“I suppose he is well. In fact, I don’t know but he is likely to live as long as I do. There can’t be more than five years’ difference in our ages.”
“That is a discouraging outlook.”
“I should say so! But there is one chance for me during his life.”
“What is that?”
“He may be declared insane. In that case the management of the estate would naturally be transferred to me as the direct heir.”
“But is there any ground for assumption that he is insane?”
“Yes. Ever since his son’s death he has acted in an eccentric way—made a hermit of himself and withdrawn from society. You know grief brooded over often terminates in insanity. Then there was his wife’s terrible death, which had a strange effect upon him.
“I did not understand that the boy died.”
“Well, he disappeared. He is undoubtedly dead.”
“It is his being out of the way that makes you the heir, is it not?”