Besche v. Brady

Urner, J., delivered the opinion of the Court. In September, 1919, Mrs. Frank Brady, wife of the appellee, bought from Besche Brothers, the appellants, some household furniture, under a conditional contract of purchase in writing, for prices aggregating $511.15, of which the sum of fifty dollars was paid at once and the balance was payable at the rate of six dollars bi-weekly. About a month after the purchase and delivery of the furniture, Mrs. Brady and her husband had a misunderstanding which caused their separation. In view of that occurrence, Mr. Brady, who had provided the money for the original and succeeding payments on the furniture, asked the appellants, as he testified, to store it for him until he and his wife should become re-united.

According to the appellants’ version the request was that the furniture be taken back as a means of terminating the contract of purchase. At all events the greater part of the furniture was removed by the appellants to their store room. Mr. Brady kept in his possession several articles, the contract prices of ■which totaled $12.15, and Mrs. Brady retained a lamp valued at $10.50, for which she made a separate settlement. The biweekly payments were continued by Mr. Brady for a period of about ten months.

A reconciliation having been then effected between himself and his wife, they together went to the store of the appellants and asked that a bed-room-suit included in the original purchase be returned to their possession. They were informed by the appellants that the furniture had been placed in stock when it was brought' back to the store, and had afterwards been sold. An offer -to substitute other furniture, and a proposed settlement on a monetary ⁵⁸⁴ basis, not being acceptable, Mr. Brady brought this action in trover to recover damages for the conversion of the furniture, which he claims the appellants agreed to hold in storage subject to his order. It was asserted and disputed in' the testimony that the market value of the furniture had largely increased, as compared with the purchase price, when its redelivery was requested.

The appeal is from a judgment, on the verdict of a jury, in the plaintiff’s favor for the sum of three hundred dollars. There is one bill of exception in the record. It relates to the rulings on the prayers. The appellants complain particularly of the granting of a prayer offered by the plaintiff which defined the measure of damages.

It instructed the jury that, if they found for the plaintiff, their verdict should be ££for such a sum of money as the jury may find to be the value of the goods and chattels mentioned in the evidence at the time of the conversion with interest to date.” Under ordinary conditions that would be a correct statement of the measure of damages in an action of trover. Seaboard Air Line Rwy. v. Phillips, 108 Md. 285 ; Swartz v. G. B. S. Brewing Co., 109 Md. 393 . But the prayer