“For me?”
“For you—from your uncle.”
“But—how?”
He lighted, took a serene puff or two, drew the jest from his pocket, and, throwing it on a chair, “You’ll have to allow some value to cryptograms at last,” he said, and sat down to enjoy himself.
“Chaunt!”
“O,” he said, “it was a bagatelle. An ass might have brayed it out at sight.”
“Please, I am something less than an ass. Please will you interpret for me?” I said humbly.
He neighed out—I beg his pardon—a great laugh at last.
“O,” he cried: “your uncle was true blue; he stuck to his guns; but I never really supposed he meant to disinherit you, Johnny. You always had the first place in his heart, for all your obstinacy. He took his own way to convince you, that was all. Pretty poor stuff it is, I’m bound to confess; but enough to run your capacities to extinction. Here, hand it over.”
“Don’t be hard on me,” I protested, giving him the paper. “If I’m all that you say, it was as good as cutting me off with a penny.”