"My client, Mark Mason, authorizes me to demand of you an accounting of the sums received by you as executor of the estate of his late grandfather, Elisha Doane, to the end that his mother, co-heiress with your wife, may receive her proper shares of the estate. An early answer will oblige,
"Yours respectfully,
"George Gerrish."
"Do you know Mr. Gerrish well, too?" asked Talbot.
"No, sir, but Mr. Rockwell gave me a note to him. I have had an interview with him."
"Say to him that he will hear from me."
Mark bowed and withdrew. Within a week Solon Talbot had agreed to make over to his sister-in-law, Mrs. Mason, a sum of over fifty thousand dollars, representing her share of her father's estate. He reconsidered his purpose of buying the house in West Forty-Seventh Street, and decided to remain in the flat which he then occupied.
Mrs. Mason and Mark took a handsome flat up town, and henceforth were able to live as well as their pretentious relatives. Mark was advised by Mr. Rockwell as to the investment of his mother's money, and it has already increased considerably. He is himself taking a mercantile course at a commercial college, and will eventually enter the establishment of Mr. Gilbert, with whom he is as great a favorite as ever.
It never rains but it pours. One morning Mrs. Mack, the aged miser, was found dead in bed. She left a letter directing Mark to call on her lawyer. To his surprise he found that he was left sole heir to the old lady's property, amounting to about five thousand dollars.
"What shall I do with it, mother?" he asked. "I have no rightful claim to it. She only left it to me that her nephew might not get it."
"Keep it till he gets out of prison, and then help him judiciously if he deserves it. Meanwhile invest it and give the income to charity."