"I will tell it to you. All I can remember of my earliest days is that I was traveling around the world from city to city with a strange man who bade me call him uncle. He was a great magician. He taught me his trade. I had a natural aptitude for the business. I evidently possessed a gift in that direction, and he cultivated my natural gift so that I became a wonder to him and a wonder to myself. Well, one day, without any previous warning, the old man announced to me here in New York that he was going away—to leave me. I was amazed and heart-broken. He had been in America a year when he made the announcement. He would not tell me why he deserted me; he would not tell me where he was going and would not assure me that I should ever see him or hear from him again. And what was stranger still, although I knew that he was rich—for together we had been very successful—he was leaving me practically penniless. All he gave me was five dollars, and when I reproached him he said:
"'You can earn the money you need with your wonderful gift.' He gave me a great deal of good advice as concerned my conduct while making the struggle of life."
"Did you not ask him about your parentage?"
"I did, but he refused to give me any information."
"Did he deny knowing about you?"
"He indicated that he did know the story of my earliest life, but he refused to give me any information. He did say, however, that some day if I lived I would learn all about myself."
"How cruel he was!"
"It would appear so, but after all it is proved that he knew what he was talking about. He said I could earn all the money I needed with my great gift, and his words have proved true. I have not wanted for anything since the night he so strangely disappeared. Before going he gave me a box and told me I must not open that box until I was twenty-one, or until such time as I might fall into some dreadful calamity; then, when all other means failed, I was to open the box."
"And you have that box?"
"I have."