The old man waved me down. “It’s me that speaks here,” he said curtly; and we waited the coming of the lawyer in a triple silence. He appeared at last, the maid ushering him in—a spectacled, dry, but not ungenial-looking man.
“Here, Gregg,” cried my grandfather, “just a question: What has Aadam got to do with my will?”
“I’m afraid I don’t quite understand,” said the lawyer, staring.
“What has he got to do with it?” repeated the old man, smiting with his fist upon the arm of his chair. “Is my money mine’s, or is it Aadam’s? Can Aadam interfere?”
“O, I see,” said Mr. Gregg. “Certainly not. On the marriage of both of your children a certain sum was paid down and accepted in full of legitim. You have surely not forgotten the circumstance, Mr. Loudon?”
“So that, if I like,” concluded my grandfather, hammering out his words, “I can leave every doit I die possessed of to the Great Magunn?”—meaning probably the Great Mogul.
“No doubt of it,” replied Gregg, with a shadow of a smile.
“Ye hear that, Aadam?” asked my grandfather.
“I may be allowed to say I had no need to hear it,” said my uncle.
“Very well,” says my grandfather. “You and Jeannie’s yin can go for a bit walk. Me and Gregg has business.”