On his return to the house Rodney asked his mother about the matter.
“It’s all very strange to me. The gentleman, and it was very evident that he was one, called and handed me a paper, saying, ‘Madam, there is the deed to your home. I understand that leaves you free of debt. I do not wish to seem impertinent but am I correct?’”
“I told him I knew of no other obligations. I said: ‘You are very kind and I am deeply grateful if I do not seem so. It is hard for one unaccustomed to charity to accept it, you know. I must know to whom I 145 am indebted, for I certainly hope the time may come when it may be repaid.’”
“What did he say?”
“His reply was, ‘This is not given as charity. It is to repay a debt owed to one very dear to you and I am not at liberty to mention the debtor’s name. I assure you, however, that it is not charity, but the payment of an obligation. The only request is, that this home, never, so long as in your possession, be mortgaged again.’”
“Father was always helping people and saying nothing about it,” replied Rodney, and the tears came to his eyes.
They sat many minutes looking into the open fire. Then Mrs. Allison said: “Rodney, I wish you would go to the closet in my room and get the little trunk in which your father kept his papers.”
The boy brought back a little leather-bound trunk, neatly ornamented and secured with brass headed tacks.
Mrs. Allison was a woman of strong character and, after the shock of hearing the report of her husband’s death, took up her duties with composure, though the lines in her face seemed deeper, and Rodney saw that an errant lock of her hair, which he had always thought a part of the attractiveness of her fair face, was now quite gray, and, as she pushed it aside, a familiar way she had, he noticed how thin and white her hand was and saw that it trembled.
“As I put the deed in the trunk with the other papers, the day it was brought to me, I noticed a sealed 146 paper there, which I think we perhaps should open,” saying which she took it and held it out that her son might read the inscription, which was: “To be opened by my dear wife after my death, if she should survive, otherwise to be burned unread.”