“I should think, sir,—as you ask my opinion,—that in the case of a gentleman in holy orders there would be no impropriety. Mr. Stoddard is a fine gentleman; I heard your late grandfather speak of him very highly.”
“That, I imagine, is hardly conclusive in the matter. There is the executor—”
“To be sure; I hadn’t considered him.”
“Well, you’d better consider him. He’s the court of last resort, isn’t he?”
“Well, of course, that’s one way of looking at it, sir.
“I suppose there’s no chance of Mr. Pickering’s dropping in on us now and then.”
He gazed at me steadily, unblinkingly and with entire respect.
“He’s a good deal of a traveler, Mr. Pickering is. He passed through only this morning, so the mail-boy told me. You may have met him at the station.”
“Oh, yes; to be sure; so I did I” I replied. I was not as good a liar as Bates; and there was nothing to be gained by denying that I had met the executor in the village. “I had a very pleasant talk with him. He was on the way to California with several friends.”
“That is quite his way, I understand,—private cars and long journeys about the country. A very successful man is Mr. Pickering. Your grandfather had great confidence in him, did Mr. Glenarm.”