Leaving Miss Cusack and Miss Ransom we then went into the old man’s bedroom, where the three claimants undressed and were carefully weighed. I append their respective weights, which I noted down:
Graham 13 stone 9 lbs 6 oz.
Tyndall 11 stone 6 lbs 3 oz.
Wimburne 12 stone 11 lbs.
Having resumed their attire, Miss Cusack and Miss Ransom were summoned, and the lawyer, drawing out a bunch of keys, went across to a large iron safe which had been built into the wall.
We all pressed round him, everyone anxious to get the first glimpse of the old man’s hoard. The lawyer turned the key, shot back the lock, and flung open the heavy doors. We found that the safe was literally packed with small canvas bags – indeed, so full was it that as the doors swung open two of the bags fell to the floor with a heavy crunching noise. Mr Southby lifted them up, and then cutting the strings of one, opened it. It was full of bright sovereigns.
An exclamation burst from us all. If all those bags contained gold there was a fine fortune awaiting the successful candidate! The business was now begun in earnest. The lawyer rapidly extracted bag after bag, untied the string, and shot the contents with a crash into the great copper scale pan, while the attendant kept adding weights to the other side to balance it, calling out the amounts as he did so. No one spoke, but our eyes were fixed as if by some strange fascination on the pile of yellow metal that rose higher and higher each moment.
As the weight reached one hundred and fifty pounds, I heard the old servant behind me utter a smothered oath. I turned and glanced at him; he was staring at the gold with a fierce expression of disappointment and avarice. He at any rate was out of the reckoning, as at eleven stone six, or one hundred and sixty pounds, he could be nowhere near the weight of the sovereigns, there being still eight more bags to untie.
The competition, therefore, now lay between Wimburne and Graham. The latter’s face bore strong marks of the agitation which consumed him; the veins stood out like cords on his forehead, and his lips trembled. It would evidently be a near thing, and the suspense was almost intolerable. The lawyer continued to deliberately add to the pile. As the last bag was shot into the scale, the attendant put four ten-pound weights into the other side. It was too much. The gold rose at once. He took one off, and then the two great pans swayed slowly up and down, finally coming to a dead stop.
‘Exactly one hundred and eighty pounds, gentlemen,’ he cried, and a shout went up from us all. Wimburne at twelve stone eleven, or one hundred and seventy-nine pounds, had won.
I turned and shook him by the hand.
‘I congratulate you most heartily,’ I cried. ‘Now let us calculate the amount of your fortune.’
I took a piece of paper from my pocket and made a rough calculation. Taking 56 to the pound avoirdupois, there were at least ten thousand and eighty sovereigns in the scale before us.
‘I can hardly believe it,’ cried Miss Ransom.
I saw her gazing down at the gold, then she looked up into her lover’s face.
‘Is it true?’ she said, panting as she spoke.
‘Yes, it is true,’ he answered. Then he dropped his voice. ‘It removes all difficulties,’ I heard him whisper to her.
Her eyes filled with tears, and she turned aside to conceal her emotion.
‘There is no doubt whatever as to your ownership of this money, Mr Wimburne,’ said the lawyer, ‘and now the next thing is to ensure its safe transport to the bank.’
As soon as the amount of the gold had been made known, Graham, without bidding goodbye to anyone, abruptly left the room, and I assisted the rest of the men in shovelling the sovereigns into a stout canvas bag, which we then lifted and placed in a four-wheeled cab which had arrived for the purpose of conveying the gold to the city.
‘Surely someone is going to accompany Mr Wimburne?’ said Miss Cusack at this juncture. ‘My dear Edgar,’ she continued, ‘you are not going to be so mad as to go alone?’
To my surprise, Wimburne coloured, and then gave a laugh of annoyance.
‘What could possibly happen to me?’ he said. ‘Nobody knows that I am carrying practically my own weight in gold into the city.’
‘If Mr Wimburne wishes I will go with him,’ said Tyndall, now coming forward. The old man had to all appearance got over his disappointment, and spoke eagerly.
‘The thing is fair and square,’ he added. ‘I am sorry I did not win, but I’d rather you had it, sir, than Mr Graham. Yes, that I would, and I congratulate you, sir.’
‘Thank you, Tyndall,’ replied Wimburne, ‘and if you like to come with me I shall be very glad of your company.’
The bag of sovereigns being placed in the cab, Wimburne bade us all a hasty goodbye, told Miss Ransom that he would call to see her at Miss Cusack’s house that evening, and, accompanied by Tyndall, started off. As we watched the cab turn the corner I heard Miss Ransom utter a sigh.
‘I do hope it will be all right,’ she said, looking at me. ‘Don’t you think it is a risky thing to drive with so much gold through London?’
I laughed in order to reassure her.
‘Oh, no, it is perfectly safe,’ I answered, ‘safer perhaps than if the gold were conveyed in a more pretentious vehicle. There is nothing to announce the fact that it is bearing ten thousand and eighty sovereigns to the bank.’
A moment or two later I left the two ladies and returned to my interrupted duties. The affair of the
