CHAPTER III
RENA’S LETTER TO TOM GILES
(With remarks by Tom, as he read it)
“New York, June 10, 18—.
“Dear Old Tom:
“It is an age since I have heard from you. Don’t you know we have been home from Europe six weeks, and you haven’t been to see us. What kind of a cousin is that, I’d like to know? Are you so busy in your office, earning your bread, as you said you were when I tried to have you come over to Paris and meet us? Well, by and by I may be in a position to give you your daily bread, as you did me when I was a poor little waif stranded at your mother’s door before Uncle Reuben left me some money and Aunt Mary took me up.
“I have a tremendous matrimonial speculation on hand, with thousands and thousands of dollars in it.”
(“The devil you have!” was Tom’s exclamation, as he wiped his wet face, for the morning was hot and Rena’s letter made him hotter. Then he read on:)
“I never knew about it till a little while ago when I got the queerest letter from a Mr. Colin McPherson, enclosing a copy of the stupidest, ridiculousest, absurdest, craziest will that was ever made. Did you ever hear of old Sandy McPherson, of Oakfield, a little town on the New England coast, with nothing in it but rocks and ferns and huckleberries and sumac bushes? I never heard of it or him till I got his brother’s letter. It seems Sandy was my great-step-grandfather, who was married twice. His second wife was a widow, a Mrs. Somebody, who had a daughter when she married him and she—the wife—was my great-grandmother. I never knew I had a great-grandmother, though I suppose I must have had. I certainly did not know that she married Sandy McPherson. But to return to the will.
“Sandy McPherson’s first wife was also a widow, like the second. He was great on widows, and his first wife had a son, not his, but somebody else’s. That would make him a stepson just as my grandmother was a stepdaughter. I hope you follow me. I had to read the letter over two or three times before I understood it. Where was I? Oh, I know. I was telling you about the first wife and her son, and along this line comes Mr. McPherson’s great-step-grandson, Reginald Travers.”
(“Lord Harry!” and Tom nearly fell off his chair. Then straightening himself, he read on:)