"Yes," he said, looking up, "if my calculations are correct, Leila J. Pinckney wrote in all a matter of nine million one hundred and forty thousand words of glutinous sentimentality at Honeysuckle Cottage, and it was a condition of her will that James should reside there for six months in every year. Failing to do this, he was to foreit the five thousand pounds."
"It must be great fun making a freak will," I mused. "I often wish I was rich enough to do it."
"This was not a freak fill. The conditions are perfectly undertandable. James Rodman was a writer of sensational mystery stories, and his aunt Leila had always disapproved of his work. She was a great believer in the influence of envionment, and the reason why she inserted that clause in her will was that she wished to compel James to move from London to the country. She considered that living in London hardened him and made his outlook on life sordid. She often asked him if he thought it quite nice to harp so much on sudden death and blackmailers with squints. Surely, she said, there were enough squinting blackmailers in the world without writing about them."
(from Meet Mr. Mulliner, by Sir Pelham Wodehouse)
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