I had been a forty nine-er and a lucky one at that. Having made a small fortune in gold, that is to say, enough to put a substantial stake in a successful shipping business, my stock had risen and I was then a man who could spend time at leisure. […]
Thirty years ago on a wet autumn evening the household of Mallett’s Lodge was gathered round the death-bed of Ursula Mallow, the eldest of the three sisters who inhabited it. The dingy moth-eaten curtains of the old wooden bedstead were drawn apart, the light of a smoking oil-
