If there is going to be peace everywhere, I do not know that
I should care very much about staying in the army; but, as I said, we
need not decide at present."
Ten days later, Ralph was so far recovered that he was able to return
home with his mother. As soon as she informed him of her arrival at
Dover, Mr. Tallboys wrote to tell her that he had had an interview in
London with the Miss Penfolds' lawyer, who informed him that he had
instructions from his clients to examine the will, and if satisfied of
its genuineness, to offer no opposition whatever to its being proved.
Mr. Tallboys had thereupon shown him the will, and had no difficulty
in convincing him that it was the document he himself had drawn up,
and Mr. Penfold had signed in his presence.
The lawyer has placed all the deeds and documents relating to Mr.
Penfold's property in my hands, and, as I was of course before well
aware, my late client died worth a very considerable property in
addition to his large estates in this country. For the last twenty
years his income has exceeded his expenditure by an average of three
thousand a year, and as the surpluses have been judiciously invested,
and as the prices of all funds and stocks now stand vastly higher than
they did during the course of the long war, their total value now
amounts to something over a hundred and thirty thousand pounds.
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