There was another long silence after this statement, but it expressed only incredulity.
"When was this very extraordinary will drawn up?"
"Three weeks ago."
"The witnesses are living, then? It is to be presumed that they, too, were not carried off by the holocaust which so reduced our population last Saturday." Badger's sarcasm was brutal, but it told.
"The witnesses were three neighbors, called in. The servants could not act, as they were remembered in the document."
"No lawyer was present?"
"My uncle seldom employed a lawyer."
Such a statement, relating to a man of Prof. Arnold's wealth, might have excited doubt if his eccentricity on this point had not been noised about beforehand.
"He drew up the will himself, then? Has any one seen it except you?"
"Not so far as I know. I myself never saw it."