Page:Dick Hamilton's Fortune.djvu/27

Rh such an investment within twelve months your mother's fortune will be tied up so that you can not touch it, or derive any benefit from it, for a certain period, which will be disclosed later."

"Does that mean I will have to be—be poor?"

"Well, not exactly poor, but you will have to put up with a good deal less than you have now. You see, your mother's idea was to have you avoid the pitfalls and snares into which fall many wealthy youths with millionaire parents. She wanted to make you appreciate the value of money, to know how to spend it, and to learn, above everything else, that money begets money.

"That is why she made such a peculiar will, and, I think, she did wisely. So, for a year, at least, you are to live as do other millionaires' sons who are older. In fact, you are to have more money to spend than you ever had before, for, though I have been liberal with you, I wanted you to have something still better to look forward to. So, now, your fortune is your own to make.

"If you devote some of the money you are to have to a wise and paying investment, you will, comparatively soon, come into possession of your mother's vast wealth, though, of course, the executors of the will, of whom I am one, are to have certain control over you. You have twelve months from to-day in which to make your try, Dick, my boy."

"A year to make money out of money. But how, father? I have no knowledge of business."