"Only vaguely," I was willing to admit.
"It presented some very interesting features," he went on, blandly, "and assuming that you really only remember them vaguely, I will put them before you as clearly as possible, in order that you may follow my argument more easily later on.
"The victim of the mysterious tragedy was, as no doubt you remember, an eccentric old invalid named Thornton Ashley, the well-known naval constructor, who had made a considerable fortune during the war and then retired, chiefly, it was said, owing to ill-health. He had two sons, one of whom, Charles, was a misshapen, undersized creature, singularly unprepossessing both in appearance and in manner, whilst the other, Philip, was a tall, good-looking fellow, very agreeable and popular wherever he went. Both these young men were bachelors, a fact which, it appears, had been for some time a bone of contention between them and their father. Old Ashley was passionately fond of children, and the one desire of his declining years was to see the grandchildren who would ultimately enjoy the fortune which he had accumulated. Whilst he was ready to admit that Charles, with his many afflictions, did not stand much chance with the fair sex, there was no reason at all why Philip should not marry, and there had been more than one heated quarrel between father and son on that one subject.
"So much so, indeed, that presently Philip cut his stick and went to live in rooms in Jermyn Street. He had a few hundreds a year of his own, left to him by a godmother. He had been to Rugby and to Cambridge, and had been a temporary officer in the war: pending his obtaining some kind of job he settled down to live the life of a smart young bachelor in town, whilst his brother Charles was left to look after the old man, who became more and more eccentric as his health gradually broke up. He sold his fine house in Hyde Park Gardens, his motor, and the bulk of his furniture, and moved into a cheap flat in Maida Vale, where he promptly took to his bed, which he never left again. His eccentricities became more and more pronounced and his temper more and more irascible. He took a violent dislike to strangers, refused to see anybody except his sons and two old friends, Mr. Oldwall, the well-known solicitor, and Dr. Fanshawe-Bigg, who visited him from time to time and whose orders he obstinately refused to obey. Worst of all, as far as the unfortunate Charles was concerned, he became desperately mean, denying himself (and, incidentally, his son) every luxury, subsisting on the barest necessities, and keeping no servant to wait on him except a daily 'char.'
"Soon his miserliness degenerated into a regular mania.
"'Charles and I are saving money for the grand-children you are going to give me one day,' he would say with a chuckle whenever Philip tried to reason with him on the subject of this self-denying ordinance. 'When you have an establishment of your own, you can invite us to come and live with you. There will be plenty then for housekeeping, I promise you!'
"At which the handsome Philip would laugh and shrug his shoulders and go back to his comfortable rooms in Jermyn Street. But no one knew what Charles thought about it all. To an outsider his case must always have appeared singularly pathetic. He had no money of his own and his delicate health had made it impossible for him to take up any profession: he could not cut his stick like his brother Philip had done, but, truth to tell, he did not appear to wish to do so. Perhaps it was real fondness for his father that made him seem contented with his lot. Certain it is that as time went on he became a regular slave to the old man, waiting on him hand and foot, more hard-worked than the daily 'char,' who put on her bonnet and walked out of the flat every day at six o'clock when her work was done, and who had all her Sundays to herself.
"All the relaxation that Charles ever had were alternate week-ends, when his brother Philip would come over and spend Saturday to Monday in the flat taking charge of the invalid. On those occasions Charles would get on an old bicycle, and with just a few shillings in his pocket which he had saved during the past fortnight out of the meagre housekeeping allowance which he handled, he would go off for the day somewhere into the country, nobody ever knew where. Then on Monday morning he would return to the flat in Maida Vale, ready to take up his slave's yoke, to all appearances with a light heart.
"'Charles Ashley is wise,' the gossiping acquaintances would say, 'he sticks to the old miser. Thornton Ashley can't live for ever, and Oldwall says that he is worth close on a quarter of a million.'
"Philip, on the other hand, could have had no illusions with regard to his father's testamentary intentions. The bone of contention—Philip's celibacy—was still there, making bad blood between father and son; more than once the old miser had said to him with a sardonic grin: 'Let me see you married soon, my boy, and with a growing family around you, or I tell you that my money shall go to that fool Charles, or to the founding of an orphan asylum or the establishment of a matrimonial agency.'