“Read it to me, my son, I cannot.”
He reads as follows:—
“To my nephew, Claude Angland, of Auckland, New Zealand.
“I am dying before my work is completed. It rests with you to allow me to rest in peace after my death. I wish to make reparation to those I have neglected too long. I have tried to bury the past in science and in work. Your mother will explain all to you at the proper time. Come to where I now lie. You can trust Billy, whom you will remember with me in England. I believe he will get out of this. Come here alone with him, and at once. Good-bye to all. I hope you keep up your chemistry. Beware of squatters and police. This note will be hard to read, but read the whole of it.
“Samuel D. Dyesart.”
“What does he mean?” muses Claude out loud, after a pause,—inadvertently speaking as if the writer was still alive, so difficult was it to believe that the hand that had guided the pencil that traced those shaky letters was fast turning into its original dust.
Mrs. Angland comes of a practical stock, and sees the letter only as it is.
“I suppose, poor fellow,” she says, speaking slowly and softly, “he liked to think that some one he had loved in life would visit his lonely grave out there in those fearful wastes. He was very fond of you, Claude, even from the time he first saw you, a mere baby. But don’t go, Claude,” she adds beseechingly; “that horrible Queensland that has cost me a brother shall not take my son.”
“Mother,” interrupts Claude at this point, “you don’t understand what I mean. Let me read the letter to you again.” The letter is re-read. Presently Mrs. Angland breaks the silence.
“Perhaps he wants you to finish his work—his horrid exploring. God forgive me if I am wicked when I think it was wrong of your uncle to tempt you away from me. But perhaps he was wandering in his mind rather. Poor fellow, what he must have suffered! How odd of him to think of your chemistry. ‘I hope you keep up your chemistry,’” quoting from the letter. “Fancy his thinking of that when so near death.”