I hadn’t seen Jack for years, not
since he went off to California, where he now had a young family. I can’t pretend I’d ever liked him:
he was energetic and got things done, true enough; but at the same time he was
pushy and greedy; always with an eye on the main chance, grabbing what he could
for himself, with no consideration for anyone else. So when he turned up when
we were sorting through old uncle Arthur’s possessions, I
knew he’d be on the prowl looking for
something valuable. As far as I knew he’d never done
anything for uncle Arthur; not even bothered to send him Christmas cards; but
as the old chap had died leaving everything to us jointly, without details, he
was within his rights.
Jack asked what we’d found. I
explained that the house was rented, so that didn’t come into it, but some of the contents were good quality: china, and
pictures, and furniture and so forth, and might be worth a bit. There was a
whole lot of rubbish too, of course, but we’d already cleared
that out; even up in the attic.
“Anything interesting up there?” Jack asked
“Well, we found his stamp
collection, hidden away behind the cold water tank”.
“Oh yes, the stamp collection”, said Jack. If I was writing a novel, I’d describe him as having a glint in his eye at this
point. “Uncle Arthur was always
telling us about it when we were kids, wasn’t he?”
“Yes, he was. He even showed it
to me once or twice. Not that I ever knew anything about stamps, but he thought
it was quite valuable. In fact, towards the end, he got positively paranoid
about it being stolen, so he hid it away up there. I’ve got it here now: I’ll show you”
There were two heavy albums. “There’s some kind of lock on them”, I said, “But I can’t find the key, so I haven’t opened them”.
“And you’re not interested in stamps?”
“Not at all”
“Well, neither am I, but my
kids would just love them. You wouldn’t mind if I took
them?”
“Go ahead. Fine by me!”
Jack picked up the albums, and it was almost as if he was having pangs
of conscience, which was most unusual for him.
“Are you sure that’s okay? Because I’d love to take
these back to L.A. with me, as a present for the kids. Are there any legal
forms to sign? I’d better get going as soon as
I can, because I really can’t afford to spend
much time away from my job, and you’re welcome to
anything else in the house“.
So we signed all the relevant papers, and then Jack flew back to
California taking the stamp collection with him, and he left me with the china
and the pictures and all the furniture and everything else; and I’m sure he was congratulating himself on the bargain he’d struck, but this didn’t bother me at all. Actually I did know something about stamps. Uncle
Arthur had got me interested, you see. Poor old uncle Arthur! He was so proud
of his collection. I never had the heart to tell him it was worthless.
