Ring the bell

You pull on the end of the rope, and can just hear the answering chime of the bell behind the door. You wait for a moment, and are about to pull the rope again when the door opens to reveal an old man, dressed in an old fashioned looking black suite, his thinning grey hair combed back from his forehead. He looks at you for a moment, adjusting his half-moon spectacles on the hooked bridge of his nose, before his lips twitch into a ghost of a smile.
He dips his head in a curt bow;

"Master Edward, we've been expecting you. Please come in..." he says in a dry, whispery voice, beckoning you inside.

You wonder how he could possibly know who you are, without ever having met you.

"Can I get you a cup of tea? Or perhaps," he consults an antique-looking silver fob-watch, "a brandy? It's a little early, but allowance can be made, given the nature of your visit..."

You shake your head;

"Tea will be fine, thank you Mr...?" you tail off, realising you don't know who you are speaking to.

"Rosenkreutz, John Rosenkreutz. Unorthodox, for even a junior partner like myself to be answering the door, I know, but our little practise is not what it once was." he replies with an apologetic shrug. You look around you at the interior of the building, everything is clearly very old; the wood panelling on the walls stained dark with the patina of centuries, the carpet beneath your feet thick but faded and dusty.

You follow the gnomish old solicitor into a side office, where he pours you a cup of tea into a porcelain mug and motions to the leather chair in front of, presumably, his desk. On which is a wooden chest, bound in brass and iron and embossed with the same symbol that appeared on the wax seal of the letter that brought you here. You take the seat, sip the weak tea and wait to find out what was left to you in your Grand Uncle's will.