“Philanthropic or personal?” I queried. “Not the former I sincerely trust, or the pickings will be even less than I hope for. I know he’s been roaming the wide world mysteriously ever since I can remember, but I thought it was the inherited taint of travel. We’ve had a lot of sailors in the family, Mr. Crum.”
“That is very true,” answered the man of law impressively, “and in a certain indirect sense I won’t say you are altogether wrong. But the simplest way will be to put the whole matter before you as I learned it from your uncle. Excuse me a moment.”
He turned to where a row of tin boxes, shiny and white-lettered, lined the walls along a broad shelf. Taking down one labelled “Viscount Heatherslie,” he took up a key that had been lying handy upon the desk and opened it. He extracted a bundle of papers tied in red tape, and began sorting them with neat precision. I occupied myself in wondering with unaffected curiosity what on earth was coming next.
Of course Uncle Leonard had been a wanderer on the wide earth, but he had always been to me not so much a man as an impression. My poor dear mother used to remark occasionally, “I see your uncle’s wintering in Egypt,” or “Leonard’s in Japan again,” wondering always, as women do, what could induce him to leave the comforts of his native isle for such outlandish realms. But I had paid but slight attention. Uncle Leonard was nothing to me—I was his heir-at-law, of course, but then he had always been expected to marry late in life, as most of his ancestors had done, and I had never troubled about him. I remember his coming down one Fourth at Eton and stumbling across me, more by accident than intention, and tipping me a fiver. But that was a feat he had never followed up and improved upon in later life, so I had let him drop out of my calculations, and he—well, he never spent three weeks of the year in England, I suppose. Some men have the regular gypsy taint in the blood. They must move in aimless joy of moving, or they absolutely shrivel up for want of occupation. The mania in his case was more or less inherited, I knew. Half-a-dozen of our forebears have been adventurers—not to say buccaneers—in the past. They pop up in various capacities all across the pages of Elizabethan and eighteenth century history. So the fact that in my late uncle’s case there was more behind this activity than was his by birth and ancestry came to me truly as a surprise. I awaited developments pondering many possibilities.
Old Crum found what he wanted at last. Replacing all the papers but one—rather a musty-looking document—he kennelled his legs comfortably beneath his writing-table and began his revelation, tapping his fingers upon the dusty law books before him to emphasize his remarks.
I’ll give you the tale as he gave it to me. Then judge me if I was a consummate fool or not, in that I followed in the footsteps of my uncle.
CHAPTER II
THE TALE OF A COINCIDENCE
“The late Viscount Heatherslie,” said Mr. Crum, tapping the desk before him like a schoolmaster demanding silence for a lecture, “was a collector, and at the same time an economist. These you will probably think are walks in life entirely incompatible one with the other. I will explain further. Though he lived far within his income, he had the mania for collection and gratified it. But he did this by making it a rule never to buy what had a merely temporary or sentimental value, but only what was likely to be intrinsically marketable. I never knew a man with a sounder sense of finance or one who, without professional knowledge, made such use of unprofessional experience. I doubt if he ever struck a bad bargain in his life. You will to-day reap the benefit of his judgment. I do not think I exaggerate when I say that you may safely count on his treasures fetching a sum of not less than one hundred thousand pounds.”
I gasped in amazement, nearly bouncing from my chair. My excited shuffling upset a blob of ink from the inkstand before me. With an air of respectful deprecation Crum began to mop it up methodically, before answering the questions I fired at him like bullets.
“Great Heavens!” I exclaimed, “the leery old dog! You mean to tell me in sober earnest that he has amassed all that money by simple grubbing after curios, when we thought he just roamed around for mere amusement and love of travel. Where has he stuck them all? Not at Kilberran, I sincerely hope, or they’re all rotten with mildew by now. And what are they? Pictures, bronzes, china? Why, neither my mother nor my poor old dad had an inkling of it. Great Scott! One hundred thousand pounds. Now really, don’t you think you may be exaggerating, my dear Mr. Crum?”