"That's easy to see."
"It wasn't so easy to do. But I heard of the last of an old Virginia family who had died of consumption in Arizona. I traced his family. He was the last of it. Then it was easy to arrange a little story: Terence Colby had married a girl in Arizona, died shortly after; the girl died also, and I took the baby. Nobody can disprove what I say. There's not a living soul who knows that Terence is the son of Jack Hollis—except you and me."
"How about the woman I got the baby from?"
"I bought her silence until fifteen years ago. Then she died, and now Terry is convinced that he is the last representative of the Colby family."
She laughed with excitement and beckoned him out of the room and into another—Terry's room, farther down the hall. She pointed to a large photograph of a solemn-faced man on the wall. "You see that?"
"Who is it?"
"I got it when I took Terry to Virginia last winter—to see the old family estate and go over the ground of the historic Colbys."
She laughed again happily.
"Terry was wild with enthusiasm. He read everything he could lay his hands on about the Colbys. Discovered the year they landed in Virginia; how they fought in the Revolution; how they fought and died in the Civil War. Oh, he knows every landmark in the history of 'his' family. Of course, I encouraged him."
"I know," chuckled Vance. "Whenever he gets in a pinch, I've heard you say: 'Terry, what should a Colby do?'"