He had followed the example of his ancestors, who had collected not only pictures and furniture but objects of historical interest.
His house in Park Lane and his castle in the country were the envy of all his contemporaries, as, when he had inherited the title, he found numerous treasures that had been passed down through the ages by his ancestors and he had seen none of them before.
He did not want people to envy him or to applaud his purchases and thus he only showed his most recent acquisitions to the more intelligent members of his family. After his grandmother had stopped pleading with him to marry, she had been enchanted with some exquisite carvings and strange weapons over three hundred years old.
“I cannot think, David,” she said, “how you were clever enough to find these fasci
