Children of the rich -- Fiction; England -- Social life and customs -- Fiction; Inheritance and succession -- Fiction
"When I was at school I used to imitate the masters' writing, the
other fellows' writing, anybody's writing; it used to give me a sort
of importance in the eyes of the other boys, and I'm afraid I
sometimes used my gift in ways which weren't altogether to my credit;
you haven't forgotten what boys are. Trevor was at school with me, so
he knew all about it. As he turned over page after page of his album,
he kept saying that I couldn't imitate this writing, and I couldn't
imitate that; I hadn't tried my hand since I had left school; I didn't
know if he was right or wrong, and I didn't care. Finally he came to a
signature which, so far as I remember, was on a scrap of paper which
might have been torn off the bottom of a letter; the name itself was
recalled to my memory with unpleasant vividness yesterday--it was
Donald Lindsay."
"Frank!"
"We are fearfully and wonderfully made. It had gone clean out of my
mind till Mr. Morgan showed it to me yesterday on a bill of exchange;
then it came back with a rush of recollection which frightened me.
Wasn't that an extraordinary thing?"
"Go on; I don't see yet what you are coming to."
"Trevor made a special point of this signature. He sat down and
imitated it himself, and then challenged me to do better. His
imitation was a bad one; and--I did better."
"What did you write on?"
"I have a vague impression that it was on a blank sheet of paper; but
I was in such a state of muddle that I couldn't positively affirm. Had
I been myself I should have changed the conversation before, but I was
in such a condition that I could only sit and listen, with but a dim
appreciation of his meaning."
"But you do remember copying Donald Lindsay's signature on what you
believe was a blank sheet of paper?"
"Unfortunately I do; the name meant nothing to me; I had never heard
of such a person; I acted on Trevor's persistent suggestion
practically like a man might do who was in a mesmeric trance. When I
had finished, Trevor, taking it up, declared it wasn't a bit like,
and, if I couldn't do better than that, he'd beaten me. So I tried
again."
"You mean that you copied Donald Lindsay's signature a second time?"
"I did."
"On the same sheet of paper?"
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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