"God grant it. "This is my last will and testament. "(Signed) Thomas Ossington, "October the twenty-second, 1892. "In the presence of Edward John Hurley, Solicitor's Clerk, 13, Hercules Buildings, Holborn. And of Louisa Broome, 2, Acacia Cottages, Battersea (Maid-servant at present in the employ of the said Thomas Ossington)." The reading was followed by silence, possibly the silence of amazement. The first observation came from Jack. "By George!" The next was Ella's. "Dear life!" For some reason, Madge's eyes were dim, and her tone still shaking. "Isn't it a voice from the grave?" She looked down, biting her lower lip; then up again. "I think, Mr. Graham, this may be more in your line than ours." She handed him the paper. He read it. Without comment he passed it to Jack, who read it with Ella leaning over his shoulder. He placed it on the table, where they all four gathered round and looked at it. The paper was stained here and there as with spots of damp. But these had in no way blurred the contents. The words were as clear and legible as on the day they were written. The caligraphy was small and firm, and a little finical, but as easy to read as copperplate: the handwriting of a man who had taken his time, and who had been conscious that he was engaged on a weighty and a serious matter. The testator's signature was rather in contrast with the body of the document, and was bold and strong, as if he had desired that the witnesses should have no doubt about the fact that it was his name he was affixing. Edward John Hurley's attestation was in a cramped legal hand, expressionless, while Louisa Broome's was large and straggling, the sign-manual of an uneducated woman. Jack Martyn asked a question, addressed to Graham. "Is it a will?--a valid one, I mean?" "Looking at it on the surface, I should say certainly--if the witnesses can be produced to prove the signatures. Indeed, given certain circumstances, even that should not be necessary. The man expresses his wishes; their meaning is perfectly plain; he gives reasons for them. No testator need do more than that. What may seem the eccentric devising of his property is, in his position, easily accounted for, and is certainly consistent with entire sanity. Thousands of more eccentric documents have been held to be good in law. I have little doubt--if the testator's signature can be proved--that the will is as sound as if it had been drawn up by a bench of judges." Madge drew a long breath. Jack was jocular, or meant to be. "Think of that, now!" "But I don't see," said Ella, "that we're any forwarder now, or that we're any nearer to Madge's mysterious hoard. The will--if it is a will--says that the fortune is hidden in the house, but it doesn't give the faintest notion where. We might pull the whole place to pieces and then not find it." "Suppose the whole affair is a practical joke?"