He would have kept that Club going
until now, if I hadn't deserted, he said. He said he worked like a slave
over those reports; each of them cost him from a week to a fortnight's
work, and the work gave him pleasure and kept him alive and willing to be
alive. It was a bitter blow to him when the Club died.
Finally, there wasn't any Corrigan Castle. He had invented that, too.
It was wonderful--the whole thing; and altogether the most ingenious and
laborious and cheerful and painstaking practical joke I have ever heard
of. And I liked it; liked to bear him tell about it; yet I have been a
hater of practical jokes from as long back as I can remember. Finally he
said--
"Do you remember a note from Melbourne fourteen or fifteen years ago,
telling about your lecture tour in Australia, and your death and burial
in Melbourne?--a note from Henry Bascomb, of Bascomb Hall, Upper
Holywell Hants."
"Yes."
"I wrote it."
"M-y-word!"
"Yes, I did it. I don't know why. I just took the notion, and carried
it out without stopping to think. It was wrong. It could have done
harm.
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