Benson looked a trifle blank at this. He tried to remember just how Raymond had impressed him, but the years had effaced whatever impression good or bad he may once have had of his guide. He was troubled in spite of himself. While he could not think that the papers meant anything, yet there was something ominous in their recovery after all these years.
“Well, you must admit it's a mighty singular incident any way you view it,” said Wade. After all he was not disposed to hang to a point when it displeased Benson, for the older lawyer had been useful to him in the past, and it would not be his fault if this use was not repeated in the future.
“I'd advise Mrs. Landray to look out for this man Rogers. His recovery of the papers comes too pat on Mrs. Crittendon's meeting with him.”
“Oh, I don't think that,” said Wade. “Reddy says he's a rich man, and that he's known him intimately for some time.”
“Rogers is the name of the girl Reddy's going to marry,” said Stephen.
He had been an interested listener to all that had been said, though he had taken no part in the conversation. He believed that the whole circumstance of the recovery of the papers was merely one of those mysteries that occasionally come into the lives of people. He was willing to accept the explanation Reddy had offered for what it was worth; he could not imagine any motive for fraud such as Benson apparently suspected.
“That's so!” said Wade. “Rogers is her name, and she is the daughter of one of his neighbours. I guess it's the same, Stephen.”
Benson had quite recovered his composure, and that he had lost it had been only evidenced by a certain sharpness that had crept into his voice when he addressed Wade. If the papers were what Reddy said they were, they were probably nothing more than letters; or perhaps the list of the share-holders in the ill-starred venture in which Stephen Landray had lost his life; undoubtedly this was what they would prove to be.
With the passing of Benson's opposition to Wade's facts, the conversation drifted into other channels, and presently, for the time being at least, they forgot all about Reddy's singular communication.
That is, all forgot but Benson; he could not forget.