“Who does?” The girl’s eyes opened wide.
“My uncle, Nicholas Fischer.”
“Oh, Nicholas Fischer.” The girl’s voice dropped. “But he is the kindest man! Comes here with books. He sells them to Mr. Morrow who owns this store—secondhand books. Perhaps they come from the trunks. And Mr. Morrow says he helps poor people, your uncle does, and he doesn’t let anyone know who it is.”
“But he buys trunks, other people’s trunks, and sells them!” Grace insisted.
“Yes, buys them at auction, I guess. Several people on this street do that. Express auctions, railway auctions, storage house auctions and all that. And you are to help him open them up!” she exclaimed quite suddenly. “You are to explore them? How I envy you!”
“Envy?” Grace stared in unbelief.
“But why not? Think of the things you may find. Diamonds perhaps; stocks and bonds; rare old coins and rarer old books; ancient silver plate. Just think of the things people pack away in their trunks! Letters; diaries; quaint old pictures. It—why it’s like a trip around the world!”
“But it—it seems so unfair,” Grace wavered.
“You’re not the one that’s being unfair,” the bright-eyed one reasoned. “Those people can’t have their things in those trunks. Perhaps they are dead. In some cases they lost their trunks because they were too poor to pay storage or express charges. You can’t well help that. So why think about it?”
Grace Krowl was to think about it many times and in the end to do something about it. That something was to draw her into a great deal of trouble. For the moment she left the little secondhand bookshop soothed, comforted, and filled with a desire to call again.