“Yes,” said Tim. “But nobody noticed it—I mean, T. Paul’ could be anybody. And when I saw magazines for writers on the newsstands and bought them, I got on to the way to use a pen name on the story and my own name and address up in the corner. Before that I used a pen name and sometimes never got the things back or heard about them. Sometimes I did, though.”
“What then?”
“Oh, then I’d endorse the check payable to me and sign the pen name, and then sign my own name under it. Was I scared to do that! But it was my money.”
“Only stories?”
“Articles, too. And things. That’s enough of that for today. Only— I just wanted to say—a while ago, T. Paul told the bank he wanted to switch some of the money over to a checking account. To buy books by mail, and such. So, I could pay you, Dr. Welles—” with sudden formality.
“No, Tim,” said Peter Welles firmly. “The pleasure is all mine. What I want is to see the story that was published when you were eight. And some of the other things that made T. Paul rich enough to keep a consulting psychiatrist on the payroll. And, for the love of Pete, will you tell me how all this goes on without your grandparents’ knowing a thing about it?”
“Grandmother thinks I send in box tops and fill out coupons,” said Tim. “She doesn’t bring in the mail. She says her little boy gets such a big bang out of that little chore. Anyway that’s what she said when I was eight. I played mailman. And there were box tops—I showed them to her, until she said, about the third time, that really she wasn’t greatly interested in such matters. By now she has the habit of waiting for me to bring in the mail.”
Peter Welles thought that was quite a day of revelation. He spent a quiet evening at home, holding his head and groaning, trying to take it all in.
And that I. Q.—120, nonsense! The boy had been holding out on him. Tim’s reading had obviously included enough about I. Q. tests, enough puzzles and oddments in magazines and such, to enable him to stall successfully. What could he do if he would co-operate?
Welles made up his mind to find out.