In the story, a wealthy and highly unpleasant clergyman named Dr. Rant makes two wills. In the first will, he leaves everything to his nephew John Eldred. In the second will, he disinherits John Eldred and leaves everything to his niece Mary Simpson. Dr. Rant tells his niece and nephew that the second will is written inside a printed book which used to belong to him but which is no longer in his house. Although the will is written in English, it does not look as if it is. Thirty years after Dr. Rant's death, Mary Simpson has stopped looking for the hidden will. John Eldred, however, continues to search for the second will in order to destroy it. He comes to believe that the will is written in a Hebrew-language book, an 18th century edition of the Talmud called the Tractate Middoth, which i