The Impostor

The Impostor by Edgar Saltus (1917)

George Gorgias Vulper, an elderly New York occultist, is discovered writing his will on the night he dies. He leaves a copyright to his hideously disfigured son Michael ("Mike") Vulper, one dollar to his nephew Arthur Glendenning, a manuscript called "Alpha and Omega" to the British Museum, and the residue of his fortune to his ward, Camille Marcy, whose late father had made Vulper her guardian and split his estate between them. Vulper's physician, Doctor Dix, witnesses the will's drafting and is skeptical of Vulper's occult beliefs about the fourth dimension and a Brahman figure named Shri Shankira, whom Vulper credits with the theft and suppression of a French book, La Période Solaire, and its author Delormel's death. Before the will can be properly executed, Mike says goodbye to Camille, gives her a five-franc coin to keep for him, and leaves the house saying he is going to join a friend, Victor Revell. Shortly after, Vulper is found dead of cardiac paralysis brought on by chloral; the money and manuscript from his safe are missing, and the unsigned will bears Vulper's scrawled note "Shri Shankira." The public administrator takes over the estate when Mike cannot be located. Camille moves to an apartment on Riverside Drive; Glendenning continues pressing her to marry him and retains a lawyer, Tatum, regarding the estate. Months later, Revell arrives in New York with a letter from Mike and news that Mike has died of pneumonia in San Francisco, naming Revell sole heir in a will executed there. Glendenning suspects foul play and pushes a theory that Mike killed his father and that Revell later killed or blackmailed Mike. Tatum investigates through San Francisco correspondents and learns Mike drew and copied his will himself at a hotel, then later died at a rougher hotel, the Morrow House, attended by Revell and a Doctor Towers, after which the body was cremated. Camille and Revell grow close; he tries to sign the inherited estate over to her, which she refuses. Meanwhile Doctor Dix reveals that the missing money and manuscript have been recovered from the old servant Archibald, who had died of a cerebral hemorrhage; Dix concludes Archibald took them in a moment of temptation while Vulper lay unconscious from chloral, not murder, and turns the packages over to the Amsterdam Trust Company as part of the estate. Glendenning and Tatum confront Revell at his hotel, the St. Jasper, attempting to pressure him into surrendering two-thirds of the inheritance by threatening to contest the will and expose scandal. Revell rebuffs them coldly, then is called to the telephone, where Camille tells him she has found a hidden spring in Mike's silver coin containing a note establishing Mike's identity, and that Mike intended to have his face surgically altered (referencing an article on facial reconstruction that Dix has in his office). Returning to Glendenning and Tatum, Revell needles them, then reveals that he is Mike Vulper himself, having had his appearance changed. He tells the stunned Tatum he expects to marry the next day, leaving Glendenning shattered.

By Edgar Saltus · First published 1917 · Genre: Mystery/Detective Fiction, Psychological Thriller, Romance · 12 chapters · 27,143 words

First lines

As the old man, after shoving the package into the safe, piled the money in on top of it, he was conscious of being watched. At the moment, you could have heard a lizard move. With a lizard's rapidity, he turned. There was no one. Save for himself -- for the safe, the chairs, the books, the immense table -- the large, high-ceiled room was vacant.

For a moment he hesitated. Then, at once going to the table, he touched a button, sat down, and began to write.

898 West Eighty-ninth Street, New York, 4th November, 1915

I, George Gorgias Vulper, declare this to be my last will and testament.

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The Impostor is listed on Textopian as a novella by Edgar Saltus, dated 1917 CE.

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Genres

Tags

occultism · spirituality · death · inheritance · mystery fiction · New York setting · 1910s · Gothic · supernatural · appearance and identity · imposture · Hindu mysticism

Contents

More by Edgar Saltus