He had found a paper in the secret drawer at the back which appeared
to startle him.

Billy unfolded it slowly, with a puzzled look growing in his
countenance. Then for a moment Margaret's golden head drew close to
his yellow curls and they read it through together. And in the most
melodramatic and improbable fashion in the world they found it to be
the last will and testament of Frederick R. Woods.

"But--but I don't understand," was Miss Hugonin's awed comment. "It's
exactly like the other will, only--why, it's dated the seventeenth
of June, the day before he died! And it's witnessed by Hodges and
Burton--the butler and the first footman, you know--and they've never
said anything about such a paper. And, then, why should he have made
another will just like the first?"

Billy pondered.

By and bye, "I think I can explain that," he said, in a rather
peculiar voice. "You see, Hodges and Burton witnessed all his papers,
half the time without knowing what they were about. They would hardly
have thought of this particular one after his death. And it isn't
quite the same will as the other; it leaves you practically
everything, but it doesn't appoint any trustees, as the other did,
because this will was drawn up after you were of age. Moreover, it
contains these four bequests to colleges, to establish a Woods chair
of ethnology, which the other will didn't provide for. Of course, it
would have been simpler merely to add a codicil to the first will,
but Uncle Fred was always very methodical. I--I think he was probably
going through the desk the night he died, destroying various papers.
He must have taken the other will out to destroy it just--just before
he died. Perhaps--perhaps--" Billy paused for a little and then
laughed, unmirthfully. "It scarcely matters," said he. "Here is the
will. It is undoubtedly genuine and undoubtedly the last he made.
You'll have to have it probated, Peggy, and settle with the colleges.
It--it won't make much of a hole in the Woods millions."

There was a half-humorous bitterness in his voice that Margaret noted
silently. So (she thought) he had hoped for a moment that at the last
Frederick R. Woods had relented toward him. It grieved her, in a dull
fashion, to see him so mercenary. It grieved her--though she would
have denied it emphatically--to see him so disappointed. Since he
wanted the money so much, she would have liked for him to have had it,
worthless as he was, for the sake of th