The Sorcerer's House by Gene Wolfe Page B

of the river. A tract roughly three miles long and half a mile wide."
    I sensed, rather than saw, Doris's reaction.
    "Let me tell you the whole thing from my point of view. Fifteen years ago I was just Jim Hardaway, another real-estate salesman. Do you shoot, Mr. Dunn?"
    "Birds, you mean?" I shook my head.
    "Handguns. It's my hobby. I collect old pistols and revolvers. There's a range outside of town, and I shoot a bit. At the range, I became friendly with Alex Skotos."
    "Yes?"
    "He was a shooter and a collector, too. We had a lot in common, and we did some trading. Say that I had an old dueling pistol. I might trade it to him for a Peacemaker. Sometimes we just got together to talk."
    "I understand."
    "When we'd known each other for a year or so, he asked me about investments. He was thinking, he said, of putting some money into realestate. Short term?, I said, or long? He said long, so I told him what I always tell everybody. The best long-term investment a man can make is undeveloped land fronting on water. He asked me to look around."
    Doris said, "I know it must be a good property, sir. You would never advise a client to buy one that wasn't."
    "I didn't find the Skotos Strip all at once," Hardaway told her. "I did find him a good-sized tract that became the nucleus of it. After that, I handled the negotiations for him. He wanted the property on either side, and it took four or five years to get it." Mr. Hardaway paused, clearly wishing he could light a cigar.
    "Alex passed away, and I was surprised to find out he'd made me his executor. Thunderstruck, in fact. But when I thought the matter over, it made a great deal of sense. He'd had no wife and no kids. No other relatives, so far as I could discover. His gun collection was nice, but not terribly valuable. You could duplicate it today for about thirty thousand, in my judgment. Other than that and his furniture, his estate consisted of a sizable bank account and the Skotos Strip. That's what we've been calling it here at the agency."
    Doris asked, "Didn't he own a home, sir?"
    "No. He leased an apartment. His will was a simple one, but it hasn't been simple to carry out. He directed that his furniture should be auctioned. The same thing for his collection, except for one nice set of cased dueling pistols. He was particularly fond of them and wanted them to go to his heir."
    "And Mr. Dunn is the heir?"
    "I think so." Hardaway turned to me. "There's better than a hundred thousand in the account. A hundred and five thousand and change. Are you impressed?"
    "Tolerably."
    He laughed. "I agree. There's also the Skotos Strip of one and a half square miles. One square mile is six hundred and forty acres, so nine hundred and sixty in the Strip. Allow a hundred and sixty for streets. That's four hundred two-acre building lots. Two acres is a large lot."
    I said I knew that.
    "For two-acre lots in that location you could, in my judgement,average about ten thousand dollars today if the operation were handled right. So, four million. There'd be commissions to pay and other expenses." He smiled. "You'd be looking at well over three million even so."
    "If I sell now," I said.
    "Exactly. Are you going to?"
    "I don't know. To begin with, Mr. Hardaway, I don't require the money. My needs are modest, and I have more than a sufficiency. The best investment a man can make, or so I've heard, is unimproved land fronting water. It might be wise for me to hold the land for a few more years before I cash in."
    "You're right. I was about to advise you, in fact I do advise you, to sell those lots off slowly. If we do that--pardon me, I misspoke. As executor, I could not be a party to the transaction."
    I objected. "But Mrs. Griffin is my agent."
    She took my hand.
    "Okay, but she's an associate here at the agency. She doesn't represent me as a person, in other words. You can, if you want to, and I hope you will, engage the Country Hill Agency to act in your behalf. Naturally the agency can and will