“Come in here. There is no one about, and we can be quiet. I want to speak to you.” When we sat down on a seat with none other near it, father said:
“You are a student of the law. What does all that mean?” I thought it a good occasion for an epigram, so I said one word:
“Bilk!”
“H’m!” said father; “that is so far as you and I are concerned. You with a beggarly ten thousand, and I with twenty. But what is, or will be, the effect of those secret trusts?”
“Oh, that,” I said, “will, I dare say, be all right. Uncle Roger evidently did not intend the older generation to benefit too much by his death. But he only gave Rupert St. Leger one thousand pounds, whilst he gave me ten. That looks as if he had more regard for the direct line. Of course—” Father interrupted me:
“But what was the meaning of a further sum?”
“I don’t know, father. There was evidently some condition which he was to fulfil; but he evidently didn’t expect that he would. Why, otherwise, did he leave a second trust to Mr. Trent?”
“True!” said father. Then he went on: “I wonder why he left those enormous sums to Trent and old MacKelpie. They seem out of all proportion as executors’ fees, unless—”
“Unless what, father?”
“Unless the fortune he has left is an enormous one. That is why I asked.”