“He didn’t say how, did he?”
“Not exactly, but I understood he had put it in trust—deeded it, in some way, so that it would eventually come to us—to you and to me.”
“Did he ever show you any papers in that connection?”
“No. He was going to, and we had planned to go over the matter together, when he fell ill, and—”
Her voice choked, and she could not proceed for a moment.
Tom’s eyes filled with tears as he led his mother into the house. They sat down together, and presently Mrs. Taylor regained control of herself, so that she could go on.
“Why I said anything in my letter,” she resumed, “was because of something I found when going over some old papers of your father’s. It was a few days ago, and among some useless documents I found a rough draft of a trust deed he had drawn up regarding the railroad property, as I call it.”
“To whom was the deed made out?” Tom asked.
“To Captain Hawkesbury and Mr. Doolittle.”
“What!” cried Tom, startled by his mother’s answer. “To those—”