
D. Obtain an understanding of the client's internal control structure and give management a
report about control problems and deficiencies.
35. Which of the following best describes the main reason independent auditors report on
management's financial statements?
A. Management fraud may exist and it is likely to be detected by independent auditors.
B. The management that prepares the statements and the persons who use the statements may
have conflicting interests.
C. Misstated account balances may be corrected as the result of the independent audit work.
D. The management that prepares the statements may have a poorly designed system of internal
control.
1-8
36. The auditor's judgment concerning the overall fairness of the presentation of financial position,
results of operations, and cash flows is applied within the framework of
A. quality control.
B. generally accepted auditing standards, which include the concept of materiality.
C. the auditor's evaluation of the audited company's internal control.
D. the applicable financial reporting framework (i.e., GAAP in the United States).
37. Assurance services involve all of the following, except
A. relevance as well as the reliability of information.
B. nonfinancial information as well as traditional financial statements.
C. providing absolute rather than reasonable assurance.
D. electronic databases as well as printed reports.
38. Because of the risk of material misstatement, an audit of financial statements in accordance with
generally accepted auditing standards should be planned and performed with an attitude of
A. objective judgment.
B. independent integrity.
C. professional skepticism.
D. impartial conservatism.
39. Which of the following best describes assurance services?
A. Independent professional services that report on the client's financial statements
B. Independent professional services that improve the quality of information for decision makers
C. Independent professional services that report on specific written management assertions
D. Independent professional services that improve the operations of the client
40. Which of the following is not a PCAOB assertion about inventory related to presentation and
disclosure?
A. Inventory is properly classified as a current asset on the balance sheet.
B. Inventory is properly stated at its cost on the balance sheet.
C. Major inventory categories and their valuation bases are adequately disclosed in notes.
D. All of these are PCAOB presentation and disclosure assertions about inventory
41. Which of the following is not an ASB assertion about inventory related to presentation and
disclosure?
A. Inventory is properly classified as a current asset on the balance sheet.
B. Inventory is properly stated at cost on the balance sheet.
C. Major inventory categories and their valuation bases are adequately disclosed in notes.
D. All of these are ASB presentation and disclosure assertions about inventory.
1-9
42. In performing an attestation engagement, a CPA typically
A. supplies litigation support services.
B. assesses control risk at a low level.
C. expresses a conclusion on an assertion about some type of subject matter.
D. provides management consulting advice.
43. An attestation engagement is one in which a CPA is engaged to
A. issue, or does issue, a report on subject matter or an assertion about the subject matter that is
the responsibility of another party.
B. provide tax advice or prepare a tax return based on financial information the CPA has not
audited or reviewed.
C. testify as an expert witness in accounting, auditing or tax matters, given certain stipulated
facts.
D. assemble prospective financial statements based on the assumptions of the entity's
management without expressing any assurance.
44. The underlying conditions that create demand by users for reliable information include all of the
following, except
A. transactions are numerous and complex.
B. users lack professional skepticism.
C. users are separated from accounting records by distance and time.
D. financial decisions are important to investors and users.
E. decisions are time-sensitive.
45. Cutoff tests designed to detect credit sales made before the end of the year that have been
recorded in the subsequent year provide assurance about the PCAOB assertion of
A. presentation.
B. completeness.
C. rights.
D. existence.
46. Inquiries of warehouse personnel concerning possible obsolete or slow moving inventory items
provide assurance about the PCAOB assertion of
A. completeness.
B. existence.
C. presentation.
D. valuation.
E. rights and obligations.
1-10
47. Inquiries of warehouse personnel concerning possible obsolete or slow moving inventory items
provide assurance about the ASB balance assertion of
A. completeness.
B. existence.
C. presentation.
D. valuation.
E. rights and obligations.
48. The probability that the information circulated by a company will be false or misleading is referred
to as
A. business risk.
B. information risk.
C. assurance risk.
D. audit risk.
49. The Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002 requires that the key company officials certify the financial
statements. Certification means that the company CEO and CFO must sign a statement
indicating
A. they have read the financial statements.
B. they are not aware of any false or misleading statements (or any key omitted disclosures).
C. they believe that the financial statements present an accurate picture of the company's
financial condition.
D. All of these.
50. The process of a CPA obtaining a certificate and license in a state other than the state in which
the CPA's certificate was originally obtained is referred to as
A. substantial equivalency.
B. quid pro quo.
C. relicensing.
D. re-examination.
51. The risk an entity will fail to meet its objectives is referred to as
A. business risk.
B. information risk.
C. assurance risk.
D. audit risk.
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1-11
52. The four basic requirements for becoming a CPA in most states are
A. education, the CPA Examination, experience, and substantial equivalency.
B. the CPA Examination, experience, continuing professional education, and a state certificate.
C. continuing professional education, the CPA Examination, experience, and an AICPA
certificate.
D. education, the CPA Examination, experience, and a state certificate.
53. The study of business operations for the purpose of making recommendations about the efficient
use of resources, effective achievement of business objectives, and compliance with company
policies is referred to as
A. environmental auditing.
B. financial auditing.
C. compliance auditing.
D. operational auditing.
54. The accounting, auditing, and investigating agency of the U.S. Congress, headed by the U.S.
Comptroller General is known as
A. the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI).
B. the U.S. General Accountability Office (GAO).
C. the Internal Revenue Service (IRS).
D. the United States Legislative Auditors (USLA).
Short Answer Questions
1-12
55. Which of the PCAOB assertions (A-E) are best verified by the following audit procedures (1-4)?
A. Existence or occurrence
B. Rights and obligations
C. Valuation or allocation
D. Completeness
E. Presentation and disclosure
1. Confirming inventory held on consignment by the client with independent third party.
2. Consulting the Wall Street Journal for year-end prices of securities held by the client.
3. Physically examine all major property and equipment additions.
4. Review the aged trial balance for significant past due accounts.
56. ABC Company had a major sale to XYZ Company. This sale accounted for 20% of the revenue of
ABC Company. The auditors performed the audit procedures listed 1-3. For each audit procedure
select the ASB transaction assertion that is most likely being tested.
A. Occurrence
B. Completeness
C. Cutoff
D. Accuracy
E. Classification
1. The auditor reviewed the shipping documents to check the date that product was shipped to
XYZ Company.
2. The auditor reviewed the shipping documents to ensure that all product included in the sales
revenue to XYZ had been shipped.
3. The auditor reviewed the invoice sent to XYZ Company to ensure that XYZ had been properly
billed.
1-13
57. Auditors are auditing the warehouse of Huge Lots Corporation. The auditors performed the audit
procedures listed 1-5. For each audit procedure select the ASB balance assertion that is most
likely being tested.
A. Existence
B. Rights and obligations
C. Completeness
D. Accuracy
E. Valuation
1. The auditors walked through the warehouse looking for obsolete inventory.
2. The auditors compared invoices received from suppliers with the cost of inventory listed in the
inventory accounts.
3. The auditors reviewed purchase orders to determine if any inventory was on consignment.
4. The auditors reviewed vendor invoices to determine if freight costs, taxes, tariffs or other costs
had been included in inventory costs.
5. The auditors selected items from the inventory and reviewed inventory records to ensure these
items were included in those records.
Essay Questions
58. What are the differences between the American Accounting Association and AICPA definitions
and objectives of auditing?
1-14
59. What is operational auditing and by whom is it performed?
60. What is information risk? What is business risk?
61. What are the four basic requirements for becoming a CPA?
62. Define assurance, attestation, and auditing in the context of "lending credibility."
1-15
Chapter 01 Auditing and Assurance Services Answer Key
Multiple Choice Questions
1. The audit objective that all transactions and accounts that should be presented in the financial
statements are in fact included is related to which of the PCAOB assertions?
A. Existence
B. Rights and obligations
C. Completeness
D. Valuation
AACSB: Analytic
AICPA: BB Legal
AICPA: FN Research
Accessibility: Keyboard Navigation
Blooms: Remember
Difficulty: 1 Easy
Learning Objective: 01-03 Describe and define the assertions that management makes about the recognition; measurement;
presentation; and disclosure of the financial statements and explain why auditors use them as the focal point of the audit.
Source: Original
Topic: Management's Financial Statement Assertions
2. Cutoff tests designed to detect purchases made before the end of the year that have been
recorded in the subsequent year provide assurance about management's assertion of
A. presentation and Disclosure.
B. completeness.
C. rights and obligations.
D. existence.
AACSB: Analytic
AICPA: BB Legal
AICPA: FN Research
Accessibility: Keyboard Navigation
Blooms: Remember
Difficulty: 2 Medium
Learning Objective: 01-03 Describe and define the assertions that management makes about the recognition; measurement;
presentation; and disclosure of the financial statements and explain why auditors use them as the focal point of the audit.
Source: Original
Topic: Management's Financial Statement Assertions
1-16
3. During an audit of an entity's stockholders' equity accounts, the auditor determines whether
there are restrictions on retained earnings resulting from loans, agreements or state law. This
audit procedure most likely is intended to verify management's assertion of
A. existence or occurrence.
B. completeness.
C. valuation or allocation.
D. presentation and disclosure.
AACSB: Analytic
AICPA: BB Legal
AICPA: FN Research
Accessibility: Keyboard Navigation
Blooms: Remember
Difficulty: 2 Medium
Learning Objective: 01-03 Describe and define the assertions that management makes about the recognition; measurement;
presentation; and disclosure of the financial statements and explain why auditors use them as the focal point of the audit.
Source: Original
Topic: Management's Financial Statement Assertions
4. The confirmation of an account payable balance selected from the general ledger provides
primary evidence regarding which management assertion?
A. Completeness
B. Valuation
C. Allocation
D. Existence
AACSB: Analytic
AICPA: BB Legal
AICPA: FN Research
Accessibility: Keyboard Navigation
Blooms: Remember
Difficulty: 2 Medium
Learning Objective: 01-03 Describe and define the assertions that management makes about the recognition; measurement;
presentation; and disclosure of the financial statements and explain why auditors use them as the focal point of the audit.
Source: Original
Topic: Management's Financial Statement Assertions
5. What type of evidence would provide the highest level of assurance in an attestation
engagement?
A. Evidence secured solely from within the entity.
B. Evidence obtained from independent sources.
C. Evidence obtained indirectly.
D. Evidence obtained from multiple internal inquiries.
AACSB: Analytic
AICPA: BB Legal
AICPA: FN Research
Accessibility: Keyboard Navigation
Blooms: Remember
Difficulty: 3 Hard
Learning Objective: 01-02 Define and contrast financial statement auditing; attestation; and assurance services.
Source: AICPA
Topic: Auditing, Attestation, and Assurance Services
1-17
6. Which of the following management assertions is an auditor most likely testing if the audit
objective states that all inventory on hand is reflected in the ending inventory balance?
A. The entity has rights to the inventory.
B. Inventory is properly valued.
C. Inventory is properly presented in the financial statements.
D. Inventory is complete.
AACSB: Analytic
AICPA: BB Legal
AICPA: FN Research
Accessibility: Keyboard Navigation
Blooms: Remember
Difficulty: 3 Hard
Learning Objective: 01-03 Describe and define the assertions that management makes about the recognition; measurement;
presentation; and disclosure of the financial statements and explain why auditors use them as the focal point of the audit.
Source: AICPA
Topic: Management's Financial Statement Assertions
7. An auditor traces the serial numbers on equipment to a nonissuer's sub-ledger. Which of the
following management assertions is supported by this test?
A. Valuation and allocation.
B. Completeness.
C. Rights and obligations.
D. Presentation and disclosure.
AACSB: Analytic
AICPA: BB Legal
AICPA: FN Research
Accessibility: Keyboard Navigation
Blooms: Remember
Difficulty: 3 Hard
Learning Objective: 01-03 Describe and define the assertions that management makes about the recognition; measurement;
presentation; and disclosure of the financial statements and explain why auditors use them as the focal point of the audit.
Source: AICPA
Topic: Management's Financial Statement Assertions
8. An auditor has substantial doubt about the entity's ability to continue as a going concern for a
reasonable period of time because of negative cash flows and working capital deficiencies.
Under these circumstances, the auditor would be most concerned about the
A. control environment factors that affect the organizational structure.
B. correlation of detection risk and inherent risk.
C. effectiveness of the entity's internal control activities.
D. possible effects on the entity's financial statements.
AACSB: Analytic
AICPA: BB Legal
AICPA: FN Research
Accessibility: Keyboard Navigation
Blooms: Remember
Difficulty: 3 Hard
Learning Objective: 01-03 Describe and define the assertions that management makes about the recognition; measurement;
presentation; and disclosure of the financial statements and explain why auditors use them as the focal point of the audit.
Source: AICPA
Topic: Management's Financial Statement Assertions
1-18
9. Which of the following types of audit evidence provides the least assurance of reliability?
A. Receivable confirmations received from the client's customers.
B. Prenumbered receiving reports completed by the client's employees.
C. Prior months' bank statements obtained from the client.
D. Municipal property tax bills prepared in the client's name.
AACSB: Analytic
AICPA: BB Legal
AICPA: FN Research
Accessibility: Keyboard Navigation
Blooms: Remember
Difficulty: 3 Hard
Learning Objective: 01-03 Describe and define the assertions that management makes about the recognition; measurement;
presentation; and disclosure of the financial statements and explain why auditors use them as the focal point of the audit.
Source: AICPA
Topic: Management's Financial Statement Assertions
10. Which of the following is a management assertion regarding account balances at the period
end?
A. Transactions and events that have been recorded have occurred and pertain to the entity.
B. Transactions and events have been recorded in the proper accounts.
C. The entity holds or controls the rights to assets, and liabilities are obligations of the entity.
D. Amounts and other data related to the transactions and events have been recorded
appropriately.
AACSB: Analytic
AICPA: BB Legal
AICPA: FN Research
Accessibility: Keyboard Navigation
Blooms: Remember
Difficulty: 3 Hard
Learning Objective: 01-03 Describe and define the assertions that management makes about the recognition; measurement;
presentation; and disclosure of the financial statements and explain why auditors use them as the focal point of the audit.
Source: AICPA
Topic: Management's Financial Statement Assertions
11. A practitioner is engaged to express an opinion on management's assertion that the square
footage of a warehouse offered for sale is 150,000 square feet. The practitioner should refer to
which of the following sources for professional guidance?
A. Statement of Auditing Standards.
B. Statements on Standards for Attestation Engagements.
C. Statements on Standards for Accounting and Review Services.
D. Statements on Standards for Consulting Services.
AACSB: Analytic
AICPA: BB Legal
AICPA: FN Research
Accessibility: Keyboard Navigation
Blooms: Remember
Difficulty: 3 Hard
Learning Objective: 01-02 Define and contrast financial statement auditing; attestation; and assurance services.
Source: AICPA
Topic: Auditing, Attestation, and Assurance Services
1-19
12. In auditing the long term debt account, an auditor's procedures most likely would focus
primarily on management's assertion of
A. existence.
B. completeness.
C. allocation.
D. rights and obligations.
AACSB: Analytic
AICPA: BB Legal
AICPA: FN Research
Accessibility: Keyboard Navigation
Blooms: Remember
Difficulty: 2 Medium
Learning Objective: 01-03 Describe and define the assertions that management makes about the recognition; measurement;
presentation; and disclosure of the financial statements and explain why auditors use them as the focal point of the audit.
Source: Original
Topic: Management's Financial Statement Assertions
13. An auditor selected items for test counts from the client's warehouse during the physical
inventory observation. The auditor then traced these test counts into the detailed inventory
listing that ultimately agreed to the financial statements. This procedure most likely provided
evidence concerning management's assertion of
A. completeness.
B. valuation.
C. presentation and disclosure.
D. existence.
E. rights and obligations.
AACSB: Analytic
AICPA: BB Legal
AICPA: FN Research
Accessibility: Keyboard Navigation
Blooms: Remember
Difficulty: 2 Medium
Learning Objective: 01-03 Describe and define the assertions that management makes about the recognition; measurement;
presentation; and disclosure of the financial statements and explain why auditors use them as the focal point of the audit.
Source: Original
Topic: Management's Financial Statement Assertions
1-20
14. An auditor selected items from the client's detailed inventory listing (that agreed to the financial
statements). During the physical inventory observation, the auditor then found each item
selected and counted the number of units on hand. Assuming that the amount on hand was
the same as the amount in the client's detailed inventory listing, this procedure most likely
would provide evidence concerning management's assertion of
A. completeness.
B. valuation.
C. presentation and disclosure.
D. existence.
E. rights and obligations.
AACSB: Analytic
AICPA: BB Legal
AICPA: FN Research
Accessibility: Keyboard Navigation
Blooms: Remember
Difficulty: 2 Medium
Learning Objective: 01-03 Describe and define the assertions that management makes about the recognition; measurement;
presentation; and disclosure of the financial statements and explain why auditors use them as the focal point of the audit.
Source: Original
Topic: Management's Financial Statement Assertions
15. According to PCAOB Auditing Standard No. 5 (AS 5), the auditor should identify significant
accounts and disclosures and their relevant assertions. Which of the following financial
statement assertions is not explicitly identified in AS 5?
A. Completeness
B. Valuation or Allocation
C. Accuracy
D. Existence or Occurrence
E. All of these are assertions identified in AS 5.
AACSB: Analytic
AICPA: BB Legal
AICPA: FN Research
Accessibility: Keyboard Navigation
Blooms: Remember
Difficulty: 2 Medium
Learning Objective: 01-03 Describe and define the assertions that management makes about the recognition; measurement;
presentation; and disclosure of the financial statements and explain why auditors use them as the focal point of the audit.
Source: Original
Topic: Management's Financial Statement Assertions
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1-21
16. When testing the completeness assertion for a liability account, an auditor ordinarily works
from the
A. financial statements to the potentially unrecorded items.
B. potentially unrecorded items to the financial statements.
C. accounting records to the supporting evidence.
D. trial balance to the subsidiary ledger.
AACSB: Analytic
AICPA: BB Legal
AICPA: FN Research
Accessibility: Keyboard Navigation
Blooms: Remember
Difficulty: 2 Medium
Learning Objective: 01-03 Describe and define the assertions that management makes about the recognition; measurement;
presentation; and disclosure of the financial statements and explain why auditors use them as the focal point of the audit.
Source: Original
Topic: Management's Financial Statement Assertions
17. If an auditor is performing procedures related to the information that is contained in the client's
pension footnote, he/she is most likely obtain evidence concerning management's assertion
about
A. rights and obligations.
B. existence.
C. valuation.
D. presentation and disclosure.
AACSB: Analytic
AICPA: BB Legal
AICPA: FN Research
Accessibility: Keyboard Navigation
Blooms: Remember
Difficulty: 2 Medium
Learning Objective: 01-03 Describe and define the assertions that management makes about the recognition; measurement;
presentation; and disclosure of the financial statements and explain why auditors use them as the focal point of the audit.
Source: Original
Topic: Management's Financial Statement Assertions
18. Which of the following questions would be inappropriate for an auditor to ask a client when
exhibiting an appropriate level of professional skepticism while completing an audit procedure
related to the internal control system?
A. What can go wrong in this process?
B. Which of your employees is a fraudster?
C. What else is important to know about this process?
D. What happens when a key employees goes on vacation?
AACSB: Analytic
AICPA: BB Legal
AICPA: FN Research
Accessibility: Keyboard Navigation
Blooms: Remember
Difficulty: 1 Easy
Learning Objective: 01-04 Define professional skepticism and explain its key characteristics.
Source: Original
Topic: Professional Skepticism
1-22
19. To be proficient as an auditor, a person must first be able to accomplish which of these tasks
in a decision-making process?
A. Identify audit evidence relevant to the verification of assertions management makes in its
unaudited financial statements and notes.
B. Formulate evidence-gathering procedures (audit plan) designed to obtain sufficient,
competent evidence about assertions management makes in financial statements and
notes.
C. Recognize the financial assertions made in management's financial statements and
footnotes.
D. Evaluate the evidence produced by the performance of procedures and decide whether
management's assertions conform to generally accepted accounting principles and reality.
AACSB: Analytic
AICPA: BB Legal
AICPA: FN Research
Accessibility: Keyboard Navigation
Blooms: Remember
Difficulty: 3 Hard
Learning Objective: 01-03 Describe and define the assertions that management makes about the recognition; measurement;
presentation; and disclosure of the financial statements and explain why auditors use them as the focal point of the audit.
Source: Original
Topic: Management's Financial Statement Assertions
20. Which of the following is an underlying condition that in part creates the demand by users for
reliable information?
A. Economic transactions that are numerous and complex
B. Decisions are time-sensitive
C. Users separated from accounting records by distance and time
D. Financial decisions that are important to investors and users
E. All of these
AACSB: Analytic
AICPA: BB Industry
AICPA: FN Research
Accessibility: Keyboard Navigation
Blooms: Remember
Difficulty: 2 Medium
Learning Objective: 01-01 Define information risk and explain how the financial statement auditing process helps to reduce this
risk; thereby reducing the cost of capital for a company.
Source: Original
Topic: User Demand for Reliable Information
1-23
21. Which of the following is not included in The American Accounting Association (AAA) definition
of auditing?
A. Potential conflict of interest
B. Systematic process
C. Assertions about economic actions
D. Established criteria
AACSB: Analytic
AICPA: BB Legal
AICPA: FN Research
Accessibility: Keyboard Navigation
Blooms: Remember
Difficulty: 1 Easy
Learning Objective: 01-02 Define and contrast financial statement auditing; attestation; and assurance services.
Source: Original
Topic: Auditing, Attestation, and Assurance Services
22. What is the term used to identify the risk that the client's financial statements may be
materially false and misleading?
A. Business risk
B. Information risk
C. Client risk
D. Risk assessment
AACSB: Analytic
AICPA: BB Legal
AICPA: FN Risk Analysis
Accessibility: Keyboard Navigation
Blooms: Remember
Difficulty: 1 Easy
Learning Objective: 01-01 Define information risk and explain how the financial statement auditing process helps to reduce this
risk; thereby reducing the cost of capital for a company.
Source: Original
Topic: User Demand for Reliable Information
23. Which of the following is not a recommendation usually made following the completion of an
operational audit?
A. Economic and efficient use of resources
B. Effective achievement of business objectives
C. Attesting to the fairness of the financial statements
D. Compliance with company policies
AACSB: Communication
AICPA: BB Legal
AICPA: FN Reporting
Accessibility: Keyboard Navigation
Blooms: Remember
Difficulty: 1 Easy
Learning Objective: 01-06 Describe the audits and auditors in governmental; internal; and operational auditing.
Source: Original
Topic: Other Kinds of Engagements and Information Professionals
1-24
24. In order to be considered as external auditors with respect to government agencies, GAO
auditors must be
A. organizationally independent.
B. empowered as the accounting and auditing agency by the U.S. Congress.
C. funded by the federal government.
D. guided by standards similar to GAAS.
AACSB: Ethics
AICPA: BB Legal
AICPA: FN Research
Accessibility: Keyboard Navigation
Blooms: Remember
Difficulty: 2 Medium
Learning Objective: 01-06 Describe the audits and auditors in governmental; internal; and operational auditing.
Source: Original
Topic: Other Kinds of Engagements and Information Professionals
25. Which of the following is the essential purpose of the audit function?
A. Detection of fraud
B. Examination of individual transactions to certify as to their validity
C. Determination of whether the client's financial statement assertions are fairly state
D. Assurance of the consistent application of correct accounting procedures
AACSB: Analytic
AICPA: BB Legal
AICPA: FN Reporting
Accessibility: Keyboard Navigation
Blooms: Remember
Difficulty: 2 Medium
Learning Objective: 01-02 Define and contrast financial statement auditing; attestation; and assurance services.
Source: Original
Topic: Auditing, Attestation, and Assurance Services
26. The audit objective that all the transactions and accounts presented in the financial statements
represent real assets, liabilities, revenues, and expenses is related most closely to which of
the PCAOB assertions?
A. Existence or occurrence
B. Rights and obligations
C. Completeness
D. Presentation and disclosure
AACSB: Analytic
AICPA: BB Legal
AICPA: FN Research
Accessibility: Keyboard Navigation
Blooms: Remember
Difficulty: 1 Easy
Learning Objective: 01-03 Describe and define the assertions that management makes about the recognition; measurement;
presentation; and disclosure of the financial statements and explain why auditors use them as the focal point of the audit.
Source: Original
Topic: Management's Financial Statement Assertions
1-25
27. The audit objective that all transactions are recorded in the proper period is related most
closely to which of the Audit Standards Board (ASB) transaction assertions?
A. Occurrence
B. Completeness
C. Cutoff
D. Accuracy
AACSB: Analytic
AICPA: BB Legal
AICPA: FN Research
Accessibility: Keyboard Navigation
Blooms: Remember
Difficulty: 1 Easy
Learning Objective: 01-03 Describe and define the assertions that management makes about the recognition; measurement;
presentation; and disclosure of the financial statements and explain why auditors use them as the focal point of the audit.
Source: Original
Topic: Management's Financial Statement Assertions
28. The audit objective that all transactions are recorded in the proper account is related most
closely to which one of the ASB transaction assertions?
A. Occurrence
B. Completeness
C. Accuracy
D. Classification
AACSB: Analytic
AICPA: BB Legal
AICPA: FN Research
Accessibility: Keyboard Navigation
Blooms: Remember
Difficulty: 1 Easy
Learning Objective: 01-03 Describe and define the assertions that management makes about the recognition; measurement;
presentation; and disclosure of the financial statements and explain why auditors use them as the focal point of the audit.
Source: Original
Topic: Management's Financial Statement Assertions
29. The audit objective that all balances include items owned by the client is related most closely
to which one of the ASB balance assertions?
A. Existence
B. Rights and obligations
C. Completeness
D. Valuation
AACSB: Analytic
AICPA: BB Legal
AICPA: FN Research
Accessibility: Keyboard Navigation
Blooms: Remember
Difficulty: 1 Easy
Learning Objective: 01-03 Describe and define the assertions that management makes about the recognition; measurement;
presentation; and disclosure of the financial statements and explain why auditors use them as the focal point of the audit.
Source: Original
Topic: Management's Financial Statement Assertions
1-26
30. The audit objective that all balances include all items that should be recorded in that account
is related most closely to which one of the ASB balance assertions?
A. Existence
B. Rights and obligations
C. Completeness
D. Valuation
AACSB: Analytic
AICPA: BB Legal
AICPA: FN Research
Accessibility: Keyboard Navigation
Blooms: Remember
Difficulty: 1 Easy
Learning Objective: 01-03 Describe and define the assertions that management makes about the recognition; measurement;
presentation; and disclosure of the financial statements and explain why auditors use them as the focal point of the audit.
Source: Original
Topic: Management's Financial Statement Assertions
31. The audit objective that footnotes in the financial statements should be clear and expressed
such that the information is easily conveyed to the readers of the financial statements is
related most closely with which of the ASB presentation and disclosure assertions?
A. Occurrence
B. Rights and obligations
C. Comprehensibility
D. Understandability
AACSB: Analytic
AICPA: BB Legal
AICPA: FN Research
Accessibility: Keyboard Navigation
Blooms: Remember
Difficulty: 1 Easy
Learning Objective: 01-03 Describe and define the assertions that management makes about the recognition; measurement;
presentation; and disclosure of the financial statements and explain why auditors use them as the focal point of the audit.
Source: Original
Topic: Management's Financial Statement Assertions
1-27
32. The engineering department at Omni Company built a piece of equipment in the company's
own shop for use in the company's operations. The auditor reviewed all work orders that were
capitalized as part of the equipment costs. Which of the following is the ASB transaction
assertion most closely related to the auditor's testing?
A. Occurrence
B. Completeness
C. Accuracy
D. Classification
AACSB: Analytic
AICPA: BB Legal
AICPA: FN Research
Accessibility: Keyboard Navigation
Blooms: Understand
Difficulty: 3 Hard
Learning Objective: 01-03 Describe and define the assertions that management makes about the recognition; measurement;
presentation; and disclosure of the financial statements and explain why auditors use them as the focal point of the audit.
Source: Original
Topic: Management's Financial Statement Assertions
33. The engineering department at Omni Company built a piece of equipment in the company's
own shop for use in the company's operations. When looking at the ending balance for the
fixed asset account the auditor examined all work orders, purchased materials, labor cost
reports, and applied overhead that were capitalized as part of the equipment costs. Which of
the following is the ASB balance assertion most closely related to the auditor's testing?
A. Existence
B. Completeness
C. Rights and obligations
D. Valuation
AACSB: Analytic
AICPA: BB Legal
AICPA: FN Research
Accessibility: Keyboard Navigation
Blooms: Understand
Difficulty: 3 Hard
Learning Objective: 01-03 Describe and define the assertions that management makes about the recognition; measurement;
presentation; and disclosure of the financial statements and explain why auditors use them as the focal point of the audit.
Source: Original
Topic: Management's Financial Statement Assertions
1-28
34. Which of the following best describes the primary role and responsibility of independent
external auditor?
A. Produce a company's annual financial statements and notes.
B. Express an opinion on the fairness of a company's annual financial statements and
footnotes.
C. Provide business consulting advice to audit clients.
D. Obtain an understanding of the client's internal control structure and give management a
report about control problems and deficiencies.
AACSB: Analytic
AICPA: BB Legal
AICPA: FN Research
Accessibility: Keyboard Navigation
Blooms: Remember
Difficulty: 1 Easy
Learning Objective: 01-02 Define and contrast financial statement auditing; attestation; and assurance services.
Source: Original
Topic: Auditing, Attestation, and Assurance Services
35. Which of the following best describes the main reason independent auditors report on
management's financial statements?
A. Management fraud may exist and it is likely to be detected by independent auditors.
B. The management that prepares the statements and the persons who use the statements
may have conflicting interests.
C. Misstated account balances may be corrected as the result of the independent audit work.
D. The management that prepares the statements may have a poorly designed system of
internal control.
AACSB: Analytic
AICPA: BB Industry
AICPA: FN Reporting
Accessibility: Keyboard Navigation
Blooms: Understand
Difficulty: 2 Medium
Learning Objective: 01-02 Define and contrast financial statement auditing; attestation; and assurance services.
Source: Original
Topic: Auditing, Attestation, and Assurance Services
1-29
36. The auditor's judgment concerning the overall fairness of the presentation of financial position,
results of operations, and cash flows is applied within the framework of
A. quality control.
B. generally accepted auditing standards, which include the concept of materiality.
C. the auditor's evaluation of the audited company's internal control.
D. the applicable financial reporting framework (i.e., GAAP in the United States).
AACSB: Analytic
AICPA: BB Legal
AICPA: FN Research
Accessibility: Keyboard Navigation
Blooms: Remember
Difficulty: 2 Medium
Learning Objective: 01-02 Define and contrast financial statement auditing; attestation; and assurance services.
Source: Original
Topic: Auditing, Attestation, and Assurance Services
37. Assurance services involve all of the following, except
A. relevance as well as the reliability of information.
B. nonfinancial information as well as traditional financial statements.
C. providing absolute rather than reasonable assurance.
D. electronic databases as well as printed reports.
AACSB: Analytic
AICPA: BB Industry
AICPA: FN Research
Accessibility: Keyboard Navigation
Blooms: Remember
Difficulty: 2 Medium
Learning Objective: 01-02 Define and contrast financial statement auditing; attestation; and assurance services.
Source: Original
Topic: Auditing, Attestation, and Assurance Services
38. Because of the risk of material misstatement, an audit of financial statements in accordance
with generally accepted auditing standards should be planned and performed with an attitude
of
A. objective judgment.
B. independent integrity.
C. professional skepticism.
D. impartial conservatism.
AACSB: Analytic
AICPA: BB Legal
AICPA: FN Risk Analysis
Accessibility: Keyboard Navigation
Blooms: Remember
Difficulty: 2 Medium
Learning Objective: 01-04 Define professional skepticism and explain its key characteristics.
Source: AICPA
Topic: Professional Skepticism
1-30
39. Which of the following best describes assurance services?
A. Independent professional services that report on the client's financial statements
B. Independent professional services that improve the quality of information for decision
makers
C. Independent professional services that report on specific written management assertions
D. Independent professional services that improve the operations of the client
AACSB: Analytic
AICPA: BB Industry
AICPA: FN Research
Accessibility: Keyboard Navigation
Blooms: Remember
Difficulty: 2 Medium
Learning Objective: 01-02 Define and contrast financial statement auditing; attestation; and assurance services.
Source: Original
Topic: Auditing, Attestation, and Assurance Services
40. Which of the following is not a PCAOB assertion about inventory related to presentation and
disclosure?
A. Inventory is properly classified as a current asset on the balance sheet.
B. Inventory is properly stated at its cost on the balance sheet.
C. Major inventory categories and their valuation bases are adequately disclosed in notes.
D. All of these are PCAOB presentation and disclosure assertions about inventory
AACSB: Analytic
AICPA: BB Legal
AICPA: FN Research
Accessibility: Keyboard Navigation
Blooms: Understand
Difficulty: 2 Medium
Learning Objective: 01-03 Describe and define the assertions that management makes about the recognition; measurement;
presentation; and disclosure of the financial statements and explain why auditors use them as the focal point of the audit.
Source: Original
Topic: Management's Financial Statement Assertions
41. Which of the following is not an ASB assertion about inventory related to presentation and
disclosure?
A. Inventory is properly classified as a current asset on the balance sheet.
B. Inventory is properly stated at cost on the balance sheet.
C. Major inventory categories and their valuation bases are adequately disclosed in notes.
D. All of these are ASB presentation and disclosure assertions about inventory.
AACSB: Analytic
AICPA: BB Legal
AICPA: FN Research
Accessibility: Keyboard Navigation
Blooms: Understand
Difficulty: 2 Medium
Learning Objective: 01-03 Describe and define the assertions that management makes about the recognition; measurement;
presentation; and disclosure of the financial statements and explain why auditors use them as the focal point of the audit.
Source: Original
Topic: Management's Financial Statement Assertions
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Keith wanted to go to him and help him, but he knew that he
wanted to be alone. Fathers did not call for little boys to help them
at such times.
It might have aided poor RoBards a little to feel that he himself
was at just such a distance from his own heavenly Father, and He as
helpless to explain. But that would not comport with any theology he
understood. And he paced his cage.
CHAPTER XX
WHEN RoBards had cried out all the blasphemy in his heart he fell to
praying for some divine miracle to undo the past, to erase the truth
and turn it into a nightmare. But soon he was put into God’s place
and proved himself as adamant to prayer.
He had walked until he fell upon the old sofa. He rose from that,
remembering that Harry Chalender had lain there when he was
wounded. He went to a big chair and sank into it, a mere heap of
weary bones and flaccid muscles.
Then his eyes paced the room, walking along the shelves, reading
the names of books: lawbooks, philosophies, fiction, poetry—all of
them records of the vanity of human efforts to conquer the storms
that swept spirit and flesh. Every title was a monument of defeat.
To escape these reminders, his eyes went longingly to the window
where they could release their vision like the raven set free upon the
flooded world.
He rose and leaned upon the casement and stared into the sky,
and saw nothing but blue emptiness, the infinite idle azure, soulless,
sorrowless, loveless, hateless, deaf, dumb, indifferent, without
shame or mercy, morals or duties; the inverted ocean of the
heavens, the topless pit where souls went hurtling when the earth
flung them into its depths to drown in eternity, to emerge upon
some inconceivable shore and crawl forward to the feet of judgment
for everlasting doom or everlasting bliss.
It was said that Eyes looked down from there and saw the
sparrow fall, saw the least quirk of a finger, saw through the brain
and watched the darkest thoughts that stole like thieves through the
night of a mind.
Yet the sparrow fell, or went soaring away in the claws of the
hawk; the little children died or lived to be trodden and gored and
seared and crazed with fright. And the child’s cry for help was as
unheard or unheeded as the sparrow’s.
Rebellious thoughts stirred RoBards to mutiny. He was ready to
defy heaven and denounce its indifferent tyranny, as Lucifer had
done and the other angels. Better to be thrust over the jasper walls
and to fall for seven days into hell than not to protest.
And then he was himself put to the test of an appeal for his
mercy. He heard a voice below him and glanced forth from his
window as from a little heaven to a petitioner on earth.
“Please, sir, could I have a word with you, if you please, sir.”
As he looked down and with a kind of divinity understood
beforehand just who was praying and what the prayer would be and
that it would not be granted, he felt that God must find it hard at
times to look into some of the wrinkled old faces that are upturned
in desperate appeal, like shriveled flowers praying for rain.
“I’m Mrs. Lasher, sir, of down the road a bit. You’re always passin’
our house. It’s not much to see and I’ve not had luck with my
children, for all they’re so many; but to-day I—would you—could you
spare me a minute of your precious time, sir—could you?”
He was afraid to ask her in or to encourage her at all; for he
dreaded his own weakness. He sat on the window sill and,
abstaining from any temptation to courtesy, said:
“Go on.”
She took complete discouragement from his manner, and went
into a panic, pursing her lips and doddering and mixing her fingers
together in a silly restlessness as she spoke:
“It’s about my son, Jud, sir. He says he’s goin’ to sea for a sailor.”
“Why?”
“His only reason is because you gave him the advice to go.”
“Well, why not?”
“Oh, if it comes to that! He’s not much brains and he knows
nothing of the ships. He is none too good here in this lonely place
and what wouldn’t he be were he to mingle with sailors and the like?
They must be terrible people from all I hear—and the danger, sir.
They say they fall off masts and they go mad and jump in the sea
and the sharks follow them and in the ports they get drunk and get
killed and for the least thing they tie them to masts or whatever they
are and whip their poor bare backs till the blood streams and they
hit them with iron weights and—oh, from all they tell me it’s a hell’s
own life, if you’ll excuse the saying. And at best my boy would be
gone for maybe five years or more and we never hearing a word of
how he is, or if he’s alive even. Oh, I couldn’t abear it, Mr. RoBards. I
need Jud at home. He’s strong and helps me sometimes and when
the strange tempers are not on him he’s as good a boy to his mother
as ever boy was; and when the strange tempers are on him, he
needs his mother more than I can tell you.
“To-day now, he came home all bloody and battered like, and I
misdoubt he was trespassin’ on your property, often as I’ve told him
never to bother you. He said he fell out of a tree into your pond up
there whilst he was robbin’ birds’ nests. I don’t believe him and it’s
likely you had to thrash him. I see your knuckles is all scarred and
I’m sorry for any trouble he gave you, and welcome you are to whip
him whenever he annoys you, and the punishment is what he needs,
but don’t send him away, Mister RoBards.
“To-day I could wash his wounds and tie them up and put him to
bed where his father won’t find him and whip him again. But oh, if
he was at sea and was hurt or punished, who would wash his
wounds for him and tie them up and give him a little petting when
he needs it?
“He’s a lonely boy, sir. He’s like a haunted house sometimes, full of
ghosts and queer notions and—but I’m taking too much of your
valuable time. I came over only to ask you, would you take back
your advice and tell him not to go to sea, sir!—if you please, sir!”
“I’m sorry, Mrs. Lasher, very sorry, but I can’t.”
“Oh, but to send him away whalin’! Five years gone into the
storms and the wickedness, with nobody to pray for him or give him
a kind word. The wickedness of the sailors——”
“There’s wickedness everywhere, Mrs. Lasher.”
“But not up here where everything’s so clean and sweet and
beautiful. There’s wickedness of course here in plenty, but it’s
nothing to what the ships has on them. It’s as good as sending my
boy to hell to send him to sea.”
“I can’t help you. I’m sorry—very sorry.”
Her wildly beseeching eyes fell before the sad sternness of his.
She nodded meekly:
“All right, sir. Thank you, sir. You know best, I suppose.”
And with this Thy-will-be-done she accepted her fate. She was
used to being denied her prayers. She turned and moved across the
grass toward the gate. She paused once or twice to look back, as if
hoping that he would relent. RoBards gazed at her with profound
pity, but he could not grant her plea. Finding that he would not
beckon her to return, Mrs. Lasher nodded, slipped through the gate,
and moved on to what must be almost the funeral of her boy.
She left RoBards in as much confusion as his benumbed spirit
could feel. The reptile Jud had evidently told his mother only a part
of the story. He had remembered enough to lie about the cause of
his punishment. But how long could he be trusted to keep the rest
concealed?
Who could keep a secret? Immy’s pitiful future was already at the
mercy of her own babbling, of her little brother’s wondering, of the
farmer’s wife who loved gossip, and of twist-wit Jud.
RoBards was afraid even of his own power to keep it inviolate.
Suppose he himself talked in his sleep and Patty heard him?
Suppose that in one of his wild tempers, when wrath like a
drunkenness made him eager to fling off all decencies and rave in
insults, he should hurl this truth at Patty or someone else?
In many of the rocks on the farm the roots of trees had made little
rifts and squeezed and squirmed and grown until they split granite
asunder. What heart could withstand the relentless pressure, from
the irresistible gimleting of a secret?
Once the truth was uttered, it could no more be recalled than the
dead itself. It was cruelly easy in this world to do, to say, to think;
and hideously impossible to undo, unsay, unthink. One could only
add repentance and remorse to guilt or carelessness.
Repentance and remorse were dangerous, too, to the soul, for one
could repent a good deed, a mercy, an abstention as easily as evil.
He found now in his conscience nothing but regret that he had let
that filthy serpent crawl away. The copperhead had struck and he
had merely bruised it and left it alive with all its venom, and the
forked tongue and hissing of gossip.
In this room he had sorely repented two deeds of pity: sparing
Chalender’s life and Jud Lasher’s. What a poltroon thing pity was,
after all!
The next day he rode over to White Plains and found a letter from
Patty among his mail. He read it on the way home, letting the reins
lie in the mane of the horse while he conned the pages. They were
dashed off in a mood of girlish hilarity. New York was a fountain of
renewing youth to her. It had grown enormously, she said, since she
left it a few months ago. The railroad journey was a sensational
adventure. Like most of the other passengers, she had been fairly
choked with smoke and riddled with cinders and one of them had
stuck in her eye a long while. But New York with even half an eye
was heaven.
She hoped that he would come soon. She would have the house
ready for him in a few days. St. John’s Park that had been way
uptown when they moved in was already slipping downtown. It was
mighty pretty, though, and the water when it came would make it a
paradise of convenience. She reminded him to keep the children off
the highway and away from those miserable Lashers.
Her solemn edicts were as girlishly innocent as her gayeties. It
made bitter reading, that warning—that ex post facto warning—
against the Lashers. Whatever happened she must never know this
blighting truth.
In a few days Immy was playing in the yard again. She seemed to
have forgotten her experience as she forgot the nightmares that
sometimes woke her screaming from sleep. But now and then she
would cast upon her father a look of amazement. In her games with
Keith she shrieked more easily in a wilder alarm. Her shrieks stabbed
RoBards and made him dread that the experience had worked some
permanent injury in the fabric of the child’s soul.
All the ignorance that had been wrapped about her youth for her
protection was gone now. The blindfold had been snatched from her
eyes. The questions that she had been rebuked for asking, were
brutally answered and yet left unanswered. The beauty, the mystery,
the holiness of innocence had been torn like the rent veil in the
temple, and only the uglier knowledge vouchsafed.
And a stain had been cast upon her indelibly. She would be
regarded with pity and yet with horror forever. She was branded with
all the curses of abominable sin, though she had had no choice, no
share, no understanding of it.
And such things could happen in a world where the fall of a
sparrow was marked—marked but not prevented!
Immy must at all costs be sheltered from any further hazards. It
seemed unwise to take her to the city, where dangers thronged
everywhere, and pollution increased hourly. But when he hinted that
it might be better not to go to town for the procession, Immy almost
went into a convulsion of protest. She pleaded that she had a special
right to see the parade because she had been so badly hurt.
RoBards granted the prayer to silence the argument. He wondered
if Jud Lasher had left yet, but dared not ask. When he rode past the
hut, he put spurs to his horse lest the mother accost him again, but
his sidelong glances never caught a glimpse of Jud.
He did not know that the wretch had lain abed for days while his
bruises mended and that when he was up again and saw RoBards in
the road, he ran and hid, stealing out again to shake his fist at the
vanishing figure and gibber new threats.
At length the parade day drew near. Mr. and Mrs. Albeson decided
to go in the farm wagon drawn by their own team. Mrs. Albeson
would not risk her bones in the steam railroad and she quenched her
husband’s enthusiasm for an experimental ride on the devil-wagons.
She cooked a dinner and a supper for RoBards and the children and
set the table for them and drove off.
RoBards had promised the children a ride on the steam-cars and
planned to leave the house the next morning. After the Albesons had
clattered away, he went to his library to select such books as he
might want in town during the winter. He walked now and then to
the window to watch the children playing on the lawn.
As he stood there once he caught sight of a lone pedestrian, a
hulking youth who carried his belongings in a bag hung on a stick
slung across his shoulder. He recognized Jud Lasher—evidently on
his way to sea.
Without telling them why, RoBards called the children indoors.
They scampered about his feet for a while, then their game led them
gradually into the hall. There they played hide and seek, with long
silences broken by loud outcries and a racket of running and
laughter.
After a vague period he woke from a reverie like a deep sleep and
realized that he had not heard their voices for a long time. He called;
there was no answer. He cried their names up the stairway. A sense
of some uncanny horror set his heart athrob. He went back to the
library window puzzled, calling.
Then he caught sight of Keith standing chubbily against a huge
tulip tree with his hands over his eyes. He was counting loudly.
RoBards smiled at the solemnity of the everlasting game of hide-
and-seek—grown-ups and infants hiding their eyes and hiding
themselves and making a sport of what should be a serious
business.
He looked about for Immy, expecting to see her crouching behind
a crimson rambler’s trellis or some other concealment. He heard a
faint cry, so faint and far away that it might have been a distant bird.
His gaze darted here and there. A moving figure caught his eye on a
hillside. He saw that it was Jud Lasher, and that he was running
toward a thicket on a ledge of rocks. In his arms he held something
that struggled. RoBards knitted his brows and shaded his eyes to
peer into the glare of the afternoon sun. He heard again that
delicate call. It sounded like Immy’s voice; it frightened him.
He pushed through the window and dropped to the lawn. He saw
his horse grazing near; saddled, the reins trailing along the ground.
RoBards ran to him, caught him as he whirled to bolt, threw the
reins back over his neck, set foot in stirrup and rose to the saddle.
As the horse reared, RoBards struck him between the ears with his
fist to bring him down, then sent him flying to the gate. He turned
him into the main road and the horse, catching terror and rage from
his rider, beat the dust into a rolling cloud.
At the point where he had seen Jud running, RoBards jerked the
bridle and, setting the horse to the low stone wall, lifted him over
before he had time to refuse. Up the hill RoBards kept him on the
run. He caught sight of Jud Lasher as Jud Lasher caught sight of
him. Only a little way the fugitive went before he flung Immy down
like a bundle, and darted into a chaos of rocks and thistles and of
tall sycamores holding out naked branches livid with leprous white
patches.
RoBards did not pause by Immy’s side but rode on, his heels
beating a tattoo on the horse’s ribs.
Jud Lasher was mad with fright, but terror made him as agile as a
weasel. He slipped easily through mazes that the horse must blunder
over or around.
RoBards was so intent upon him that he did not see a heavy
sycamore bough thrust right across his path until it swept him from
the saddle. But he kept clutch on the reins, dragged the horse’s
head round and brought him to earth.
RoBards was up and in the saddle before the horse could rise. He
charged on up the hill and overtaking Jud Lasher in a clearing, rode
him down. The youth fell begging for mercy, but when the horse
swerved to avoid him RoBards lifted his head so sharply that he
went up beating the air with his forehoofs. Then he came down with
them upon the prostrate body like a great two-tined pitchfork.
Keith who had stood watching his father’s pursuit from a long
distance hid his head in his arm. Immy watching from where she lay,
covered her eyes with her hands. They saw their father slip from the
saddle and disappear behind a shelving boulder. There was a brief
hubbub, then silence.
After a long time of awful emptiness, their father came down the
hillside leading the horse.
He went to Immy and lifted her in his arms, and kissing her,
mumbling:
“Did he scare you?”
She nodded, almost more afraid of her father than of Jud.
“He won’t scare you again. He’s gone now.”
“Far?”
“Far.”
“I’m glad! I was hiding behind the big rose bush and he grabbed
me like a big bear would; and he runned off with me. I’m glad he’s
gone.”
She laughed, but her father set his palm across her mouth quickly
and hugged her to his heart so hard that she cried out.
He made her promise that she would say nothing also of this and
when she asked him why Jud wouldn’t let her alone, he said:
“He will now. But if you tell anybody he will come back for you.”
He scanned the landscape, but nobody was to be seen except
little Keith waiting in a daze.
He took the two children into the house and once more solemnly
pledged them never to mention the name of Jud Lasher, or the
efforts he had made to steal Immy.
When supper time came RoBards waited on the two children, but
did not eat.
He put them early to bed, and heard their prayers, and waited till
he was assured they were sound asleep. They felt his kisses upon
their brows as they sank away into oblivion.
CHAPTER XXI
IT was black when Keith woke suddenly. Some little sound had
pierced the depths of his profound immersion in sleep. He imagined
Indians or Cowboys or Skinners. His ears seemed to rise like a
terrier’s; his skin bristled with attention. He wondered if thieves were
about; or lions or tigers or any of the witches or hobgoblins that
peopled the night.
It was the good old custom to invoke all manner of demons for
the discipline of children. Good children never asked questions or
never delayed to sleep. Bad children were watched not only by an
unsleeping God of remarkable vindictiveness but by swarms of
demons, child-eating animals, ogres that made ginger-bread of
babies, or so-called saints who broiled them on live coals in a
kitchen called hell. It was a hard world for children here and
hereafter.
The nightmares that attended waking hours were horrifying, but
at night alone upstairs, with the dark smothering and blinding the
wide eyes that could see little and imagine much, and the room a
very lair of shapeless monsters that could see without being seen, it
was the supreme torment. Even to cry aloud to nurse for help or a
bit of light was to incur an added punishment. To run wildly out of
the cavern and seek shelter in parental arms was to incur ridicule
and often to shock strange guests and bring shame upon father and
mother.
Even grown-up people lost their senses when they were awake in
the dark and made spooks and ghosts of dark chairs and tables,
heard groans and clanking chains in the night-wind noises and the
creaking of restless timbers.
RoBards as a child had run the gauntlet of such agonies. He tried
to save his children from them, but in vain. The lonely babies
concocted fiends of their own, and nurses, impatient to be free of
their importunities, added traditional atrocities.
RoBards had caught one or two of the nurses at the ancient game
and discharged them, only to be looked upon as a meddler. He had
threatened the dusky Teen with a return to slavery if she did not try
to disabuse the children’s minds of savagery. But she believed too
much herself to be relied upon to inculcate atheism.
Keith was a brave little knight, however, and an investigator by
instinct. Instinctively he pitted his inborn skepticism against the
tyrannies of imagination, and when he could not exorcise a fiend by
denying it, he met it with bravery. His bedroom was a little
Thermopylæ and he Leonidas fighting the swarming hosts.
Sometimes he surrendered and buried his head under the pillow.
Sometimes he put them all to ignominious flight. He had an ally of
mystic powers who now and then gave unconscious aid: an old
crack-voiced rooster, a tenor who had seen better days, who
dreamed aloud at midnight of his former glories and snored a sleepy
cock-a-doodle-doo long before the young beaux started their
morning fanfare.
This old rooster’s drowsy utterances always reminded Keith that
dawn would come again and the sun with its long broom of light
would sweep the room clear of its child-hating mobs. The blessed
sun would explain the panther about to spring as an old rocking
chair, the broom-straddling witch at the window as a tulip tree
bough, the pirate with uplifted cutlass as a pile of clothes.
Keith loved realism. He was educating himself in the night school
to disbelieve the dark, to rely upon hard facts and distrust his
terrifying fancies. A dawning scientist was evolving so fast that each
week covered an æon of human experience.
Besides, he had an explorer’s curiosity, a soldier’s curiosity, a
willingness to bet his safety against any mystery that threatened or
nagged him.
He had put to flight no end of Indians, Skinners, and bogies by
simply pointing his forefinger at them, snapping his trigger-thumb
and observing, “Bang! bang!”
To-night he quaked only a few minutes before he realized that
whatever the menace was it was downstairs. His first theory was
that Jud Lasher might be stealing back to make another attempt to
carry Immy away. The why of Jud’s persistence baffled him—as well
it might. His best guess was that Jud wanted to take Immy with him
on the whaling ship that his father had commanded him to join.
This thought substituted anger for terror. Keith’s little heart
plunged with resentment and he slipped out of bed. The first sweat
of fear chilled as he stood barefoot on the creaking floor. Then, like a
child ghost in his long white nightshirt, he stole from his room to the
hall. He peered into Immy’s room and saw that she was asleep in
safety. He padded stealthily to his father’s room and, lifting the latch
as silently as he could, swung back the door. He was stunned to find
the room empty, the bed unoccupied, the covers still smooth and
taut.
His father might be at work in the library. He peered over the
banisters, but the library door was open and no light yellowed the
hall carpet as he had so often seen it when he had wakened on
other occasions and made adventurous forays about the house in
search of a drink or reinforcements against the armies in his room.
Sometimes he had dared to steal down into the pantry and loot
the cooky-jar. The thought of the pantry emboldened him now. He
descended the stairway slowly with the awe of an Orpheus in Hades.
The moon poured down on the front of the house; and, streaming
through the glass in the front door, carpeted the lower hall with a
swaying pattern of moon-dappled tree-shadows. Keith felt as if he
waded a little brook of light as he flitted here and there. The sound
continued, but always from below.
He went at last to the cellar door. This house boasted to all
passers-by that its builders had not placed the cellar out in the yard
but had tucked it under the ground floor. There were two doors to
the cellar, one in the kitchen, one on the outside of the house.
Keith was interested to find a little glow of light on the kitchen
floor, seeping in from the cellar. He listened and heard someone
moving about, heard a mystifying chipping noise, such as the stone-
cutters had made when they put the new marble hearthstone in
place and when they had recently enlarged the cellar and
strengthened the foundation with a course or two of stone. The
cellar walls were eleven feet thick in places.
They were made, Mr. Albeson said, “in the good old days when
builders were honest and houses were solid—none of your modern
flimsies.”
Keith had spent much time there on the cellar stairs watching the
masons and asking questions. He had learned much of the chemistry
of mortar and the dangers of quicklime. He had seen it smoke like
milk on fire. He had been told that if he fell in it he would disappear,
be just eaten up bones and all.
What could be going on down there now? Masons did not work at
night. A burglar would hardly try to cut his way through stone
foundations when the windows were usually left unlocked.
Keith reached up and putting his fat hand on the thumb-latch
pressed it down with all the gentleness he could command. Not a
sound did he make, and the door came open silently. But a damp
draught enveloped him and icy water seemed to flow round his
ankles.
With the wind that poured up the stairs came a stream of light,
and an increase of sound. He leaned through the door and stared
down.
He saw his father in rough old clothes splotched with white. He
looked like a mason and he was dragging from the thick wall of the
chimney a big stone. On the cellar floor were many others ragged
with old mortar. In the chimney was a big hole and his father was
making it bigger.
Keith’s darting eyes made out a long box of white lime fuming and
simmering with a long something half buried in it.
He watched his father in a stupor of bewilderment while he
cleared a sort of oven in the wall. He had never seen such a look on
his father’s face. At length he took the lamp and set it in another
place, and bent to draw that something from the quicklime box.
As he hoisted it awkwardly out of the shadow into the light, Keith
saw that it was Jud Lasher.
He seemed to be asleep, for he hung all limp in white clothes and
he made no sound.
Keith saw his father carry the gaunt, gangling form to the chimney
and stuff it into the hollow. It would not fit, and he began frantically
thrusting at the arms and legs to crowd them in. The head rolled
across the edge and Keith caught sight of the face.
Jud was not asleep! He was——
The boy pitched forward; slid and thudded down the cellar stairs
head first.
He fell and fell. The next thing he knew was the feel of his bed
about him. His head was on his pillow. The covers tucked under his
chin.
His head was swimming and there was a big throbbing lump on
his forehead. As he put his hand to its ache, his eyes made out a tall
figure standing by him.
“That you, Papa?”
“Yes, Keith.”
“Papa! what happened?”
“You must have had a dream, honey.”
“But my head hurts.”
“I heard you scream and I found you on the floor.”
“In my room?”
“Yes.”
“That’s funny! I thought I fell down the cellar stairs.”
“That would be funny!”
“I thought I saw you in the cellar.”
“What would I be doing in the cellar?”
“You were—papa, where’s Jud Lasher?”
“He’s gone to sea, hasn’t he?”
“Will he come back? Ever?”
“Not unless you talk about him. He might if you do.”
“I thought you didn’t believe in ghosts.”
“There are ghosts and ghosts. Foolish people talk about the
imaginary ones. The real ones—big men don’t talk about them at all,
and you’re getting to be a big man, aren’t you?”
“Yes, papa; yes, sir.”
He was dizzy. He swung like a blown rag on a clothesline—or like a
sailor on a—a whaler. A sailor on a whaler.
The old rooster snored. His father’s hands came out across the
ocean and drew the covers over the sailor’s hands. He—he was—
was——
It was morning.
It takes girls a long while to dress, and Keith was always
downstairs long before Immy. This morning he was quicker than
ever. He wanted to get to that cellar and see it by daylight.
He met his father in the hall, pacing up and down. His father
looked at him queerly as if he were afraid. That was a silly thing to
think, of course, but his father looked sick—as if he hadn’t slept well
or any at all.
The boy thought it best to be frank.
“Papa, was that a dream? All of it?”
“Was what a dream?”
“About me being in the cellar and seeing you taking stones out of
the wall.”
“Let’s go down and look at the cellar.”
Keith loved that. When in doubt, visit the scene of the legend.
He went down the steps. The morning light came in through little
windows smeared with cobwebs.
Keith missed first the heap of stones on the floor, the hole in the
foundation of the chimney, the box of quicklime. The stones were in
place. There was no hole in the wall, no quicklime. The cellar floor
was clean—cleaner than usual.
“I guess it was a dream, papa.”
He took his father’s hand. The hand felt funny, gritty and clammy,
as if it had been washed very hard. He glanced down and the nails
were white along the edges.
He said nothing as they started upstairs, but his backward look
noted a thing he thought he ought to speak of:
“Papa, the stones in the chimney look like they’d been chiseled out
and put back in again with fresh mortar.”
“Do they?” his father gasped, and sat down hard on the cellar
steps. He nodded and groaned wearily.
“They do look that way.”
He thought a while, then rose and took an old broom and jabbed
it into spider webs on the windows and whisked them away and
spread them across the fresh lines.
“Does that look better?”
“If you could get the spiders to move there it would.”
Now the boy felt that he was made an accomplice. His father took
his criticism and acted on it.
It was the most wonderful thing that had ever happened to the
boy. He was saving his father from some mistake. The greatest
lawyer in the world was taking Keith’s advice. He groaned with
delight and hugged his father’s arm, murmuring:
“We’re like pardners——”
“Partners we are.”
“I’m a big man now at last. Couldn’t you let me know ever’thing,
so’s I could help you when you needed me?”
His father gazed at him devotedly and kissed him. He did not like
that kissing business. Big men did not indulge in such girls’ play. Still
he remembered the story of Nelson’s death in the sea battle and
how the fearless admiral’s last words were a plea to another officer
to kiss him.
But in spite of this burst of affection his father would not explain
the Lasher mystery; he said the boy was too young to know. Yet he
was not too young to tell enough to let other grown-up people
know. RoBards, haggard with loss of sleep and the storms he had
barely weathered, was frantic to prevent the children from
publishing the devastating news.
Curiosity would work in them like a yeast and the instinct to ask
questions could only be overcome by some overwhelming injunction.
He led Keith to the library and fetched out the vast family Bible,
and set the boy’s little hand on it and said:
“Swear that you will never mention Jud Lasher’s name to anybody,
or breathe a word of what he did or what I did to him. Do you
swear?”
“Yes, papa, I swear, and I p’omise——”
“Do you know what happens to people who break their oaths?”
“Oh, yessir, they burn in hell-fire forever and ever, amen.”
His father paid the boy a noble homage when he made the appeal
to his chivalry above his fear:
“Worse than that, it would mean that if you told, your little sister
would be shamed before everybody as long as she lived. Everybody
would think of her as if she were worse than wicked; nobody would
ever marry her. She would be afraid to be seen anywhere. She
would cry all the time and never smile.”
“That would be worse’n me burning in hell. Oh, yessir, I won’t tell,
sir.”
“This promise won’t wear out in a few days or months, will it? This
house will be yours when I am gone. It must never be sold; never
be torn down till I am dead and gone. After Immy dies it won’t
matter so much. Does your poor little brain understand all this?”
His accurate soul answered: “I don’t understand it, no sir; but you
do, and what you want is enough for me. I wish you would trust
me.”
“I do. And one last word: don’t tell Immy what I’ve told you. Don’t
let her talk about it. And always remember that the least word you
let slip might mean that the policemen would come and take me
away and hang me before all the people.”
The boy screamed at that and was hardly soothed back to calm.
“SWEAR THAT YOU WILL NEVER MENTION JUD LASHER’S
NAME TO ANYBODY”
CHAPTER XXII
ROBARDS was afraid to leave the house. How could he trust it to
keep the secret? There would be nobody to guard the cellar from
intrusion. Yet no intruder would be interested in studying the stone
walls. Anyone who entered the house would seek jewelry or silver or
clothes.
He dared not ask the children to deny themselves the visit to the
city. They were already nagging him to make haste lest they be too
late for the parade.
So he locked the house up and drove away. When he cast his last
glance back he sent a prayer in his eyes to the house to be good to
him and to protect him and its other children.
The tulip tree stood at attention, solemn and reliable.
He approached the Lasher hovel with dread and tried to make the
horses gallop past, but Mrs. Lasher stood in the middle of the road
and held up her arms.
He had to face her, and he checked his horses while his heart
plunged and galloped. But all she said was:
“I just wanted to tell you that Jud left home yesterday to go to
sea. It broke my heart, but I hope you’re satisfied.”
RoBards took reassurance from the irony of this taunt, sorry as he
felt for the poor, life-beaten woman before him. He nodded and
touched his hat, and she stepped aside to let him pass.
He could only hope that she would not visit the house in his
absence. He caught a quick look from Keith’s eyes—a look of proud
complicity. During the long drive the boy’s hand kept stealing round
his arm and patting it encouragingly.
They reached the railroad station just in time. The cars were so
crowded that it was hard to squeeze aboard. It seemed that the
whole countryside was drained of its populace.
Everybody was bound for New York. Everybody had on his best or
hers. The day was glorious and the world in a holiday mood. Many
of the people carried baskets of food. The silliest joke brought
guffaws of success and idiotic repartee.
RoBards was hailed by clients and other acquaintances: “Here’s
lawyer RoBards!” “How air ye, Jedge?” “Well, we put up a good
fight, but I guess it was a good thing we got licked.” “That’s right;
you never know your luck.” “Bigger N’ York grows, the better it’ll be
for all of us.” “They’ll want plenty o’ butter ’n’ eggs down to the
setty. We got water enough to dieloot the melk and then spare some
for the pore town rats.”
The engine whistled. Everybody jumped. The bell rang. Everybody
cheered. The locomotive puffed and strained and jerked and the
carriages began to move.
Keith leaned far out of the window while his father held his heels.
He saw the engine rolling round a curve with a brave choo-choo.
Immy was content to wonder at the people, their funny hats and gay
clothes. But Keith wanted to know how the engine ran without
horses. His father had such a hard time explaining the modern
miracle, that Keith offered to bet they had a couple of horses hidden
in the old engine somewhere.
It was appalling how fast they went. The landscape was a blur.
“The horses are running away!” Keith yelled and then came in
yowling, bringing an eyeful of coal dust. It was hard to get him to
open his eyes till the grime was washed out. RoBards found an
allegory in that: how human it was to clench the eyes and the heart
tight upon what hurt them most; how hard it was to persuade
people to let go what they could not endure.
The carriages rocked and threatened to capsize. Women squealed
and baskets came tumbling down from the racks. An umbrella
almost transfixed the hat of one fluttering farm-wife.
Everybody agreed that the steam locomotive was the devil’s own
invention—something unchristian about it; folks would soon go back
to horses like God meant them to. No wonder some God-fearing
souls had risen to forbid the use of the schoolhouse for meetings in
the interest of this contraption of Beelzebub.
But in an incredibly short time the train was running among
streets. They were in New York already and the city was decorated
“like as if they was a weddin’ in every last house.”
Loops of bunting and marvelous clevernesses of flag arrangement
bedecked all the homes, and throngs were hastening south to the
heart of the city and the grandest parade of modern times.
One pitiful, forlorn little old woman was seemingly the only human
being left behind to guard Westchester County till its populace
returned from the excursion to New York City. Westchester had
presented the metropolis with one of its rivers, and it went down to
make the bestowal formal.
Mrs. Lasher had not the money nor the time for such a journey.
Water to her was the odious stuff she lugged from the well to the
washtub or the stove. New York meant scarce more to her than
Bombay or Hong-Kong. She hardly lifted her eyes from her toil to
note who passed her hovel or in which direction. Yet she had
watched for RoBards and had run out to taunt him with his cruelty to
her.
And now she was multiplied in his eyes into an endless procession
of visions more terrible to him than an army with banners, more
numerous than the parading hosts that poured along the streets of
New York.
While the bands thumped and brayed and the horses’ hoofs
crackled on the cobblestones, and the soldiers and firemen and
temperance folk strutted, he seemed to see only that little
despondent hag wringing her work-tanned fingers over the loss of
her good-for-nothing son. She was bitter against RoBards for
sending the lout away to be a sailor. What would she have said if she
had known—what would she say when she learned as learn she
surely must—that RoBards had saved her boy from the perils of the
seven seas by immuring him in the foundation walls of his home?
The Russians had been wont to build a living virgin into the walls
they wished to sanctify. He had sacrificed a lad and he was doomed
to stand guard over the altar. He was as much a prisoner as the
dead Jud—chained to a corpse.
It terrified him to think that the half-crazed old mother had the
franchise of Tuliptree Farm for this day, since there was never a soul
left on the place to prevent her wandering about. What if she chose
the opportunity to visit the home where she had never been invited
to call? Just to see how her betters lived, she might climb in at a
window and wander about the rooms. He saw her in his fancy
gasping at the simple things that would be splendor to her pauper’s
eye.
What if the blood of her son should cry aloud to her like Abel’s
from the ground, and draw her to the cellar? What if she should see
through the clumsy disguise of spiderwebs and begin tearing at the
foundation stones with those old hen’s-claw fingers of hers?
It was a ridiculous image to be afraid of, but RoBards could not
banish it.
CHAPTER XXIII
THE children had apparently forgotten all about the tragedy. The
newness of the train-ride, the fear of missing something, of being
late somewhere, of not being everywhere at once, kept their little
minds so avid that there was no thought of yesterday.
They entered the city as if they were wading into the boisterous
surf at Rockaway Beach. The crowds broke about them with a din of
breakers thundering shoreward. Yet they were not afraid.
When they descended from the train at the station, RoBards could
hardly keep them in leash long enough to get them into a hack. As it
bounced across the town to St. John’s Park, he had only their backs
and heels for company. Each child hung across a door and stared at
the hurrying mobs.
At length they reached the home and all their thoughts were
forward. Nothing that had ever happened in the country could pit
itself against the revelry of the city.
Their young and pretty mother looked never so New Yorkish as
when she ran down the front stoop to welcome them. When she
cried the old watchword, “How have you been?” they answered
heedlessly, “All right!” Immy, of all people, answered, “All right!”
Even RoBards forgot for the brief paradise of embracing his
gracious wife that everything was all wrong. She had to take him
about the house and show him the improvements she had made,
especially the faucet in the kitchen for the Croton water when it
should come gurgling through the pipes. From a parlor window she
pointed with delicious snobbery to the hydrant at the edge of the
front porch. Most marvelous of all was a shower-bath that she had
had installed upstairs. It would be possible to bathe every day!
There was something irreligious and Persian about the apparatus,
but RoBards rejoiced for a moment in the thought of what musical
refreshment it would afford him on hot mornings after long nights of
work.
The children were so impatient to get them gone that they had
hardly a glance to spare at the new toys, the faucets and hydrants,
the municipal playthings which would prevent fires in the future or at
least make the life of a fireman a pastime instead of a vain slavery.
Patty’s mother had been caught in the new craze for
“Temperance” and she called the Croton water as much of a
godsend as the floods that gushed out from the rock that Moses
smote. Since the city had removed the old pumps there had been no
place for a man to quench his thirst except by going to a grocery
store and asking for a cup of water as a charity. Few people had the
courage to beg for water, so they either went dry or paid for a glass
of brandy. This, she said, had kept up the evil of drunkenness that
was undermining the health and character of so many men and
women. Once the pure Croton water was accessible and free,
intoxication would cease.
But old man Jessamine, himself a child now, belittled the
significance of the Croton day. It would be nothing, he said, to the
great day when the Erie Canal was opened and the first boat from
the lakes started its voyage through the canal to the Hudson and
down the river to the sea. He held the frantic children fast while he
talked ancient history: described the marvelous speed of the news.
“The very identical moment the first drop of Erie water entered
the canal at Buffalo, a cannon was fired. Eight miles away stood
another cannon and the minute that cannoneer heard the first shot,
he fired the second cannon. Eight miles away was another, and so
on all the way to Sandy Hook. For more than five hundred miles the
cannon were lined up eight miles apart and it took only an hour and
twenty minutes for the news to reach New York, and then they sent
the news back to Buffalo the same way; and so it took less than
three hours to send a message more than a thousand miles. Wasn’t
that wonderful?”
The children wriggled impatiently and said, “Please, grampa, the
bands are playing. We’d better hurry.”
The old man held them tighter and went on:
“When the canal boats reached New York there was a grand
procession of ships, and there were two elegant kegs of Erie water
with gold hoops and Governor Clinton emptied one of them into the
ocean to marry the sea to the lakes; and another man poured in
phials of water from the Elbe, the Rhine, the Rhone, and all the
rivers and seas. And the land parade, you should have seen that! All
the societies had wagons: the Hatters’ Society with men making hats
before your very eyes; the Rope-makers with a ropewalk in
operation; the comb-makers, the cordwainers, the printers printing
an ode. To-day will be nothing to what people did when I was
young, for in those days——”
But the children had broken away from his sharp knees and his fat
stomach and his mildewed legends. The band outside was
irresistible, and their father was waiting to say good-by to them.
Keith was mighty proud of his father in his fireman’s uniform. But
when RoBards seized Immy, tossed her aloft and brought her down
to the level of his lips, she was as wildly afraid as Hector’s child had
been of him in his great helmet. Immy was easily frightened now.
Her scream pierced the air, and she almost had a fit, squirming in
her father’s arms and kicking him in the breast as he turned her over
to Patty, who received her, wondering like another Andromache.
“What’s the matter? what on earth?” Patty cried. And Immy
sobbed:
“I thought Papa was Jud Lasher.”
“What a funny thought! Why should you——”
Patty’s father called to her opportunely, demanding with senile
querulousness, who had hidden his walking stick and where.
RoBards forgave the old man much for playing providence this once.
As Patty turned aside, Keith seized Immy’s foot and warned her to
“keep still for heavem’s sakes.” She understood; her eyes widened
and she pleaded with her father to forgive her. He was as afraid of
her penitence as of her terror; but somehow in the flurry of leaving
the house, Patty forgot her curiosity, and the incident passed over.
The loyalty of Keith and his quick rally to his father’s protection
from Immy’s indiscretion touched RoBards deeply. The boy had
evidently inherited the family love of secrecy for the family’s sake.
But RoBards was sick with fear, realizing on what slender threads
the secret hung. He dreaded to leave the children with their mother,
lest they let slip some new clue to the agony he loved Patty too well
to share with her. But he had to take his place with his fire company,
though the sky fell in his absence.
CHAPTER XXIV
THAT procession was seven miles long, and everyone who marched
or rode, and each of the massed spectators had his or her terror of
life at the back of the heart. But RoBards knew only his own anxiety.
The Fire Kings had left their engine house by the time he reached
the place and he had to search for them in the welter of humanity.
The Battery was the point from which the parade was to start and
every street within two miles of it was filled with men and horses
and mobs of impatient people already footsore with standing about
on the sharp cobblestones.
At last the serpent began to move its glittering head. The Grand
Marshal, General Hopkins, set forth with a retinue of generals and
aids, guards and riflemen. The horse artillery and various guard
regiments followed with seven brass bands. The second division
under Major General Stryker consisted of the Governor and his staff,
the state artillery, State Fencibles and cadets, councilmen from
various cities, foreign consuls, and members of the Society of the
Cincinnati, escorting the water commissioners and engineers, all in
barouches. The third division included officers of the army and navy
and militia, “reverend the clergy,” judges, lawyers, professors, and
students; the chamber of commerce and the board of trade. The
firemen made up the fourth division. Four other divisions tailed after.
It seemed that there could be nobody left to watch when so many
marched. But the walks and windows, porches and roofs were a
living plaster of heads and bodies. New York had more than doubled
its numbers since the Erie Canal festival and had now nearly three
hundred and fifty thousand souls within its bounds, as well as
thousands on thousands of visitors.
It gave RoBards’ heart another twinge to stand an obscure
member of a fire-gang and watch Harry Chalender go by in a
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  • 5. 1-1 Auditing and Assurance Services Louwers 6th Edition Test Bank Download full chapter at: https://testbankbell.com/product/auditing-and- assurance-services-louwers-6th-edition-test-bank/ Chapter 01 Auditing and Assurance Services Multiple Choice Questions 1. The audit objective that all transactions and accounts that should be presented in the financial statements are in fact included is related to which of the PCAOB assertions? A. Existence B. Rights and obligations C. Completeness D. Valuation 2. Cutoff tests designed to detect purchases made before the end of the year that have been recorded in the subsequent year provide assurance about management's assertion of A. presentation and Disclosure. B. completeness. C. rights and obligations. D. existence. 3. During an audit of an entity's stockholders' equity accounts, the auditor determines whether there are restrictions on retained earnings resulting from loans, agreements or state law. This audit procedure most likely is intended to verify management's assertion of A. existence or occurrence. B. completeness. C. valuation or allocation. D. presentation and disclosure.
  • 6. 1-2 4. The confirmation of an account payable balance selected from the general ledger provides primary evidence regarding which management assertion? A. Completeness B. Valuation C. Allocation D. Existence 5. What type of evidence would provide the highest level of assurance in an attestation engagement? A. Evidence secured solely from within the entity. B. Evidence obtained from independent sources. C. Evidence obtained indirectly. D. Evidence obtained from multiple internal inquiries. 6. Which of the following management assertions is an auditor most likely testing if the audit objective states that all inventory on hand is reflected in the ending inventory balance? A. The entity has rights to the inventory. B. Inventory is properly valued. C. Inventory is properly presented in the financial statements. D. Inventory is complete. 7. An auditor traces the serial numbers on equipment to a nonissuer's sub-ledger. Which of the following management assertions is supported by this test? A. Valuation and allocation. B. Completeness. C. Rights and obligations. D. Presentation and disclosure. 8. An auditor has substantial doubt about the entity's ability to continue as a going concern for a reasonable period of time because of negative cash flows and working capital deficiencies. Under these circumstances, the auditor would be most concerned about the A. control environment factors that affect the organizational structure. B. correlation of detection risk and inherent risk. C. effectiveness of the entity's internal control activities. D. possible effects on the entity's financial statements. 9. Which of the following types of audit evidence provides the least assurance of reliability? A. Receivable confirmations received from the client's customers. B. Prenumbered receiving reports completed by the client's employees. C. Prior months' bank statements obtained from the client. D. Municipal property tax bills prepared in the client's name.
  • 7. 1-3 10. Which of the following is a management assertion regarding account balances at the period end? A. Transactions and events that have been recorded have occurred and pertain to the entity. B. Transactions and events have been recorded in the proper accounts. C. The entity holds or controls the rights to assets, and liabilities are obligations of the entity. D. Amounts and other data related to the transactions and events have been recorded appropriately. 11. A practitioner is engaged to express an opinion on management's assertion that the square footage of a warehouse offered for sale is 150,000 square feet. The practitioner should refer to which of the following sources for professional guidance? A. Statement of Auditing Standards. B. Statements on Standards for Attestation Engagements. C. Statements on Standards for Accounting and Review Services. D. Statements on Standards for Consulting Services. 12. In auditing the long term debt account, an auditor's procedures most likely would focus primarily on management's assertion of A. existence. B. completeness. C. allocation. D. rights and obligations. 13. An auditor selected items for test counts from the client's warehouse during the physical inventory observation. The auditor then traced these test counts into the detailed inventory listing that ultimately agreed to the financial statements. This procedure most likely provided evidence concerning management's assertion of A. completeness. B. valuation. C. presentation and disclosure. D. existence. E. rights and obligations. 14. An auditor selected items from the client's detailed inventory listing (that agreed to the financial statements). During the physical inventory observation, the auditor then found each item selected and counted the number of units on hand. Assuming that the amount on hand was the same as the amount in the client's detailed inventory listing, this procedure most likely would provide evidence concerning management's assertion of A. completeness. B. valuation. C. presentation and disclosure. D. existence. E. rights and obligations.
  • 8. 1-4 15. According to PCAOB Auditing Standard No. 5 (AS 5), the auditor should identify significant accounts and disclosures and their relevant assertions. Which of the following financial statement assertions is not explicitly identified in AS 5? A. Completeness B. Valuation or Allocation C. Accuracy D. Existence or Occurrence E. All of these are assertions identified in AS 5. 16. When testing the completeness assertion for a liability account, an auditor ordinarily works from the A. financial statements to the potentially unrecorded items. B. potentially unrecorded items to the financial statements. C. accounting records to the supporting evidence. D. trial balance to the subsidiary ledger. 17. If an auditor is performing procedures related to the information that is contained in the client's pension footnote, he/she is most likely obtain evidence concerning management's assertion about A. rights and obligations. B. existence. C. valuation. D. presentation and disclosure. 18. Which of the following questions would be inappropriate for an auditor to ask a client when exhibiting an appropriate level of professional skepticism while completing an audit procedure related to the internal control system? A. What can go wrong in this process? B. Which of your employees is a fraudster? C. What else is important to know about this process? D. What happens when a key employees goes on vacation? 19. To be proficient as an auditor, a person must first be able to accomplish which of these tasks in a decision-making process? A. Identify audit evidence relevant to the verification of assertions management makes in its unaudited financial statements and notes. B. Formulate evidence-gathering procedures (audit plan) designed to obtain sufficient, competent evidence about assertions management makes in financial statements and notes. C. Recognize the financial assertions made in management's financial statements and footnotes. D. Evaluate the evidence produced by the performance of procedures and decide whether management's assertions conform to generally accepted accounting principles and reality.
  • 9. 1-5 20. Which of the following is an underlying condition that in part creates the demand by users for reliable information? A. Economic transactions that are numerous and complex B. Decisions are time-sensitive C. Users separated from accounting records by distance and time D. Financial decisions that are important to investors and users E. All of these 21. Which of the following is not included in The American Accounting Association (AAA) definition of auditing? A. Potential conflict of interest B. Systematic process C. Assertions about economic actions D. Established criteria 22. What is the term used to identify the risk that the client's financial statements may be materially false and misleading? A. Business risk B. Information risk C. Client risk D. Risk assessment 23. Which of the following is not a recommendation usually made following the completion of an operational audit? A. Economic and efficient use of resources B. Effective achievement of business objectives C. Attesting to the fairness of the financial statements D. Compliance with company policies 24. In order to be considered as external auditors with respect to government agencies, GAO auditors must be A. organizationally independent. B. empowered as the accounting and auditing agency by the U.S. Congress. C. funded by the federal government. D. guided by standards similar to GAAS.
  • 10. 1-6 25. Which of the following is the essential purpose of the audit function? A. Detection of fraud B. Examination of individual transactions to certify as to their validity C. Determination of whether the client's financial statement assertions are fairly state D. Assurance of the consistent application of correct accounting procedures 26. The audit objective that all the transactions and accounts presented in the financial statements represent real assets, liabilities, revenues, and expenses is related most closely to which of the PCAOB assertions? A. Existence or occurrence B. Rights and obligations C. Completeness D. Presentation and disclosure 27. The audit objective that all transactions are recorded in the proper period is related most closely to which of the Audit Standards Board (ASB) transaction assertions? A. Occurrence B. Completeness C. Cutoff D. Accuracy 28. The audit objective that all transactions are recorded in the proper account is related most closely to which one of the ASB transaction assertions? A. Occurrence B. Completeness C. Accuracy D. Classification 29. The audit objective that all balances include items owned by the client is related most closely to which one of the ASB balance assertions? A. Existence B. Rights and obligations C. Completeness D. Valuation 30. The audit objective that all balances include all items that should be recorded in that account is related most closely to which one of the ASB balance assertions? A. Existence B. Rights and obligations C. Completeness D. Valuation
  • 11. 1-7 31. The audit objective that footnotes in the financial statements should be clear and expressed such that the information is easily conveyed to the readers of the financial statements is related most closely with which of the ASB presentation and disclosure assertions? A. Occurrence B. Rights and obligations C. Comprehensibility D. Understandability 32. The engineering department at Omni Company built a piece of equipment in the company's own shop for use in the company's operations. The auditor reviewed all work orders that were capitalized as part of the equipment costs. Which of the following is the ASB transaction assertion most closely related to the auditor's testing? A. Occurrence B. Completeness C. Accuracy D. Classification 33. The engineering department at Omni Company built a piece of equipment in the company's own shop for use in the company's operations. When looking at the ending balance for the fixed asset account the auditor examined all work orders, purchased materials, labor cost reports, and applied overhead that were capitalized as part of the equipment costs. Which of the following is the ASB balance assertion most closely related to the auditor's testing? A. Existence B. Completeness C. Rights and obligations D. Valuation 34. Which of the following best describes the primary role and responsibility of independent external auditor? A. Produce a company's annual financial statements and notes. B. Express an opinion on the fairness of a company's annual financial statements and footnotes. C. Provide business consulting advice to audit clients. D. Obtain an understanding of the client's internal control structure and give management a report about control problems and deficiencies. 35. Which of the following best describes the main reason independent auditors report on management's financial statements? A. Management fraud may exist and it is likely to be detected by independent auditors. B. The management that prepares the statements and the persons who use the statements may have conflicting interests. C. Misstated account balances may be corrected as the result of the independent audit work. D. The management that prepares the statements may have a poorly designed system of internal control.
  • 12. 1-8 36. The auditor's judgment concerning the overall fairness of the presentation of financial position, results of operations, and cash flows is applied within the framework of A. quality control. B. generally accepted auditing standards, which include the concept of materiality. C. the auditor's evaluation of the audited company's internal control. D. the applicable financial reporting framework (i.e., GAAP in the United States). 37. Assurance services involve all of the following, except A. relevance as well as the reliability of information. B. nonfinancial information as well as traditional financial statements. C. providing absolute rather than reasonable assurance. D. electronic databases as well as printed reports. 38. Because of the risk of material misstatement, an audit of financial statements in accordance with generally accepted auditing standards should be planned and performed with an attitude of A. objective judgment. B. independent integrity. C. professional skepticism. D. impartial conservatism. 39. Which of the following best describes assurance services? A. Independent professional services that report on the client's financial statements B. Independent professional services that improve the quality of information for decision makers C. Independent professional services that report on specific written management assertions D. Independent professional services that improve the operations of the client 40. Which of the following is not a PCAOB assertion about inventory related to presentation and disclosure? A. Inventory is properly classified as a current asset on the balance sheet. B. Inventory is properly stated at its cost on the balance sheet. C. Major inventory categories and their valuation bases are adequately disclosed in notes. D. All of these are PCAOB presentation and disclosure assertions about inventory 41. Which of the following is not an ASB assertion about inventory related to presentation and disclosure? A. Inventory is properly classified as a current asset on the balance sheet. B. Inventory is properly stated at cost on the balance sheet. C. Major inventory categories and their valuation bases are adequately disclosed in notes. D. All of these are ASB presentation and disclosure assertions about inventory.
  • 13. 1-9 42. In performing an attestation engagement, a CPA typically A. supplies litigation support services. B. assesses control risk at a low level. C. expresses a conclusion on an assertion about some type of subject matter. D. provides management consulting advice. 43. An attestation engagement is one in which a CPA is engaged to A. issue, or does issue, a report on subject matter or an assertion about the subject matter that is the responsibility of another party. B. provide tax advice or prepare a tax return based on financial information the CPA has not audited or reviewed. C. testify as an expert witness in accounting, auditing or tax matters, given certain stipulated facts. D. assemble prospective financial statements based on the assumptions of the entity's management without expressing any assurance. 44. The underlying conditions that create demand by users for reliable information include all of the following, except A. transactions are numerous and complex. B. users lack professional skepticism. C. users are separated from accounting records by distance and time. D. financial decisions are important to investors and users. E. decisions are time-sensitive. 45. Cutoff tests designed to detect credit sales made before the end of the year that have been recorded in the subsequent year provide assurance about the PCAOB assertion of A. presentation. B. completeness. C. rights. D. existence. 46. Inquiries of warehouse personnel concerning possible obsolete or slow moving inventory items provide assurance about the PCAOB assertion of A. completeness. B. existence. C. presentation. D. valuation. E. rights and obligations.
  • 14. 1-10 47. Inquiries of warehouse personnel concerning possible obsolete or slow moving inventory items provide assurance about the ASB balance assertion of A. completeness. B. existence. C. presentation. D. valuation. E. rights and obligations. 48. The probability that the information circulated by a company will be false or misleading is referred to as A. business risk. B. information risk. C. assurance risk. D. audit risk. 49. The Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002 requires that the key company officials certify the financial statements. Certification means that the company CEO and CFO must sign a statement indicating A. they have read the financial statements. B. they are not aware of any false or misleading statements (or any key omitted disclosures). C. they believe that the financial statements present an accurate picture of the company's financial condition. D. All of these. 50. The process of a CPA obtaining a certificate and license in a state other than the state in which the CPA's certificate was originally obtained is referred to as A. substantial equivalency. B. quid pro quo. C. relicensing. D. re-examination. 51. The risk an entity will fail to meet its objectives is referred to as A. business risk. B. information risk. C. assurance risk. D. audit risk.
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  • 16. 1-11 52. The four basic requirements for becoming a CPA in most states are A. education, the CPA Examination, experience, and substantial equivalency. B. the CPA Examination, experience, continuing professional education, and a state certificate. C. continuing professional education, the CPA Examination, experience, and an AICPA certificate. D. education, the CPA Examination, experience, and a state certificate. 53. The study of business operations for the purpose of making recommendations about the efficient use of resources, effective achievement of business objectives, and compliance with company policies is referred to as A. environmental auditing. B. financial auditing. C. compliance auditing. D. operational auditing. 54. The accounting, auditing, and investigating agency of the U.S. Congress, headed by the U.S. Comptroller General is known as A. the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI). B. the U.S. General Accountability Office (GAO). C. the Internal Revenue Service (IRS). D. the United States Legislative Auditors (USLA). Short Answer Questions
  • 17. 1-12 55. Which of the PCAOB assertions (A-E) are best verified by the following audit procedures (1-4)? A. Existence or occurrence B. Rights and obligations C. Valuation or allocation D. Completeness E. Presentation and disclosure 1. Confirming inventory held on consignment by the client with independent third party. 2. Consulting the Wall Street Journal for year-end prices of securities held by the client. 3. Physically examine all major property and equipment additions. 4. Review the aged trial balance for significant past due accounts. 56. ABC Company had a major sale to XYZ Company. This sale accounted for 20% of the revenue of ABC Company. The auditors performed the audit procedures listed 1-3. For each audit procedure select the ASB transaction assertion that is most likely being tested. A. Occurrence B. Completeness C. Cutoff D. Accuracy E. Classification 1. The auditor reviewed the shipping documents to check the date that product was shipped to XYZ Company. 2. The auditor reviewed the shipping documents to ensure that all product included in the sales revenue to XYZ had been shipped. 3. The auditor reviewed the invoice sent to XYZ Company to ensure that XYZ had been properly billed.
  • 18. 1-13 57. Auditors are auditing the warehouse of Huge Lots Corporation. The auditors performed the audit procedures listed 1-5. For each audit procedure select the ASB balance assertion that is most likely being tested. A. Existence B. Rights and obligations C. Completeness D. Accuracy E. Valuation 1. The auditors walked through the warehouse looking for obsolete inventory. 2. The auditors compared invoices received from suppliers with the cost of inventory listed in the inventory accounts. 3. The auditors reviewed purchase orders to determine if any inventory was on consignment. 4. The auditors reviewed vendor invoices to determine if freight costs, taxes, tariffs or other costs had been included in inventory costs. 5. The auditors selected items from the inventory and reviewed inventory records to ensure these items were included in those records. Essay Questions 58. What are the differences between the American Accounting Association and AICPA definitions and objectives of auditing?
  • 19. 1-14 59. What is operational auditing and by whom is it performed? 60. What is information risk? What is business risk? 61. What are the four basic requirements for becoming a CPA? 62. Define assurance, attestation, and auditing in the context of "lending credibility."
  • 20. 1-15 Chapter 01 Auditing and Assurance Services Answer Key Multiple Choice Questions 1. The audit objective that all transactions and accounts that should be presented in the financial statements are in fact included is related to which of the PCAOB assertions? A. Existence B. Rights and obligations C. Completeness D. Valuation AACSB: Analytic AICPA: BB Legal AICPA: FN Research Accessibility: Keyboard Navigation Blooms: Remember Difficulty: 1 Easy Learning Objective: 01-03 Describe and define the assertions that management makes about the recognition; measurement; presentation; and disclosure of the financial statements and explain why auditors use them as the focal point of the audit. Source: Original Topic: Management's Financial Statement Assertions 2. Cutoff tests designed to detect purchases made before the end of the year that have been recorded in the subsequent year provide assurance about management's assertion of A. presentation and Disclosure. B. completeness. C. rights and obligations. D. existence. AACSB: Analytic AICPA: BB Legal AICPA: FN Research Accessibility: Keyboard Navigation Blooms: Remember Difficulty: 2 Medium Learning Objective: 01-03 Describe and define the assertions that management makes about the recognition; measurement; presentation; and disclosure of the financial statements and explain why auditors use them as the focal point of the audit. Source: Original Topic: Management's Financial Statement Assertions
  • 21. 1-16 3. During an audit of an entity's stockholders' equity accounts, the auditor determines whether there are restrictions on retained earnings resulting from loans, agreements or state law. This audit procedure most likely is intended to verify management's assertion of A. existence or occurrence. B. completeness. C. valuation or allocation. D. presentation and disclosure. AACSB: Analytic AICPA: BB Legal AICPA: FN Research Accessibility: Keyboard Navigation Blooms: Remember Difficulty: 2 Medium Learning Objective: 01-03 Describe and define the assertions that management makes about the recognition; measurement; presentation; and disclosure of the financial statements and explain why auditors use them as the focal point of the audit. Source: Original Topic: Management's Financial Statement Assertions 4. The confirmation of an account payable balance selected from the general ledger provides primary evidence regarding which management assertion? A. Completeness B. Valuation C. Allocation D. Existence AACSB: Analytic AICPA: BB Legal AICPA: FN Research Accessibility: Keyboard Navigation Blooms: Remember Difficulty: 2 Medium Learning Objective: 01-03 Describe and define the assertions that management makes about the recognition; measurement; presentation; and disclosure of the financial statements and explain why auditors use them as the focal point of the audit. Source: Original Topic: Management's Financial Statement Assertions 5. What type of evidence would provide the highest level of assurance in an attestation engagement? A. Evidence secured solely from within the entity. B. Evidence obtained from independent sources. C. Evidence obtained indirectly. D. Evidence obtained from multiple internal inquiries. AACSB: Analytic AICPA: BB Legal AICPA: FN Research Accessibility: Keyboard Navigation Blooms: Remember Difficulty: 3 Hard Learning Objective: 01-02 Define and contrast financial statement auditing; attestation; and assurance services. Source: AICPA Topic: Auditing, Attestation, and Assurance Services
  • 22. 1-17 6. Which of the following management assertions is an auditor most likely testing if the audit objective states that all inventory on hand is reflected in the ending inventory balance? A. The entity has rights to the inventory. B. Inventory is properly valued. C. Inventory is properly presented in the financial statements. D. Inventory is complete. AACSB: Analytic AICPA: BB Legal AICPA: FN Research Accessibility: Keyboard Navigation Blooms: Remember Difficulty: 3 Hard Learning Objective: 01-03 Describe and define the assertions that management makes about the recognition; measurement; presentation; and disclosure of the financial statements and explain why auditors use them as the focal point of the audit. Source: AICPA Topic: Management's Financial Statement Assertions 7. An auditor traces the serial numbers on equipment to a nonissuer's sub-ledger. Which of the following management assertions is supported by this test? A. Valuation and allocation. B. Completeness. C. Rights and obligations. D. Presentation and disclosure. AACSB: Analytic AICPA: BB Legal AICPA: FN Research Accessibility: Keyboard Navigation Blooms: Remember Difficulty: 3 Hard Learning Objective: 01-03 Describe and define the assertions that management makes about the recognition; measurement; presentation; and disclosure of the financial statements and explain why auditors use them as the focal point of the audit. Source: AICPA Topic: Management's Financial Statement Assertions 8. An auditor has substantial doubt about the entity's ability to continue as a going concern for a reasonable period of time because of negative cash flows and working capital deficiencies. Under these circumstances, the auditor would be most concerned about the A. control environment factors that affect the organizational structure. B. correlation of detection risk and inherent risk. C. effectiveness of the entity's internal control activities. D. possible effects on the entity's financial statements. AACSB: Analytic AICPA: BB Legal AICPA: FN Research Accessibility: Keyboard Navigation Blooms: Remember Difficulty: 3 Hard Learning Objective: 01-03 Describe and define the assertions that management makes about the recognition; measurement; presentation; and disclosure of the financial statements and explain why auditors use them as the focal point of the audit. Source: AICPA Topic: Management's Financial Statement Assertions
  • 23. 1-18 9. Which of the following types of audit evidence provides the least assurance of reliability? A. Receivable confirmations received from the client's customers. B. Prenumbered receiving reports completed by the client's employees. C. Prior months' bank statements obtained from the client. D. Municipal property tax bills prepared in the client's name. AACSB: Analytic AICPA: BB Legal AICPA: FN Research Accessibility: Keyboard Navigation Blooms: Remember Difficulty: 3 Hard Learning Objective: 01-03 Describe and define the assertions that management makes about the recognition; measurement; presentation; and disclosure of the financial statements and explain why auditors use them as the focal point of the audit. Source: AICPA Topic: Management's Financial Statement Assertions 10. Which of the following is a management assertion regarding account balances at the period end? A. Transactions and events that have been recorded have occurred and pertain to the entity. B. Transactions and events have been recorded in the proper accounts. C. The entity holds or controls the rights to assets, and liabilities are obligations of the entity. D. Amounts and other data related to the transactions and events have been recorded appropriately. AACSB: Analytic AICPA: BB Legal AICPA: FN Research Accessibility: Keyboard Navigation Blooms: Remember Difficulty: 3 Hard Learning Objective: 01-03 Describe and define the assertions that management makes about the recognition; measurement; presentation; and disclosure of the financial statements and explain why auditors use them as the focal point of the audit. Source: AICPA Topic: Management's Financial Statement Assertions 11. A practitioner is engaged to express an opinion on management's assertion that the square footage of a warehouse offered for sale is 150,000 square feet. The practitioner should refer to which of the following sources for professional guidance? A. Statement of Auditing Standards. B. Statements on Standards for Attestation Engagements. C. Statements on Standards for Accounting and Review Services. D. Statements on Standards for Consulting Services. AACSB: Analytic AICPA: BB Legal AICPA: FN Research Accessibility: Keyboard Navigation Blooms: Remember Difficulty: 3 Hard Learning Objective: 01-02 Define and contrast financial statement auditing; attestation; and assurance services. Source: AICPA Topic: Auditing, Attestation, and Assurance Services
  • 24. 1-19 12. In auditing the long term debt account, an auditor's procedures most likely would focus primarily on management's assertion of A. existence. B. completeness. C. allocation. D. rights and obligations. AACSB: Analytic AICPA: BB Legal AICPA: FN Research Accessibility: Keyboard Navigation Blooms: Remember Difficulty: 2 Medium Learning Objective: 01-03 Describe and define the assertions that management makes about the recognition; measurement; presentation; and disclosure of the financial statements and explain why auditors use them as the focal point of the audit. Source: Original Topic: Management's Financial Statement Assertions 13. An auditor selected items for test counts from the client's warehouse during the physical inventory observation. The auditor then traced these test counts into the detailed inventory listing that ultimately agreed to the financial statements. This procedure most likely provided evidence concerning management's assertion of A. completeness. B. valuation. C. presentation and disclosure. D. existence. E. rights and obligations. AACSB: Analytic AICPA: BB Legal AICPA: FN Research Accessibility: Keyboard Navigation Blooms: Remember Difficulty: 2 Medium Learning Objective: 01-03 Describe and define the assertions that management makes about the recognition; measurement; presentation; and disclosure of the financial statements and explain why auditors use them as the focal point of the audit. Source: Original Topic: Management's Financial Statement Assertions
  • 25. 1-20 14. An auditor selected items from the client's detailed inventory listing (that agreed to the financial statements). During the physical inventory observation, the auditor then found each item selected and counted the number of units on hand. Assuming that the amount on hand was the same as the amount in the client's detailed inventory listing, this procedure most likely would provide evidence concerning management's assertion of A. completeness. B. valuation. C. presentation and disclosure. D. existence. E. rights and obligations. AACSB: Analytic AICPA: BB Legal AICPA: FN Research Accessibility: Keyboard Navigation Blooms: Remember Difficulty: 2 Medium Learning Objective: 01-03 Describe and define the assertions that management makes about the recognition; measurement; presentation; and disclosure of the financial statements and explain why auditors use them as the focal point of the audit. Source: Original Topic: Management's Financial Statement Assertions 15. According to PCAOB Auditing Standard No. 5 (AS 5), the auditor should identify significant accounts and disclosures and their relevant assertions. Which of the following financial statement assertions is not explicitly identified in AS 5? A. Completeness B. Valuation or Allocation C. Accuracy D. Existence or Occurrence E. All of these are assertions identified in AS 5. AACSB: Analytic AICPA: BB Legal AICPA: FN Research Accessibility: Keyboard Navigation Blooms: Remember Difficulty: 2 Medium Learning Objective: 01-03 Describe and define the assertions that management makes about the recognition; measurement; presentation; and disclosure of the financial statements and explain why auditors use them as the focal point of the audit. Source: Original Topic: Management's Financial Statement Assertions
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  • 27. 1-21 16. When testing the completeness assertion for a liability account, an auditor ordinarily works from the A. financial statements to the potentially unrecorded items. B. potentially unrecorded items to the financial statements. C. accounting records to the supporting evidence. D. trial balance to the subsidiary ledger. AACSB: Analytic AICPA: BB Legal AICPA: FN Research Accessibility: Keyboard Navigation Blooms: Remember Difficulty: 2 Medium Learning Objective: 01-03 Describe and define the assertions that management makes about the recognition; measurement; presentation; and disclosure of the financial statements and explain why auditors use them as the focal point of the audit. Source: Original Topic: Management's Financial Statement Assertions 17. If an auditor is performing procedures related to the information that is contained in the client's pension footnote, he/she is most likely obtain evidence concerning management's assertion about A. rights and obligations. B. existence. C. valuation. D. presentation and disclosure. AACSB: Analytic AICPA: BB Legal AICPA: FN Research Accessibility: Keyboard Navigation Blooms: Remember Difficulty: 2 Medium Learning Objective: 01-03 Describe and define the assertions that management makes about the recognition; measurement; presentation; and disclosure of the financial statements and explain why auditors use them as the focal point of the audit. Source: Original Topic: Management's Financial Statement Assertions 18. Which of the following questions would be inappropriate for an auditor to ask a client when exhibiting an appropriate level of professional skepticism while completing an audit procedure related to the internal control system? A. What can go wrong in this process? B. Which of your employees is a fraudster? C. What else is important to know about this process? D. What happens when a key employees goes on vacation? AACSB: Analytic AICPA: BB Legal AICPA: FN Research Accessibility: Keyboard Navigation Blooms: Remember Difficulty: 1 Easy Learning Objective: 01-04 Define professional skepticism and explain its key characteristics. Source: Original Topic: Professional Skepticism
  • 28. 1-22 19. To be proficient as an auditor, a person must first be able to accomplish which of these tasks in a decision-making process? A. Identify audit evidence relevant to the verification of assertions management makes in its unaudited financial statements and notes. B. Formulate evidence-gathering procedures (audit plan) designed to obtain sufficient, competent evidence about assertions management makes in financial statements and notes. C. Recognize the financial assertions made in management's financial statements and footnotes. D. Evaluate the evidence produced by the performance of procedures and decide whether management's assertions conform to generally accepted accounting principles and reality. AACSB: Analytic AICPA: BB Legal AICPA: FN Research Accessibility: Keyboard Navigation Blooms: Remember Difficulty: 3 Hard Learning Objective: 01-03 Describe and define the assertions that management makes about the recognition; measurement; presentation; and disclosure of the financial statements and explain why auditors use them as the focal point of the audit. Source: Original Topic: Management's Financial Statement Assertions 20. Which of the following is an underlying condition that in part creates the demand by users for reliable information? A. Economic transactions that are numerous and complex B. Decisions are time-sensitive C. Users separated from accounting records by distance and time D. Financial decisions that are important to investors and users E. All of these AACSB: Analytic AICPA: BB Industry AICPA: FN Research Accessibility: Keyboard Navigation Blooms: Remember Difficulty: 2 Medium Learning Objective: 01-01 Define information risk and explain how the financial statement auditing process helps to reduce this risk; thereby reducing the cost of capital for a company. Source: Original Topic: User Demand for Reliable Information
  • 29. 1-23 21. Which of the following is not included in The American Accounting Association (AAA) definition of auditing? A. Potential conflict of interest B. Systematic process C. Assertions about economic actions D. Established criteria AACSB: Analytic AICPA: BB Legal AICPA: FN Research Accessibility: Keyboard Navigation Blooms: Remember Difficulty: 1 Easy Learning Objective: 01-02 Define and contrast financial statement auditing; attestation; and assurance services. Source: Original Topic: Auditing, Attestation, and Assurance Services 22. What is the term used to identify the risk that the client's financial statements may be materially false and misleading? A. Business risk B. Information risk C. Client risk D. Risk assessment AACSB: Analytic AICPA: BB Legal AICPA: FN Risk Analysis Accessibility: Keyboard Navigation Blooms: Remember Difficulty: 1 Easy Learning Objective: 01-01 Define information risk and explain how the financial statement auditing process helps to reduce this risk; thereby reducing the cost of capital for a company. Source: Original Topic: User Demand for Reliable Information 23. Which of the following is not a recommendation usually made following the completion of an operational audit? A. Economic and efficient use of resources B. Effective achievement of business objectives C. Attesting to the fairness of the financial statements D. Compliance with company policies AACSB: Communication AICPA: BB Legal AICPA: FN Reporting Accessibility: Keyboard Navigation Blooms: Remember Difficulty: 1 Easy Learning Objective: 01-06 Describe the audits and auditors in governmental; internal; and operational auditing. Source: Original Topic: Other Kinds of Engagements and Information Professionals
  • 30. 1-24 24. In order to be considered as external auditors with respect to government agencies, GAO auditors must be A. organizationally independent. B. empowered as the accounting and auditing agency by the U.S. Congress. C. funded by the federal government. D. guided by standards similar to GAAS. AACSB: Ethics AICPA: BB Legal AICPA: FN Research Accessibility: Keyboard Navigation Blooms: Remember Difficulty: 2 Medium Learning Objective: 01-06 Describe the audits and auditors in governmental; internal; and operational auditing. Source: Original Topic: Other Kinds of Engagements and Information Professionals 25. Which of the following is the essential purpose of the audit function? A. Detection of fraud B. Examination of individual transactions to certify as to their validity C. Determination of whether the client's financial statement assertions are fairly state D. Assurance of the consistent application of correct accounting procedures AACSB: Analytic AICPA: BB Legal AICPA: FN Reporting Accessibility: Keyboard Navigation Blooms: Remember Difficulty: 2 Medium Learning Objective: 01-02 Define and contrast financial statement auditing; attestation; and assurance services. Source: Original Topic: Auditing, Attestation, and Assurance Services 26. The audit objective that all the transactions and accounts presented in the financial statements represent real assets, liabilities, revenues, and expenses is related most closely to which of the PCAOB assertions? A. Existence or occurrence B. Rights and obligations C. Completeness D. Presentation and disclosure AACSB: Analytic AICPA: BB Legal AICPA: FN Research Accessibility: Keyboard Navigation Blooms: Remember Difficulty: 1 Easy Learning Objective: 01-03 Describe and define the assertions that management makes about the recognition; measurement; presentation; and disclosure of the financial statements and explain why auditors use them as the focal point of the audit. Source: Original Topic: Management's Financial Statement Assertions
  • 31. 1-25 27. The audit objective that all transactions are recorded in the proper period is related most closely to which of the Audit Standards Board (ASB) transaction assertions? A. Occurrence B. Completeness C. Cutoff D. Accuracy AACSB: Analytic AICPA: BB Legal AICPA: FN Research Accessibility: Keyboard Navigation Blooms: Remember Difficulty: 1 Easy Learning Objective: 01-03 Describe and define the assertions that management makes about the recognition; measurement; presentation; and disclosure of the financial statements and explain why auditors use them as the focal point of the audit. Source: Original Topic: Management's Financial Statement Assertions 28. The audit objective that all transactions are recorded in the proper account is related most closely to which one of the ASB transaction assertions? A. Occurrence B. Completeness C. Accuracy D. Classification AACSB: Analytic AICPA: BB Legal AICPA: FN Research Accessibility: Keyboard Navigation Blooms: Remember Difficulty: 1 Easy Learning Objective: 01-03 Describe and define the assertions that management makes about the recognition; measurement; presentation; and disclosure of the financial statements and explain why auditors use them as the focal point of the audit. Source: Original Topic: Management's Financial Statement Assertions 29. The audit objective that all balances include items owned by the client is related most closely to which one of the ASB balance assertions? A. Existence B. Rights and obligations C. Completeness D. Valuation AACSB: Analytic AICPA: BB Legal AICPA: FN Research Accessibility: Keyboard Navigation Blooms: Remember Difficulty: 1 Easy Learning Objective: 01-03 Describe and define the assertions that management makes about the recognition; measurement; presentation; and disclosure of the financial statements and explain why auditors use them as the focal point of the audit. Source: Original Topic: Management's Financial Statement Assertions
  • 32. 1-26 30. The audit objective that all balances include all items that should be recorded in that account is related most closely to which one of the ASB balance assertions? A. Existence B. Rights and obligations C. Completeness D. Valuation AACSB: Analytic AICPA: BB Legal AICPA: FN Research Accessibility: Keyboard Navigation Blooms: Remember Difficulty: 1 Easy Learning Objective: 01-03 Describe and define the assertions that management makes about the recognition; measurement; presentation; and disclosure of the financial statements and explain why auditors use them as the focal point of the audit. Source: Original Topic: Management's Financial Statement Assertions 31. The audit objective that footnotes in the financial statements should be clear and expressed such that the information is easily conveyed to the readers of the financial statements is related most closely with which of the ASB presentation and disclosure assertions? A. Occurrence B. Rights and obligations C. Comprehensibility D. Understandability AACSB: Analytic AICPA: BB Legal AICPA: FN Research Accessibility: Keyboard Navigation Blooms: Remember Difficulty: 1 Easy Learning Objective: 01-03 Describe and define the assertions that management makes about the recognition; measurement; presentation; and disclosure of the financial statements and explain why auditors use them as the focal point of the audit. Source: Original Topic: Management's Financial Statement Assertions
  • 33. 1-27 32. The engineering department at Omni Company built a piece of equipment in the company's own shop for use in the company's operations. The auditor reviewed all work orders that were capitalized as part of the equipment costs. Which of the following is the ASB transaction assertion most closely related to the auditor's testing? A. Occurrence B. Completeness C. Accuracy D. Classification AACSB: Analytic AICPA: BB Legal AICPA: FN Research Accessibility: Keyboard Navigation Blooms: Understand Difficulty: 3 Hard Learning Objective: 01-03 Describe and define the assertions that management makes about the recognition; measurement; presentation; and disclosure of the financial statements and explain why auditors use them as the focal point of the audit. Source: Original Topic: Management's Financial Statement Assertions 33. The engineering department at Omni Company built a piece of equipment in the company's own shop for use in the company's operations. When looking at the ending balance for the fixed asset account the auditor examined all work orders, purchased materials, labor cost reports, and applied overhead that were capitalized as part of the equipment costs. Which of the following is the ASB balance assertion most closely related to the auditor's testing? A. Existence B. Completeness C. Rights and obligations D. Valuation AACSB: Analytic AICPA: BB Legal AICPA: FN Research Accessibility: Keyboard Navigation Blooms: Understand Difficulty: 3 Hard Learning Objective: 01-03 Describe and define the assertions that management makes about the recognition; measurement; presentation; and disclosure of the financial statements and explain why auditors use them as the focal point of the audit. Source: Original Topic: Management's Financial Statement Assertions
  • 34. 1-28 34. Which of the following best describes the primary role and responsibility of independent external auditor? A. Produce a company's annual financial statements and notes. B. Express an opinion on the fairness of a company's annual financial statements and footnotes. C. Provide business consulting advice to audit clients. D. Obtain an understanding of the client's internal control structure and give management a report about control problems and deficiencies. AACSB: Analytic AICPA: BB Legal AICPA: FN Research Accessibility: Keyboard Navigation Blooms: Remember Difficulty: 1 Easy Learning Objective: 01-02 Define and contrast financial statement auditing; attestation; and assurance services. Source: Original Topic: Auditing, Attestation, and Assurance Services 35. Which of the following best describes the main reason independent auditors report on management's financial statements? A. Management fraud may exist and it is likely to be detected by independent auditors. B. The management that prepares the statements and the persons who use the statements may have conflicting interests. C. Misstated account balances may be corrected as the result of the independent audit work. D. The management that prepares the statements may have a poorly designed system of internal control. AACSB: Analytic AICPA: BB Industry AICPA: FN Reporting Accessibility: Keyboard Navigation Blooms: Understand Difficulty: 2 Medium Learning Objective: 01-02 Define and contrast financial statement auditing; attestation; and assurance services. Source: Original Topic: Auditing, Attestation, and Assurance Services
  • 35. 1-29 36. The auditor's judgment concerning the overall fairness of the presentation of financial position, results of operations, and cash flows is applied within the framework of A. quality control. B. generally accepted auditing standards, which include the concept of materiality. C. the auditor's evaluation of the audited company's internal control. D. the applicable financial reporting framework (i.e., GAAP in the United States). AACSB: Analytic AICPA: BB Legal AICPA: FN Research Accessibility: Keyboard Navigation Blooms: Remember Difficulty: 2 Medium Learning Objective: 01-02 Define and contrast financial statement auditing; attestation; and assurance services. Source: Original Topic: Auditing, Attestation, and Assurance Services 37. Assurance services involve all of the following, except A. relevance as well as the reliability of information. B. nonfinancial information as well as traditional financial statements. C. providing absolute rather than reasonable assurance. D. electronic databases as well as printed reports. AACSB: Analytic AICPA: BB Industry AICPA: FN Research Accessibility: Keyboard Navigation Blooms: Remember Difficulty: 2 Medium Learning Objective: 01-02 Define and contrast financial statement auditing; attestation; and assurance services. Source: Original Topic: Auditing, Attestation, and Assurance Services 38. Because of the risk of material misstatement, an audit of financial statements in accordance with generally accepted auditing standards should be planned and performed with an attitude of A. objective judgment. B. independent integrity. C. professional skepticism. D. impartial conservatism. AACSB: Analytic AICPA: BB Legal AICPA: FN Risk Analysis Accessibility: Keyboard Navigation Blooms: Remember Difficulty: 2 Medium Learning Objective: 01-04 Define professional skepticism and explain its key characteristics. Source: AICPA Topic: Professional Skepticism
  • 36. 1-30 39. Which of the following best describes assurance services? A. Independent professional services that report on the client's financial statements B. Independent professional services that improve the quality of information for decision makers C. Independent professional services that report on specific written management assertions D. Independent professional services that improve the operations of the client AACSB: Analytic AICPA: BB Industry AICPA: FN Research Accessibility: Keyboard Navigation Blooms: Remember Difficulty: 2 Medium Learning Objective: 01-02 Define and contrast financial statement auditing; attestation; and assurance services. Source: Original Topic: Auditing, Attestation, and Assurance Services 40. Which of the following is not a PCAOB assertion about inventory related to presentation and disclosure? A. Inventory is properly classified as a current asset on the balance sheet. B. Inventory is properly stated at its cost on the balance sheet. C. Major inventory categories and their valuation bases are adequately disclosed in notes. D. All of these are PCAOB presentation and disclosure assertions about inventory AACSB: Analytic AICPA: BB Legal AICPA: FN Research Accessibility: Keyboard Navigation Blooms: Understand Difficulty: 2 Medium Learning Objective: 01-03 Describe and define the assertions that management makes about the recognition; measurement; presentation; and disclosure of the financial statements and explain why auditors use them as the focal point of the audit. Source: Original Topic: Management's Financial Statement Assertions 41. Which of the following is not an ASB assertion about inventory related to presentation and disclosure? A. Inventory is properly classified as a current asset on the balance sheet. B. Inventory is properly stated at cost on the balance sheet. C. Major inventory categories and their valuation bases are adequately disclosed in notes. D. All of these are ASB presentation and disclosure assertions about inventory. AACSB: Analytic AICPA: BB Legal AICPA: FN Research Accessibility: Keyboard Navigation Blooms: Understand Difficulty: 2 Medium Learning Objective: 01-03 Describe and define the assertions that management makes about the recognition; measurement; presentation; and disclosure of the financial statements and explain why auditors use them as the focal point of the audit. Source: Original Topic: Management's Financial Statement Assertions
  • 37. Visit https://testbankbell.com now to explore a rich collection of testbank, solution manual and enjoy exciting offers!
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  • 39. Keith wanted to go to him and help him, but he knew that he wanted to be alone. Fathers did not call for little boys to help them at such times. It might have aided poor RoBards a little to feel that he himself was at just such a distance from his own heavenly Father, and He as helpless to explain. But that would not comport with any theology he understood. And he paced his cage.
  • 40. CHAPTER XX WHEN RoBards had cried out all the blasphemy in his heart he fell to praying for some divine miracle to undo the past, to erase the truth and turn it into a nightmare. But soon he was put into God’s place and proved himself as adamant to prayer. He had walked until he fell upon the old sofa. He rose from that, remembering that Harry Chalender had lain there when he was wounded. He went to a big chair and sank into it, a mere heap of weary bones and flaccid muscles. Then his eyes paced the room, walking along the shelves, reading the names of books: lawbooks, philosophies, fiction, poetry—all of them records of the vanity of human efforts to conquer the storms that swept spirit and flesh. Every title was a monument of defeat. To escape these reminders, his eyes went longingly to the window where they could release their vision like the raven set free upon the flooded world. He rose and leaned upon the casement and stared into the sky, and saw nothing but blue emptiness, the infinite idle azure, soulless, sorrowless, loveless, hateless, deaf, dumb, indifferent, without shame or mercy, morals or duties; the inverted ocean of the heavens, the topless pit where souls went hurtling when the earth flung them into its depths to drown in eternity, to emerge upon some inconceivable shore and crawl forward to the feet of judgment for everlasting doom or everlasting bliss. It was said that Eyes looked down from there and saw the sparrow fall, saw the least quirk of a finger, saw through the brain and watched the darkest thoughts that stole like thieves through the night of a mind.
  • 41. Yet the sparrow fell, or went soaring away in the claws of the hawk; the little children died or lived to be trodden and gored and seared and crazed with fright. And the child’s cry for help was as unheard or unheeded as the sparrow’s. Rebellious thoughts stirred RoBards to mutiny. He was ready to defy heaven and denounce its indifferent tyranny, as Lucifer had done and the other angels. Better to be thrust over the jasper walls and to fall for seven days into hell than not to protest. And then he was himself put to the test of an appeal for his mercy. He heard a voice below him and glanced forth from his window as from a little heaven to a petitioner on earth. “Please, sir, could I have a word with you, if you please, sir.” As he looked down and with a kind of divinity understood beforehand just who was praying and what the prayer would be and that it would not be granted, he felt that God must find it hard at times to look into some of the wrinkled old faces that are upturned in desperate appeal, like shriveled flowers praying for rain. “I’m Mrs. Lasher, sir, of down the road a bit. You’re always passin’ our house. It’s not much to see and I’ve not had luck with my children, for all they’re so many; but to-day I—would you—could you spare me a minute of your precious time, sir—could you?” He was afraid to ask her in or to encourage her at all; for he dreaded his own weakness. He sat on the window sill and, abstaining from any temptation to courtesy, said: “Go on.” She took complete discouragement from his manner, and went into a panic, pursing her lips and doddering and mixing her fingers together in a silly restlessness as she spoke: “It’s about my son, Jud, sir. He says he’s goin’ to sea for a sailor.” “Why?” “His only reason is because you gave him the advice to go.”
  • 42. “Well, why not?” “Oh, if it comes to that! He’s not much brains and he knows nothing of the ships. He is none too good here in this lonely place and what wouldn’t he be were he to mingle with sailors and the like? They must be terrible people from all I hear—and the danger, sir. They say they fall off masts and they go mad and jump in the sea and the sharks follow them and in the ports they get drunk and get killed and for the least thing they tie them to masts or whatever they are and whip their poor bare backs till the blood streams and they hit them with iron weights and—oh, from all they tell me it’s a hell’s own life, if you’ll excuse the saying. And at best my boy would be gone for maybe five years or more and we never hearing a word of how he is, or if he’s alive even. Oh, I couldn’t abear it, Mr. RoBards. I need Jud at home. He’s strong and helps me sometimes and when the strange tempers are not on him he’s as good a boy to his mother as ever boy was; and when the strange tempers are on him, he needs his mother more than I can tell you. “To-day now, he came home all bloody and battered like, and I misdoubt he was trespassin’ on your property, often as I’ve told him never to bother you. He said he fell out of a tree into your pond up there whilst he was robbin’ birds’ nests. I don’t believe him and it’s likely you had to thrash him. I see your knuckles is all scarred and I’m sorry for any trouble he gave you, and welcome you are to whip him whenever he annoys you, and the punishment is what he needs, but don’t send him away, Mister RoBards. “To-day I could wash his wounds and tie them up and put him to bed where his father won’t find him and whip him again. But oh, if he was at sea and was hurt or punished, who would wash his wounds for him and tie them up and give him a little petting when he needs it? “He’s a lonely boy, sir. He’s like a haunted house sometimes, full of ghosts and queer notions and—but I’m taking too much of your valuable time. I came over only to ask you, would you take back your advice and tell him not to go to sea, sir!—if you please, sir!”
  • 43. “I’m sorry, Mrs. Lasher, very sorry, but I can’t.” “Oh, but to send him away whalin’! Five years gone into the storms and the wickedness, with nobody to pray for him or give him a kind word. The wickedness of the sailors——” “There’s wickedness everywhere, Mrs. Lasher.” “But not up here where everything’s so clean and sweet and beautiful. There’s wickedness of course here in plenty, but it’s nothing to what the ships has on them. It’s as good as sending my boy to hell to send him to sea.” “I can’t help you. I’m sorry—very sorry.” Her wildly beseeching eyes fell before the sad sternness of his. She nodded meekly: “All right, sir. Thank you, sir. You know best, I suppose.” And with this Thy-will-be-done she accepted her fate. She was used to being denied her prayers. She turned and moved across the grass toward the gate. She paused once or twice to look back, as if hoping that he would relent. RoBards gazed at her with profound pity, but he could not grant her plea. Finding that he would not beckon her to return, Mrs. Lasher nodded, slipped through the gate, and moved on to what must be almost the funeral of her boy. She left RoBards in as much confusion as his benumbed spirit could feel. The reptile Jud had evidently told his mother only a part of the story. He had remembered enough to lie about the cause of his punishment. But how long could he be trusted to keep the rest concealed? Who could keep a secret? Immy’s pitiful future was already at the mercy of her own babbling, of her little brother’s wondering, of the farmer’s wife who loved gossip, and of twist-wit Jud. RoBards was afraid even of his own power to keep it inviolate. Suppose he himself talked in his sleep and Patty heard him? Suppose that in one of his wild tempers, when wrath like a
  • 44. drunkenness made him eager to fling off all decencies and rave in insults, he should hurl this truth at Patty or someone else? In many of the rocks on the farm the roots of trees had made little rifts and squeezed and squirmed and grown until they split granite asunder. What heart could withstand the relentless pressure, from the irresistible gimleting of a secret? Once the truth was uttered, it could no more be recalled than the dead itself. It was cruelly easy in this world to do, to say, to think; and hideously impossible to undo, unsay, unthink. One could only add repentance and remorse to guilt or carelessness. Repentance and remorse were dangerous, too, to the soul, for one could repent a good deed, a mercy, an abstention as easily as evil. He found now in his conscience nothing but regret that he had let that filthy serpent crawl away. The copperhead had struck and he had merely bruised it and left it alive with all its venom, and the forked tongue and hissing of gossip. In this room he had sorely repented two deeds of pity: sparing Chalender’s life and Jud Lasher’s. What a poltroon thing pity was, after all! The next day he rode over to White Plains and found a letter from Patty among his mail. He read it on the way home, letting the reins lie in the mane of the horse while he conned the pages. They were dashed off in a mood of girlish hilarity. New York was a fountain of renewing youth to her. It had grown enormously, she said, since she left it a few months ago. The railroad journey was a sensational adventure. Like most of the other passengers, she had been fairly choked with smoke and riddled with cinders and one of them had stuck in her eye a long while. But New York with even half an eye was heaven. She hoped that he would come soon. She would have the house ready for him in a few days. St. John’s Park that had been way uptown when they moved in was already slipping downtown. It was mighty pretty, though, and the water when it came would make it a
  • 45. paradise of convenience. She reminded him to keep the children off the highway and away from those miserable Lashers. Her solemn edicts were as girlishly innocent as her gayeties. It made bitter reading, that warning—that ex post facto warning— against the Lashers. Whatever happened she must never know this blighting truth. In a few days Immy was playing in the yard again. She seemed to have forgotten her experience as she forgot the nightmares that sometimes woke her screaming from sleep. But now and then she would cast upon her father a look of amazement. In her games with Keith she shrieked more easily in a wilder alarm. Her shrieks stabbed RoBards and made him dread that the experience had worked some permanent injury in the fabric of the child’s soul. All the ignorance that had been wrapped about her youth for her protection was gone now. The blindfold had been snatched from her eyes. The questions that she had been rebuked for asking, were brutally answered and yet left unanswered. The beauty, the mystery, the holiness of innocence had been torn like the rent veil in the temple, and only the uglier knowledge vouchsafed. And a stain had been cast upon her indelibly. She would be regarded with pity and yet with horror forever. She was branded with all the curses of abominable sin, though she had had no choice, no share, no understanding of it. And such things could happen in a world where the fall of a sparrow was marked—marked but not prevented! Immy must at all costs be sheltered from any further hazards. It seemed unwise to take her to the city, where dangers thronged everywhere, and pollution increased hourly. But when he hinted that it might be better not to go to town for the procession, Immy almost went into a convulsion of protest. She pleaded that she had a special right to see the parade because she had been so badly hurt. RoBards granted the prayer to silence the argument. He wondered if Jud Lasher had left yet, but dared not ask. When he rode past the
  • 46. hut, he put spurs to his horse lest the mother accost him again, but his sidelong glances never caught a glimpse of Jud. He did not know that the wretch had lain abed for days while his bruises mended and that when he was up again and saw RoBards in the road, he ran and hid, stealing out again to shake his fist at the vanishing figure and gibber new threats. At length the parade day drew near. Mr. and Mrs. Albeson decided to go in the farm wagon drawn by their own team. Mrs. Albeson would not risk her bones in the steam railroad and she quenched her husband’s enthusiasm for an experimental ride on the devil-wagons. She cooked a dinner and a supper for RoBards and the children and set the table for them and drove off. RoBards had promised the children a ride on the steam-cars and planned to leave the house the next morning. After the Albesons had clattered away, he went to his library to select such books as he might want in town during the winter. He walked now and then to the window to watch the children playing on the lawn. As he stood there once he caught sight of a lone pedestrian, a hulking youth who carried his belongings in a bag hung on a stick slung across his shoulder. He recognized Jud Lasher—evidently on his way to sea. Without telling them why, RoBards called the children indoors. They scampered about his feet for a while, then their game led them gradually into the hall. There they played hide and seek, with long silences broken by loud outcries and a racket of running and laughter. After a vague period he woke from a reverie like a deep sleep and realized that he had not heard their voices for a long time. He called; there was no answer. He cried their names up the stairway. A sense of some uncanny horror set his heart athrob. He went back to the library window puzzled, calling. Then he caught sight of Keith standing chubbily against a huge tulip tree with his hands over his eyes. He was counting loudly.
  • 47. RoBards smiled at the solemnity of the everlasting game of hide- and-seek—grown-ups and infants hiding their eyes and hiding themselves and making a sport of what should be a serious business. He looked about for Immy, expecting to see her crouching behind a crimson rambler’s trellis or some other concealment. He heard a faint cry, so faint and far away that it might have been a distant bird. His gaze darted here and there. A moving figure caught his eye on a hillside. He saw that it was Jud Lasher, and that he was running toward a thicket on a ledge of rocks. In his arms he held something that struggled. RoBards knitted his brows and shaded his eyes to peer into the glare of the afternoon sun. He heard again that delicate call. It sounded like Immy’s voice; it frightened him. He pushed through the window and dropped to the lawn. He saw his horse grazing near; saddled, the reins trailing along the ground. RoBards ran to him, caught him as he whirled to bolt, threw the reins back over his neck, set foot in stirrup and rose to the saddle. As the horse reared, RoBards struck him between the ears with his fist to bring him down, then sent him flying to the gate. He turned him into the main road and the horse, catching terror and rage from his rider, beat the dust into a rolling cloud. At the point where he had seen Jud running, RoBards jerked the bridle and, setting the horse to the low stone wall, lifted him over before he had time to refuse. Up the hill RoBards kept him on the run. He caught sight of Jud Lasher as Jud Lasher caught sight of him. Only a little way the fugitive went before he flung Immy down like a bundle, and darted into a chaos of rocks and thistles and of tall sycamores holding out naked branches livid with leprous white patches. RoBards did not pause by Immy’s side but rode on, his heels beating a tattoo on the horse’s ribs. Jud Lasher was mad with fright, but terror made him as agile as a weasel. He slipped easily through mazes that the horse must blunder
  • 48. over or around. RoBards was so intent upon him that he did not see a heavy sycamore bough thrust right across his path until it swept him from the saddle. But he kept clutch on the reins, dragged the horse’s head round and brought him to earth. RoBards was up and in the saddle before the horse could rise. He charged on up the hill and overtaking Jud Lasher in a clearing, rode him down. The youth fell begging for mercy, but when the horse swerved to avoid him RoBards lifted his head so sharply that he went up beating the air with his forehoofs. Then he came down with them upon the prostrate body like a great two-tined pitchfork. Keith who had stood watching his father’s pursuit from a long distance hid his head in his arm. Immy watching from where she lay, covered her eyes with her hands. They saw their father slip from the saddle and disappear behind a shelving boulder. There was a brief hubbub, then silence. After a long time of awful emptiness, their father came down the hillside leading the horse. He went to Immy and lifted her in his arms, and kissing her, mumbling: “Did he scare you?” She nodded, almost more afraid of her father than of Jud. “He won’t scare you again. He’s gone now.” “Far?” “Far.” “I’m glad! I was hiding behind the big rose bush and he grabbed me like a big bear would; and he runned off with me. I’m glad he’s gone.” She laughed, but her father set his palm across her mouth quickly and hugged her to his heart so hard that she cried out.
  • 49. He made her promise that she would say nothing also of this and when she asked him why Jud wouldn’t let her alone, he said: “He will now. But if you tell anybody he will come back for you.” He scanned the landscape, but nobody was to be seen except little Keith waiting in a daze. He took the two children into the house and once more solemnly pledged them never to mention the name of Jud Lasher, or the efforts he had made to steal Immy. When supper time came RoBards waited on the two children, but did not eat. He put them early to bed, and heard their prayers, and waited till he was assured they were sound asleep. They felt his kisses upon their brows as they sank away into oblivion.
  • 50. CHAPTER XXI IT was black when Keith woke suddenly. Some little sound had pierced the depths of his profound immersion in sleep. He imagined Indians or Cowboys or Skinners. His ears seemed to rise like a terrier’s; his skin bristled with attention. He wondered if thieves were about; or lions or tigers or any of the witches or hobgoblins that peopled the night. It was the good old custom to invoke all manner of demons for the discipline of children. Good children never asked questions or never delayed to sleep. Bad children were watched not only by an unsleeping God of remarkable vindictiveness but by swarms of demons, child-eating animals, ogres that made ginger-bread of babies, or so-called saints who broiled them on live coals in a kitchen called hell. It was a hard world for children here and hereafter. The nightmares that attended waking hours were horrifying, but at night alone upstairs, with the dark smothering and blinding the wide eyes that could see little and imagine much, and the room a very lair of shapeless monsters that could see without being seen, it was the supreme torment. Even to cry aloud to nurse for help or a bit of light was to incur an added punishment. To run wildly out of the cavern and seek shelter in parental arms was to incur ridicule and often to shock strange guests and bring shame upon father and mother. Even grown-up people lost their senses when they were awake in the dark and made spooks and ghosts of dark chairs and tables, heard groans and clanking chains in the night-wind noises and the creaking of restless timbers. RoBards as a child had run the gauntlet of such agonies. He tried to save his children from them, but in vain. The lonely babies
  • 51. concocted fiends of their own, and nurses, impatient to be free of their importunities, added traditional atrocities. RoBards had caught one or two of the nurses at the ancient game and discharged them, only to be looked upon as a meddler. He had threatened the dusky Teen with a return to slavery if she did not try to disabuse the children’s minds of savagery. But she believed too much herself to be relied upon to inculcate atheism. Keith was a brave little knight, however, and an investigator by instinct. Instinctively he pitted his inborn skepticism against the tyrannies of imagination, and when he could not exorcise a fiend by denying it, he met it with bravery. His bedroom was a little Thermopylæ and he Leonidas fighting the swarming hosts. Sometimes he surrendered and buried his head under the pillow. Sometimes he put them all to ignominious flight. He had an ally of mystic powers who now and then gave unconscious aid: an old crack-voiced rooster, a tenor who had seen better days, who dreamed aloud at midnight of his former glories and snored a sleepy cock-a-doodle-doo long before the young beaux started their morning fanfare. This old rooster’s drowsy utterances always reminded Keith that dawn would come again and the sun with its long broom of light would sweep the room clear of its child-hating mobs. The blessed sun would explain the panther about to spring as an old rocking chair, the broom-straddling witch at the window as a tulip tree bough, the pirate with uplifted cutlass as a pile of clothes. Keith loved realism. He was educating himself in the night school to disbelieve the dark, to rely upon hard facts and distrust his terrifying fancies. A dawning scientist was evolving so fast that each week covered an æon of human experience. Besides, he had an explorer’s curiosity, a soldier’s curiosity, a willingness to bet his safety against any mystery that threatened or nagged him.
  • 52. He had put to flight no end of Indians, Skinners, and bogies by simply pointing his forefinger at them, snapping his trigger-thumb and observing, “Bang! bang!” To-night he quaked only a few minutes before he realized that whatever the menace was it was downstairs. His first theory was that Jud Lasher might be stealing back to make another attempt to carry Immy away. The why of Jud’s persistence baffled him—as well it might. His best guess was that Jud wanted to take Immy with him on the whaling ship that his father had commanded him to join. This thought substituted anger for terror. Keith’s little heart plunged with resentment and he slipped out of bed. The first sweat of fear chilled as he stood barefoot on the creaking floor. Then, like a child ghost in his long white nightshirt, he stole from his room to the hall. He peered into Immy’s room and saw that she was asleep in safety. He padded stealthily to his father’s room and, lifting the latch as silently as he could, swung back the door. He was stunned to find the room empty, the bed unoccupied, the covers still smooth and taut. His father might be at work in the library. He peered over the banisters, but the library door was open and no light yellowed the hall carpet as he had so often seen it when he had wakened on other occasions and made adventurous forays about the house in search of a drink or reinforcements against the armies in his room. Sometimes he had dared to steal down into the pantry and loot the cooky-jar. The thought of the pantry emboldened him now. He descended the stairway slowly with the awe of an Orpheus in Hades. The moon poured down on the front of the house; and, streaming through the glass in the front door, carpeted the lower hall with a swaying pattern of moon-dappled tree-shadows. Keith felt as if he waded a little brook of light as he flitted here and there. The sound continued, but always from below. He went at last to the cellar door. This house boasted to all passers-by that its builders had not placed the cellar out in the yard
  • 53. but had tucked it under the ground floor. There were two doors to the cellar, one in the kitchen, one on the outside of the house. Keith was interested to find a little glow of light on the kitchen floor, seeping in from the cellar. He listened and heard someone moving about, heard a mystifying chipping noise, such as the stone- cutters had made when they put the new marble hearthstone in place and when they had recently enlarged the cellar and strengthened the foundation with a course or two of stone. The cellar walls were eleven feet thick in places. They were made, Mr. Albeson said, “in the good old days when builders were honest and houses were solid—none of your modern flimsies.” Keith had spent much time there on the cellar stairs watching the masons and asking questions. He had learned much of the chemistry of mortar and the dangers of quicklime. He had seen it smoke like milk on fire. He had been told that if he fell in it he would disappear, be just eaten up bones and all. What could be going on down there now? Masons did not work at night. A burglar would hardly try to cut his way through stone foundations when the windows were usually left unlocked. Keith reached up and putting his fat hand on the thumb-latch pressed it down with all the gentleness he could command. Not a sound did he make, and the door came open silently. But a damp draught enveloped him and icy water seemed to flow round his ankles. With the wind that poured up the stairs came a stream of light, and an increase of sound. He leaned through the door and stared down. He saw his father in rough old clothes splotched with white. He looked like a mason and he was dragging from the thick wall of the chimney a big stone. On the cellar floor were many others ragged with old mortar. In the chimney was a big hole and his father was making it bigger.
  • 54. Keith’s darting eyes made out a long box of white lime fuming and simmering with a long something half buried in it. He watched his father in a stupor of bewilderment while he cleared a sort of oven in the wall. He had never seen such a look on his father’s face. At length he took the lamp and set it in another place, and bent to draw that something from the quicklime box. As he hoisted it awkwardly out of the shadow into the light, Keith saw that it was Jud Lasher. He seemed to be asleep, for he hung all limp in white clothes and he made no sound. Keith saw his father carry the gaunt, gangling form to the chimney and stuff it into the hollow. It would not fit, and he began frantically thrusting at the arms and legs to crowd them in. The head rolled across the edge and Keith caught sight of the face. Jud was not asleep! He was—— The boy pitched forward; slid and thudded down the cellar stairs head first. He fell and fell. The next thing he knew was the feel of his bed about him. His head was on his pillow. The covers tucked under his chin. His head was swimming and there was a big throbbing lump on his forehead. As he put his hand to its ache, his eyes made out a tall figure standing by him. “That you, Papa?” “Yes, Keith.” “Papa! what happened?” “You must have had a dream, honey.” “But my head hurts.” “I heard you scream and I found you on the floor.”
  • 55. “In my room?” “Yes.” “That’s funny! I thought I fell down the cellar stairs.” “That would be funny!” “I thought I saw you in the cellar.” “What would I be doing in the cellar?” “You were—papa, where’s Jud Lasher?” “He’s gone to sea, hasn’t he?” “Will he come back? Ever?” “Not unless you talk about him. He might if you do.” “I thought you didn’t believe in ghosts.” “There are ghosts and ghosts. Foolish people talk about the imaginary ones. The real ones—big men don’t talk about them at all, and you’re getting to be a big man, aren’t you?” “Yes, papa; yes, sir.” He was dizzy. He swung like a blown rag on a clothesline—or like a sailor on a—a whaler. A sailor on a whaler. The old rooster snored. His father’s hands came out across the ocean and drew the covers over the sailor’s hands. He—he was— was—— It was morning. It takes girls a long while to dress, and Keith was always downstairs long before Immy. This morning he was quicker than ever. He wanted to get to that cellar and see it by daylight. He met his father in the hall, pacing up and down. His father looked at him queerly as if he were afraid. That was a silly thing to think, of course, but his father looked sick—as if he hadn’t slept well or any at all.
  • 56. The boy thought it best to be frank. “Papa, was that a dream? All of it?” “Was what a dream?” “About me being in the cellar and seeing you taking stones out of the wall.” “Let’s go down and look at the cellar.” Keith loved that. When in doubt, visit the scene of the legend. He went down the steps. The morning light came in through little windows smeared with cobwebs. Keith missed first the heap of stones on the floor, the hole in the foundation of the chimney, the box of quicklime. The stones were in place. There was no hole in the wall, no quicklime. The cellar floor was clean—cleaner than usual. “I guess it was a dream, papa.” He took his father’s hand. The hand felt funny, gritty and clammy, as if it had been washed very hard. He glanced down and the nails were white along the edges. He said nothing as they started upstairs, but his backward look noted a thing he thought he ought to speak of: “Papa, the stones in the chimney look like they’d been chiseled out and put back in again with fresh mortar.” “Do they?” his father gasped, and sat down hard on the cellar steps. He nodded and groaned wearily. “They do look that way.” He thought a while, then rose and took an old broom and jabbed it into spider webs on the windows and whisked them away and spread them across the fresh lines. “Does that look better?” “If you could get the spiders to move there it would.”
  • 57. Now the boy felt that he was made an accomplice. His father took his criticism and acted on it. It was the most wonderful thing that had ever happened to the boy. He was saving his father from some mistake. The greatest lawyer in the world was taking Keith’s advice. He groaned with delight and hugged his father’s arm, murmuring: “We’re like pardners——” “Partners we are.” “I’m a big man now at last. Couldn’t you let me know ever’thing, so’s I could help you when you needed me?” His father gazed at him devotedly and kissed him. He did not like that kissing business. Big men did not indulge in such girls’ play. Still he remembered the story of Nelson’s death in the sea battle and how the fearless admiral’s last words were a plea to another officer to kiss him. But in spite of this burst of affection his father would not explain the Lasher mystery; he said the boy was too young to know. Yet he was not too young to tell enough to let other grown-up people know. RoBards, haggard with loss of sleep and the storms he had barely weathered, was frantic to prevent the children from publishing the devastating news. Curiosity would work in them like a yeast and the instinct to ask questions could only be overcome by some overwhelming injunction. He led Keith to the library and fetched out the vast family Bible, and set the boy’s little hand on it and said: “Swear that you will never mention Jud Lasher’s name to anybody, or breathe a word of what he did or what I did to him. Do you swear?” “Yes, papa, I swear, and I p’omise——” “Do you know what happens to people who break their oaths?”
  • 58. “Oh, yessir, they burn in hell-fire forever and ever, amen.” His father paid the boy a noble homage when he made the appeal to his chivalry above his fear: “Worse than that, it would mean that if you told, your little sister would be shamed before everybody as long as she lived. Everybody would think of her as if she were worse than wicked; nobody would ever marry her. She would be afraid to be seen anywhere. She would cry all the time and never smile.” “That would be worse’n me burning in hell. Oh, yessir, I won’t tell, sir.” “This promise won’t wear out in a few days or months, will it? This house will be yours when I am gone. It must never be sold; never be torn down till I am dead and gone. After Immy dies it won’t matter so much. Does your poor little brain understand all this?” His accurate soul answered: “I don’t understand it, no sir; but you do, and what you want is enough for me. I wish you would trust me.” “I do. And one last word: don’t tell Immy what I’ve told you. Don’t let her talk about it. And always remember that the least word you let slip might mean that the policemen would come and take me away and hang me before all the people.” The boy screamed at that and was hardly soothed back to calm.
  • 59. “SWEAR THAT YOU WILL NEVER MENTION JUD LASHER’S NAME TO ANYBODY”
  • 60. CHAPTER XXII ROBARDS was afraid to leave the house. How could he trust it to keep the secret? There would be nobody to guard the cellar from intrusion. Yet no intruder would be interested in studying the stone walls. Anyone who entered the house would seek jewelry or silver or clothes. He dared not ask the children to deny themselves the visit to the city. They were already nagging him to make haste lest they be too late for the parade. So he locked the house up and drove away. When he cast his last glance back he sent a prayer in his eyes to the house to be good to him and to protect him and its other children. The tulip tree stood at attention, solemn and reliable. He approached the Lasher hovel with dread and tried to make the horses gallop past, but Mrs. Lasher stood in the middle of the road and held up her arms. He had to face her, and he checked his horses while his heart plunged and galloped. But all she said was: “I just wanted to tell you that Jud left home yesterday to go to sea. It broke my heart, but I hope you’re satisfied.” RoBards took reassurance from the irony of this taunt, sorry as he felt for the poor, life-beaten woman before him. He nodded and touched his hat, and she stepped aside to let him pass. He could only hope that she would not visit the house in his absence. He caught a quick look from Keith’s eyes—a look of proud complicity. During the long drive the boy’s hand kept stealing round his arm and patting it encouragingly.
  • 61. They reached the railroad station just in time. The cars were so crowded that it was hard to squeeze aboard. It seemed that the whole countryside was drained of its populace. Everybody was bound for New York. Everybody had on his best or hers. The day was glorious and the world in a holiday mood. Many of the people carried baskets of food. The silliest joke brought guffaws of success and idiotic repartee. RoBards was hailed by clients and other acquaintances: “Here’s lawyer RoBards!” “How air ye, Jedge?” “Well, we put up a good fight, but I guess it was a good thing we got licked.” “That’s right; you never know your luck.” “Bigger N’ York grows, the better it’ll be for all of us.” “They’ll want plenty o’ butter ’n’ eggs down to the setty. We got water enough to dieloot the melk and then spare some for the pore town rats.” The engine whistled. Everybody jumped. The bell rang. Everybody cheered. The locomotive puffed and strained and jerked and the carriages began to move. Keith leaned far out of the window while his father held his heels. He saw the engine rolling round a curve with a brave choo-choo. Immy was content to wonder at the people, their funny hats and gay clothes. But Keith wanted to know how the engine ran without horses. His father had such a hard time explaining the modern miracle, that Keith offered to bet they had a couple of horses hidden in the old engine somewhere. It was appalling how fast they went. The landscape was a blur. “The horses are running away!” Keith yelled and then came in yowling, bringing an eyeful of coal dust. It was hard to get him to open his eyes till the grime was washed out. RoBards found an allegory in that: how human it was to clench the eyes and the heart tight upon what hurt them most; how hard it was to persuade people to let go what they could not endure. The carriages rocked and threatened to capsize. Women squealed and baskets came tumbling down from the racks. An umbrella
  • 62. almost transfixed the hat of one fluttering farm-wife. Everybody agreed that the steam locomotive was the devil’s own invention—something unchristian about it; folks would soon go back to horses like God meant them to. No wonder some God-fearing souls had risen to forbid the use of the schoolhouse for meetings in the interest of this contraption of Beelzebub. But in an incredibly short time the train was running among streets. They were in New York already and the city was decorated “like as if they was a weddin’ in every last house.” Loops of bunting and marvelous clevernesses of flag arrangement bedecked all the homes, and throngs were hastening south to the heart of the city and the grandest parade of modern times. One pitiful, forlorn little old woman was seemingly the only human being left behind to guard Westchester County till its populace returned from the excursion to New York City. Westchester had presented the metropolis with one of its rivers, and it went down to make the bestowal formal. Mrs. Lasher had not the money nor the time for such a journey. Water to her was the odious stuff she lugged from the well to the washtub or the stove. New York meant scarce more to her than Bombay or Hong-Kong. She hardly lifted her eyes from her toil to note who passed her hovel or in which direction. Yet she had watched for RoBards and had run out to taunt him with his cruelty to her. And now she was multiplied in his eyes into an endless procession of visions more terrible to him than an army with banners, more numerous than the parading hosts that poured along the streets of New York. While the bands thumped and brayed and the horses’ hoofs crackled on the cobblestones, and the soldiers and firemen and temperance folk strutted, he seemed to see only that little despondent hag wringing her work-tanned fingers over the loss of her good-for-nothing son. She was bitter against RoBards for
  • 63. sending the lout away to be a sailor. What would she have said if she had known—what would she say when she learned as learn she surely must—that RoBards had saved her boy from the perils of the seven seas by immuring him in the foundation walls of his home? The Russians had been wont to build a living virgin into the walls they wished to sanctify. He had sacrificed a lad and he was doomed to stand guard over the altar. He was as much a prisoner as the dead Jud—chained to a corpse. It terrified him to think that the half-crazed old mother had the franchise of Tuliptree Farm for this day, since there was never a soul left on the place to prevent her wandering about. What if she chose the opportunity to visit the home where she had never been invited to call? Just to see how her betters lived, she might climb in at a window and wander about the rooms. He saw her in his fancy gasping at the simple things that would be splendor to her pauper’s eye. What if the blood of her son should cry aloud to her like Abel’s from the ground, and draw her to the cellar? What if she should see through the clumsy disguise of spiderwebs and begin tearing at the foundation stones with those old hen’s-claw fingers of hers? It was a ridiculous image to be afraid of, but RoBards could not banish it.
  • 64. CHAPTER XXIII THE children had apparently forgotten all about the tragedy. The newness of the train-ride, the fear of missing something, of being late somewhere, of not being everywhere at once, kept their little minds so avid that there was no thought of yesterday. They entered the city as if they were wading into the boisterous surf at Rockaway Beach. The crowds broke about them with a din of breakers thundering shoreward. Yet they were not afraid. When they descended from the train at the station, RoBards could hardly keep them in leash long enough to get them into a hack. As it bounced across the town to St. John’s Park, he had only their backs and heels for company. Each child hung across a door and stared at the hurrying mobs. At length they reached the home and all their thoughts were forward. Nothing that had ever happened in the country could pit itself against the revelry of the city. Their young and pretty mother looked never so New Yorkish as when she ran down the front stoop to welcome them. When she cried the old watchword, “How have you been?” they answered heedlessly, “All right!” Immy, of all people, answered, “All right!” Even RoBards forgot for the brief paradise of embracing his gracious wife that everything was all wrong. She had to take him about the house and show him the improvements she had made, especially the faucet in the kitchen for the Croton water when it should come gurgling through the pipes. From a parlor window she pointed with delicious snobbery to the hydrant at the edge of the front porch. Most marvelous of all was a shower-bath that she had had installed upstairs. It would be possible to bathe every day! There was something irreligious and Persian about the apparatus, but RoBards rejoiced for a moment in the thought of what musical
  • 65. refreshment it would afford him on hot mornings after long nights of work. The children were so impatient to get them gone that they had hardly a glance to spare at the new toys, the faucets and hydrants, the municipal playthings which would prevent fires in the future or at least make the life of a fireman a pastime instead of a vain slavery. Patty’s mother had been caught in the new craze for “Temperance” and she called the Croton water as much of a godsend as the floods that gushed out from the rock that Moses smote. Since the city had removed the old pumps there had been no place for a man to quench his thirst except by going to a grocery store and asking for a cup of water as a charity. Few people had the courage to beg for water, so they either went dry or paid for a glass of brandy. This, she said, had kept up the evil of drunkenness that was undermining the health and character of so many men and women. Once the pure Croton water was accessible and free, intoxication would cease. But old man Jessamine, himself a child now, belittled the significance of the Croton day. It would be nothing, he said, to the great day when the Erie Canal was opened and the first boat from the lakes started its voyage through the canal to the Hudson and down the river to the sea. He held the frantic children fast while he talked ancient history: described the marvelous speed of the news. “The very identical moment the first drop of Erie water entered the canal at Buffalo, a cannon was fired. Eight miles away stood another cannon and the minute that cannoneer heard the first shot, he fired the second cannon. Eight miles away was another, and so on all the way to Sandy Hook. For more than five hundred miles the cannon were lined up eight miles apart and it took only an hour and twenty minutes for the news to reach New York, and then they sent the news back to Buffalo the same way; and so it took less than three hours to send a message more than a thousand miles. Wasn’t that wonderful?”
  • 66. The children wriggled impatiently and said, “Please, grampa, the bands are playing. We’d better hurry.” The old man held them tighter and went on: “When the canal boats reached New York there was a grand procession of ships, and there were two elegant kegs of Erie water with gold hoops and Governor Clinton emptied one of them into the ocean to marry the sea to the lakes; and another man poured in phials of water from the Elbe, the Rhine, the Rhone, and all the rivers and seas. And the land parade, you should have seen that! All the societies had wagons: the Hatters’ Society with men making hats before your very eyes; the Rope-makers with a ropewalk in operation; the comb-makers, the cordwainers, the printers printing an ode. To-day will be nothing to what people did when I was young, for in those days——” But the children had broken away from his sharp knees and his fat stomach and his mildewed legends. The band outside was irresistible, and their father was waiting to say good-by to them. Keith was mighty proud of his father in his fireman’s uniform. But when RoBards seized Immy, tossed her aloft and brought her down to the level of his lips, she was as wildly afraid as Hector’s child had been of him in his great helmet. Immy was easily frightened now. Her scream pierced the air, and she almost had a fit, squirming in her father’s arms and kicking him in the breast as he turned her over to Patty, who received her, wondering like another Andromache. “What’s the matter? what on earth?” Patty cried. And Immy sobbed: “I thought Papa was Jud Lasher.” “What a funny thought! Why should you——” Patty’s father called to her opportunely, demanding with senile querulousness, who had hidden his walking stick and where. RoBards forgave the old man much for playing providence this once.
  • 67. As Patty turned aside, Keith seized Immy’s foot and warned her to “keep still for heavem’s sakes.” She understood; her eyes widened and she pleaded with her father to forgive her. He was as afraid of her penitence as of her terror; but somehow in the flurry of leaving the house, Patty forgot her curiosity, and the incident passed over. The loyalty of Keith and his quick rally to his father’s protection from Immy’s indiscretion touched RoBards deeply. The boy had evidently inherited the family love of secrecy for the family’s sake. But RoBards was sick with fear, realizing on what slender threads the secret hung. He dreaded to leave the children with their mother, lest they let slip some new clue to the agony he loved Patty too well to share with her. But he had to take his place with his fire company, though the sky fell in his absence.
  • 68. CHAPTER XXIV THAT procession was seven miles long, and everyone who marched or rode, and each of the massed spectators had his or her terror of life at the back of the heart. But RoBards knew only his own anxiety. The Fire Kings had left their engine house by the time he reached the place and he had to search for them in the welter of humanity. The Battery was the point from which the parade was to start and every street within two miles of it was filled with men and horses and mobs of impatient people already footsore with standing about on the sharp cobblestones. At last the serpent began to move its glittering head. The Grand Marshal, General Hopkins, set forth with a retinue of generals and aids, guards and riflemen. The horse artillery and various guard regiments followed with seven brass bands. The second division under Major General Stryker consisted of the Governor and his staff, the state artillery, State Fencibles and cadets, councilmen from various cities, foreign consuls, and members of the Society of the Cincinnati, escorting the water commissioners and engineers, all in barouches. The third division included officers of the army and navy and militia, “reverend the clergy,” judges, lawyers, professors, and students; the chamber of commerce and the board of trade. The firemen made up the fourth division. Four other divisions tailed after. It seemed that there could be nobody left to watch when so many marched. But the walks and windows, porches and roofs were a living plaster of heads and bodies. New York had more than doubled its numbers since the Erie Canal festival and had now nearly three hundred and fifty thousand souls within its bounds, as well as thousands on thousands of visitors. It gave RoBards’ heart another twinge to stand an obscure member of a fire-gang and watch Harry Chalender go by in a
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