“Yes; when, in the interview of which I have spoken, my uncle showed me the two envelopes and informed me of their several contents.”
“Did he tell you or did you learn in any way which will was in the one marked with red?”
“No. I did not ask him and he did not say.”
“So when you saw it burning you did not know with certainty whether it was the will making you or your cousin his chief heir?”
“I did not.”
He said it firmly, but he said it with effort. Again, why?
The time to consider this was not now, for at this reply, expected though it was, a universal sigh swept through the house, carrying my thoughts with it. Emotion must have its outlet. The echo in my own breast was a silent one, springing from sources beyond the ken of the simple onlooker. We were approaching a critical part of the inquiry. The whereabouts of the missing document must soon come up. Should I be obliged to listen to further insinuations such as had just been made? Was it his plan to show that I was party to a fraud and knew where the missing will lay secreted,—where it would always lie secreted because it was in his favor and not in mine? It was possible; anything was possible. If I were really wise I would prepare myself for the unexpected; for the unexpected was what I probably should be called upon to face.
Yet it was not so, or I did not think it so, in the beginning.
Asked to describe his uncle’s last moments he did so shortly, simply, feelingly.
Then came the question for which I waited.