Chapter 13

“Well, I thought over the matter all day, and by evening I was in low spirits again; for I had quite persuaded myself that the whole affair must be some great hoax or fraud, though what its object might be I could not imagine. It seemed altogether past belief that anyone could make such a will, or that they would pay such a sum for doing anything so simple as copying out the _Encyclopædia Britannica_. Vincent Spaulding did what he could to cheer me up, but by bedtime I had reasoned myself out of the whole thing. Ho…