I have your promise, I know--that you 'll not do it until after I 'm gone." Now Thornton Fairchild was gone.

But a message had remained behind; one which the patient lips evidently had feared to utter during life.
The heart of the son began to pound, slow and hard, as, with the memory of that conversation, he turned toward the bookcase and unlatched the paneled door.

A moment more and the hollowed history had given up its trust, a bit of paper scratched with numbers.

Robert Fairchild turned toward the stairs and the small room on the second floor which had served as his father's bedroom.
There he hesitated before the little iron safe in the corner, summoning the courage to unlock the doors of a dead man's past.

At last he forced himself to his knees and to the numerals of the combination.
The safe had not been opened in years; that was evident from the creaking of the plungers as they fell, the gummy resistance of the knob as Fairchild turned it in accordance with the directions on the paper.
Finally, a great wrench, and the bolt was drawn grudgingly back; a strong pull, and the safe opened.
A few old books; ledgers in sheepskin binding.