I leaned back, staring at the lamp, trying to adjust myself to a sudden and entirely new conception of my grandfather. “How did he die?” I asked.
“How?” Again the solicitor glanced through the papers on the table. “It says here that he died of cold. He was living alone high up in the Rockies. Now, as regards the company; it does not seem likely that the shares are marketable and—”
“He must have been a very old man.”
“He was seventy-nine. Now this land that is owned by the company. Your representatives in Calgary inform us that they have been fortunate enough to find a purchaser. In fact, they have an offer—” He stopped. “You’re not listening to me, Mr. Wetheral.”
“I’m sorry,” I said. “I was just wondering what an old man of seventy-nine was doing living alone in the Rocky Mountains.”
“Yes, yes, of course. Very natural... Let me see now. It’s all in Mr. Acheson’s letter. Ah, here we are. Apparently he became a little queer as he grew old. His belief that there was oil up in this territory in the mountains had become an obsession with him. From 1930 onward he lived up there in a log cabin by himself, hardly ever coming down into the towns. It was there that he was found by a late hunting party. That was on the twenty-second of November, last year.” He placed the letter on the table beside me. “I will leave that with you and you can read it at your leisure. There is also a cutting from a local paper. Now, about this land. There is apparently some scheme for damming the valley and utilizing the waters for a hydroelectric project. One of the mining companies—”
I sat back and closed my eyes. So he had gone back. That was the thing that stuck in my mind. He had really believed there was oil there.
“Please, Mr. Wetheral. I must ask for your attention. We must have your signature to this document at once. The matter is most urgent. The company concerned apparently has alternative sources of power which, if we delay much longer, may render your property valueless. As I say, your solicitors in Calgary regard the terms as generous and advise immediate acceptance. When all debts have been paid and the company wound up, they estimate that the estate will be worth some nine or ten thousand dollars.”
“How long will all this take?” I asked.
He pursed his lips. “I think we can expect to prove probate in, say, about six months’ time.”
“Six months!” I laughed. “That’s just six months too long, Mr. Fothergill.”
“How do you mean? I assure you we will do everything possible to expedite proceedings, and you can rest assured—”
“Yes, of course,” I said, “but in six months—”
I stopped. Why should I bother to explain?
I leaned back and closed my eyes, trying to think it out clearly. The money wasn’t any use to me. I’d nobody to leave it to. “I’m not sure that I want to sell,” I said, almost unconsciously voicing my thoughts.
I opened my eyes and saw that he was looking at me with astonishment.
“May I see that newspaper clipping?” I asked.
He handed it across to me. It was from the Calgary Tribune and datelined:
JASPER, 4TH DECEMBER All those who made the pilgrimage up Thunder Creek to Campbell’s Kingdom will mourn the loss of a friend. Stuart Campbell, one of the old-timers of Turner Valley and the man who coined the phrase “There’s oil in the Rocky Mountains,” is dead. His body was found by a late hunting party headed by the Jasper packer, Johnny Carstairs. It was lying stretched out on the floor of his log cabin, the aerie he built for himself 7000 feet up in the Rockies just east of the famous Cariboo area.
Campbell was a great character. He will be remembered affectionately by the hunters, miners and loggers, as well as the tourists, who visited him in his mountain kingdom and listened to his stories of the oilfields and heard him make the surrounding peaks ring with the skirl of his pipes. Even those who lost money in his ill-starred Rocky Mountain Oil Exploration Company and declared him a swindler and worse cannot but render the homage of admiration to a man who was so convinced he was right that he dedicated the last twenty-five years of his life to trying to prove it—
I started to read the paragraph through again, but the type blurred, merging into a picture of a man standing in the dock at the Old Bailey accused of swindling the public by floating a company to drill for oil that didn’t exist and then absconding with the capital. He had been arrested boarding the Majestic at Southampton. The other director, Paul Morton, had got clean away. The bulk of the company’s funds had vanished. I had accepted his guilt as I had accepted our utter poverty. They were part of the conditions of my life. And now — I stared down at the cutting, trying to adjust my mind to a new conception of him.
I looked up at the lawyer. “He really believed there was oil up there,” I said.
“Just a will-o’-the-wisp.” Fothergill gave me a dry smile. “The matter is covered by Mr. Acheson in his letter. I think you can be satisfied that Mr. Campbell’s beliefs were entirely erroneous and that the executors’ opinion that the property in itself has no value is a true statement of the situation. Now, here is the deed of sale. If you will sign both copies—”
“I don’t think I’ll sell,” I said. I needed time to think this out, to adjust myself to this new view of my grandfather.
“But, Mr. Wetheral—”
“I can’t make a decision now,” I said. “You must give me time to consider.”
“You cannot expect this company to wait indefinitely for your answer. Mr. Acheson was most pressing. Every day’s delay—”
“There’s already been a delay of four months,” I said. “Another few days shouldn’t make much difference.”
“Perhaps not. I must remind you, however,” he went on in a patient voice, “that it is only the fact that the largest creditor was Mr. Campbell’s friend that has saved the company from bankruptcy long ago. It is your duty as Mr. Campbell’s heir to consider this gentleman.”
“I won’t be stampeded,” I said irritably.
He got to his feet. “I will leave these documents with you, Mr. Wetheral. I think when you have had time to consider them—”
“I’ll let you know what I decide,” I said, and took him down to the front door.
Then I hurried eagerly back to my room. I wanted to read the personal letter attached to the will. I slit the envelope. Inside was a single sheet; it was very direct and simple.
For my grandson. Campbell’s Kingdom,
To be attached Come Lucky,
to my will. B.C.
16th March, 1947.
Dear Bruce: It is possible you may recall our one meeting, since the circumstances were peculiar. With your mother’s death I became entirely cut off from you, but in the last few weeks I have been able to obtain some information concerning your progress and your military record in the recent conflict. This leads me to believe that there is enough of the Campbell in you for me to hand on to you the aims, hopes and obligations that through age and misfortune I have been unable to fulfill.
I imagine that you are fully informed of the circumstances of my imprisonment. However, in case you should have attributed your mother’s belief in my innocence to filial loyalty, here is the testimony of a man who, when you receive this letter, will be dead:
I, Stuart Macaulay Campbell, swear before God and on His Holy Book that everything I did and said in connection with the flotation of an oil company in London known as the Rocky Mountain Oil Exploration Company was done and said in all good faith and that every word of that section of the prospectus dealing with the oil possibilities in the territory now commonly known as “Campbell’s Kingdom” was true to the best of my knowledge and belief, based on more than twelve years in the Turner Valley field and neighboring territories. And may the Lord condemn me to the everlasting fires of hell if this testimony be false.