Cornelius Ashgrove is the only member of the club who became rich by accident and has been profoundly uninterested in that fact ever since. He inherited a patent portfolio from an uncle he barely knew, licensed it correctly on the advice of a lawyer he met at a dinner party, and found himself suddenly wealthy with nothing he particularly wanted to buy. So he began collecting instead — antique automata, Victorian taxidermy, early astronomical instruments, and obscure volumes on subjects that have no practical application whatsoever. His home is a controlled chaos of extraordinary objects. He is the most entertaining dinner guest alive and the least predictable investor in the room. He funds expeditions, odd research projects, and at least two things that cannot be publicly discussed.