She wanted to leave the bulk of her money ostensibly to me, but in
reality to her nephew, so that I should hold it in trust for him till he
was twenty-eight years old, but neither he nor anyone else, except her
lawyer and myself, was to know anything about it. She would leave 5000
pounds in other legacies, and 15,000 pounds to Ernest--which by the time
he was twenty-eight would have accumulated to, say, 30,000 pounds. "Sell
out the debentures," she said, "where the money now is--and put it into
Midland Ordinary."
"Let him make his mistakes," she said, "upon the money his grandfather
left him. I am no prophet, but even I can see that it will take that boy
many years to see things as his neighbours see them. He will get no help
from his father and mother, who would never forgive him for his good luck
if I left him the money outright; I daresay I am wrong, but I think he
will have to lose the greater part or all of what he has, before he will
know how to keep what he will get from me."
Supposing he went bankrupt before he was twenty-eight years old, the
money was to be mine absolutely, but she could trust me, she said, to
hand it over to Ernest in due time.
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