Meredith Nicholson

The House of a Thousand Candles Meredith Nicholson

Pickering's letter bringing news of my grandfather's death found me at Naples early inOctober. John Marshall Glenarm had died in June. He had left a will which gave me hisproperty conditionally, Pickering wrote, and it was necessary for me to return immediatelyto qualify as legatee. It was the merest luck that the letter came to my hands at all, for it hadbeen sent to Constantinople, in care of the consul-general instead of my banker there. Itwas not Pickering's fault that the consul was a friend of mine who kept track of mywanderings and was able to hurry the executor's letter after me to Italy, where I had goneto meet an English financier who had, I was advised, unlimited money to spend on Africanrailways. I am an engineer, a graduate of an American institution familiarly known as"Tech," and as my funds were running low, I naturally turned to my profession foremployment.