Sara Davenal in her sick restlessness was early in the breakfast-room. The disappointment touching her brother was weighing down her heart. Since the arrival of the unsatisfactory note the previous evening, she had felt a conviction similar to Dr. Davenal's, that Edward would not come. Neither had spoken of it to the other; great griefs cannot be talked of; and to Sara this was a grief inexpressible. It seemed that she would give half her remaining years of life for only one five minutes' interview with him.
If he came at all he would come today, Friday; and she got up, hoping against hope; saying to herself aloud, in contradiction to the fear lying upon her heart, and which shewould notglance at, "He will be sure to come; he will never embark on that long voyage without first coming. He will remember Richard's fate." For the time being, the eager anxiety to see him almost seemed to deaden that other trouble which lay within her--the trouble that had taken possession of her on the Sunday night, never again to quit its tenement.
"Is the post in?" asked Dr. Davenal, as he entered the breakfast-room.
"No, it is not made," sharply replied Miss Davenal from her presiding place at the table. "Neal has but this minute brought in the urn. I am making it quickly as I can."
"I asked whether the post was in, Bettina. Because, if Edward is not coming, I should think there'd be a letter from him."
Sara looked up eagerly. "Don't you hope he will come, papa? Don't you think he will?"
"Well, Sara, after his letter of last night, my hopes upon the point are not very strong."
"O papa! I want to see him! I must see him before he sails."
"Hush, child!" She had spoken in a distressed tone, and her small white hands were trembling. "Agitating yourself will not bring him."
By and by the letters came in: two. Neal handed one to his master, the other to Sara. Both bore the same handwriting--Captain Davenal's. Sara, in her bitter disappointment, let hers lie by her plate untouched, but the doctor opened his.
Miss Bettina looked up. "Is he coming, Richard?"
"No. He says he can't come. That it is an impossibility."
"What else does he say?"
Dr. Davenal folded his letter and put it in his pocket, to read at his leisure. "Ask Sara what he says," was his answer, "All the gossip is in hers."
"And this is what he calls affection!" exclaimed Miss Bettina. "To leave his native land, his home, without a farewell! That's gratitude! Richard Davenal, were I you, he should carry out my displeasure with him."
"I don't know," said the doctor, his voice sadly subdued. "Send out displeasure with one whom we may never see again! No, Bettina. And it may be as he says--that he is unable to come."
He was looking straight before him as he spoke it, in a far-off, dreamy gaze. His thoughts had flown to one who had gone out under a sort of displeasure, gone out but for a short time--and had never come home again.
The hour for the funeral approached, and the doctor in his black attire stepped into his close carriage to be conveyed to the residence of Lady Oswald. He found all the mourners assembled, for he was late, with the exception of Mark Cray. Sir Philip Oswald and his eldest son; Oswald Cray; the Reverend Mr. Stephenson and his brother Mr. Joseph Stephenson. All were there, now the doctor had come, except Mark. The funeral was to be at the church at eleven.
The time went on. The hearse and mourning coaches stood before the door, the horses restless. It was close upon eleven.
"For whom do we wait?" inquired Sir Philip Oswald.
"For Mr. Cray, Sir Philip," answered the undertaker, who was gliding about, handing gloves and fixing hatbands.
"Mr. Cray?" repeated Sir Philip, as though he did not understand who Mr. Cray was.
"Lady Oswald's late medical attendant, Sir Philip, in conjunction with Dr. Davenal."
"Oh--ah--yes," said Sir Philip. He was very friendly with Dr. Davenal, exceedingly so; and condescended not to ignore Mr. Cray as the doctor's partner. It was the first time that Oswald had ever been in a room with Sir Philip. Sir Philip had bowed to him coldly enough upon his entrance, but the son, Henry Oswald, went up to him and held out his hand in a cordial manner. Oswald, haughtily self-possessed, stood before Sir Philip with his impassive face, looking more of a gentleman than the baronet did.
The clock struck eleven. "I suppose Mr. Crayiscoming?" remarked Sir Philip.
He looked at Dr. Davenal. The doctor supposed he was coming as a matter of course: he believed he was coming. He had not seen Mr. Cray that morning.
It was suggested by the undertaker that they should proceed. Mr. Cray, he observed, would possibly join them at the church; he might have been kept back unexpectedly.
So the funeral started. All that remained of poor Lady Oswald was carried out of her house, never more to return to it. Not a week ago yet, on that past Saturday morning, she had gone forth in health and strength, and now--there! What a lessen it told of the uncertainty of life!
The funeral made its way through lines of curious gazers to the church. Mark Cray was not there, and the service was performed without him. At its conclusion the gentlemen returned to the house.
A lawyer from a neighbouring town, Lady Oswald's legal adviser, was there with the will, and they were invited to enter and hear the will read.
"It cannot concern me," remarked Sir Philip. Nevertheless he went in.
"And I am sure it cannot concern me," added Oswald.
The clergyman, Mr. Stephenson, looked up with a crimson hectic on his cheek. It was next to impossible to mistake his eager glance--betraying the hope within him, sure and steadfast, that it did concern him. In point of fact he and that gentleman by his side, his brother, had the chief right to any money she might have left. It may be said the sole right. How they needed it their threadbare clothes and sunken cheeks betrayed. Gentlemen born, they had to keep up an appearance before the world; at least, they strove to keep it. But they were weary with the struggle. The brother was of no particular profession. He had been reared for the church and could never get to college, and he contrived to make a living--that is, he contrived not to starve--by writing articles for any paper or periodical that could be persuaded into taking them. Each was of good repute in the world, bearing up manfully and doing the best he could do with his lot, sanguinely hoping, humbly trusting, that time would better it. They each had a large family, and indulged the vain and wild hope of bringing up their sons as gentlemen, as they themselves had been brought up. Not as gentlemen in the matter of abstaining from labour; that would have been foolish; but they hoped to bring them up educated men, capable of doing their duty in any walk of life they might be called to. How they had looked forward to the prospect of some time possessing this money of Lady Oswald's, their hearts alone knew. If ever the excuse for cherishing such a wish could be pleaded, it surely might be by them.
"I suppose these people, the Stephensons, will chiefly inherit what she has left," whispered the baronet's son confidentially to Oswald Cray. "Perhaps you know? You have seen a good deal of Lady Oswald, I believe."
"I don't at all know how her affairs are left," was the reply of Oswald Cray.
"I should think they will inherit," continued Mr. Oswald. "Shouldn't you?"
"I should think--yes--I---should think they will. Being her only relatives, they have undoubtedly the greatest right to do so."
Why did Oswald Cray hesitate in his answer?--he so generally decisive of speech. Because in the very moment that the acquiescence was leaving his lips there flashed over his mind the words spoken to him by Lady Oswald the previous Saturday. He had not understood those words at the time, did not understand them now: but if he could interpret them at all, they certainly did not point to her nephews, the brothers Stephenson. He remembered them well: at least, their substance. "When my will comes to be read, you may feel surprised at its contents. You may deem that you had more legal claim upon me than he who will inherit: I do not think so. He to whom my money is left has most claim in my judgment: I am happy to know that he will be rewarded, and he knows it."
Not a week ago! not a week ago that she had said it. How little did Oswald foresee that he should so soon be called upon to hear that will read!
But still the words did not seem to point to either of her nephews, with whom she had not lived on any terms of friendship, and Oswald began to feel a little curious as to the inheritor.
They were waiting for the lawyer, who had not yet come into the room. He might be getting the will. His name was Wedderburn, a stout man with a pimpled face. Sir Philip Oswald had a pimpled face too; but he was not stout; he was as thin and as tall as a lath.
Dr. Davenal took out his watch. He found it later than he thought, and turned to Sir Philip.
"I cannot remain longer," he said. "I have a consultation at half-past twelve, and must not miss it. I am not wanted here: there's nothing for me to stay for: so I'll wish you good-morning."
"For that matter, I don't see that any of us are wanted," responded Sir Philip. "I'm sure I am not. Good-morning, doctor."
Nodding his salutation to the room generally, the doctor went out. Soon afterwards Mr. Wedderburn made his appearance, the will in his hand, which he prepared to read. Clearing his voice, he threw his eyes round the room, as if to see that his audience were ready. The absence of one appeared then to strike him, and he pushed his spectacles to the top of his brow and gazed again.
"Where's Dr. Davenal?"
"He is gone," replied Sir Philip Oswald.
"Gone!" repeated the lawyer, in consternation. "Why--he--Dr. Davenal should have stopped, of all people."
"He said he had a consultation. What does it signify?"
"Well, Sir Philip, he--at any rate, I suppose there's no help for it now. It must be read without him."
Not one present but looked at the lawyer with surprise, not one but thought him a strangely punctilious man to suppose Dr. Davenal's presence, as Lady Oswald's medical man and attendant at her funeral, was in any degree essential to the reading of Lady Oswald's will. They soon learned the cause.
First of all, the will bequeathed a few legacies. Very small ones. Twenty pounds to each of her servants; forty pounds and all her clothes to Parkins; fifty pounds each to her nephews John and Joseph Stephenson, with the furniture of her house to be divided between them "amicably;" a beautiful diamond ring and a little plate to Oswald Oswald Cray; the rest of the plate, by far the most valuable portion, to Sir Philip Oswald of Thorndyke; and another diamond ring to Dr. Richard Davenal. So far, so good: but now came the disposal of the bulk of her money. It was bequeathed, the whole of it, to Dr. Davenal, "my faithful friend and medical attendant for so many years."
The will was remarkably short, taking but a few minutes in the reading; and at its conclusion Mr. Wedderburn laid it open on the table that anybody might look at it who chose.
It would be difficult to say which of the countenances around him exhibited the greatest surprise. The lawyer's voice died away in a deep silence. It was broken by the clergyman, the Reverend John Stephenson.
"It is not just! It is not just!"
The wailing tone, not of passion or anger but of meek despair, struck upon them all, and told how bitter was the disappointment. Every heart in the room echoed the cry, the lawyer's probably excepted. Lawyers, as a whole, don't think much of justice. This one took out his snuffbox and inhaled a pinch with equanimity.
"I am ready to answer questions, should any gentleman wish to put them. It was Lady Oswald's desire that I should. When this will was made she said to me, 'Some of them will be for making a fuss, Wedderburn; you can explain my motives if they care to hear them.' Those motives lay in this; her ladyship knew her health and comfort to have been so materially benefited of late years by the skill and kindness of Dr. Davenal, that she considered it her duty in gratitude to reward him."
"Nevertheless it is not just," murmured the poor clergyman again. "Dr. Davenal does not want the money as we want it."
Oswald Cray awoke as from a dream. He took a step forward and addressed the lawyer. "Did Dr. Davenal know that the money was left to him?"
"I am unable to say, sir. Lady Oswald may have told him, or she may not. He did not know it from me."
Oswald Cray said no more. He leaned against the window, half-hidden by the curtain, and plunged into thought.
"Well, I must say I am surprised," remarked Sir Philip. "Not but that Lady Oswald had a perfect right to do as she pleased with her money, and she might have signalled out a less worthy man as inheritor. How much is the amount, Mr. Wedderburn? Do you know?"
"Somewhere between six and seven thousand pounds, I believe, Sir Philip. It would have been considerably more, but that her ladyship, a few years ago, was persuaded by an evil counsellor to sell out a large sum from the funds and invest elsewhere, for the sake of better interest."
"And she lost it?"
"Every shilling," replied the lawyer, with satisfaction: for it was done without his concurrence. "She would have had double the money to leave behind her but for that."
"Ah!" Sir Philip spoke the monosyllable shortly, and dropped the point. Not so very long agohehad been seduced to invest money in some grand and very plausible scheme--one of those to be heard of daily, promising a fortune in twelve months at the most--and he had burnt his fingers. The topic, consequently, was not palatable to his ears.
"Ask him how long this will has been made, John," whispered the literary man to his brother. Of a retiring timid nature himself, he rarely spoke but when he was obliged, and he shrank from putting the question. The clergyman obeyed, and the lawyer pointed to the date of the will.
"Only in April last. Lady Oswald was fond of making wills. Some people are so. I have made her, I should think, half-a-dozen, if I have made one."
"And the bulk of the money was always left to Dr. Davenal?"
"O dear no. It never was left to him until this last was made."
"Was I--were we--was it ever left to us?" asked the poor clergyman, tremblingly.
"Yes it was," replied Mr. Wedderburn. "I don't see why I should not avow it. It can't make any difference, one way or the other. In the first will she ever made after Sir John's death it was left to you. And in the last will preceding this, it was again left to you. Once it was left"--the lawyer looked towards the window--"to Mr. Oswald Cray."
Oswald gave his shoulders a haughty shrug. "I should never have accepted the legacy," he said in a distinct, deliberate tone. "I had no claim whatever to Lady Oswald's money, and should not have taken it."
Henry Oswald laughed; a pleasant, cordial laugh, as he turned to Oswald. "You don't know, Mr. Oswald Cray. We are all so ready to be chivalrous in theory: but when it comes to practice--the best of us are apt to fall off."
"True," quietly remarked Oswald: but he did not pursue the theme.
There was nothing more to be said or done then. Of what profit to remain talking of the wills that had been, while the present one was before them and must be put in force? Sir Philip made the first move; he went out, taking a formal leave; Henry Oswald with a more cordial one. Oswald Cray was the next to leave. He shook hands with the brothers, and spoke a few kind words of sympathy for their disappointment.
"It is the disappointment of a life," replied the clergyman in a low tone. "Our struggle has been continued long; and we had--there's no denying it--looked forward to this. It is a hard trial when relatives find themselves passed over for strangers."
"It is, it is;" said Oswald Cray. "I could wish Lady Oswald had been more mindful of legitimate claims."
As he was going out, Parkins waylaid him in her new mourning. "There will be a dinner ready at five o'clock, sir. Would you be pleased to stay for it?"
"Not today," replied Oswald.
Causing the sweeping crape to be taken from his hat, for he preferred to depart on foot, Oswald Cray proceeded through the town to the house of his brother. Just as he reached the door Mark rode up on horseback and leaped off with a hasty spring, throwing his bridle to the man who waited.
"Of course I am too late!" he exclaimed.
"Of course you are, by pretty near two hours. How did it happen, Mark?"
"Well--I-can hardly tell how it happened," was the answer of Mark. "I had a patient to see in the country--more than one, in fact--and I thought I could do it all first and be back in time. But I suppose I must have stayed later than I purposed, for before I was ready to return I found it was half-past eleven, and the funeral no doubt over. And then I did not hurry myself."
They were walking across the hall to the dining-room as he said this. Caroline was seated at the table, her workbox before her, doing some embroidery. She flung the work down, rose, and confronted her husband.
"Mark, why did you do this? You went into the country to avoid the funeral!"
"I--I did what?" exclaimed Mark. "Nonsense, Carrie! Why should I wish to avoid the funeral? I have attended plenty of funerals in my time."
Oswald turned quickly and looked at Mark. It was not the accusation of Mrs. Cray that had aroused his attention--thatwent for nothing; but something peculiar in Mark's tone as he answered it. To Oswald's ears it spoke of evasion. He could not see his face. It was bent, and he was slapping his dusty boots with his riding-whip.
"But why DID you go into the country?" pursued Caroline. "It was half-past ten when you were here, and I warned you then it was getting time to dress. When I saw your horse brought to the door and you gallop off on him, I could not believe my eyes."
"Well, I mistook the time, that's the fact. I am very sorry for it, but it can't be helped now. Of course I should like to have attended and paid her my last respects, poor lady. Not but that I daresay there were enough without me. I was not missed."
"But you were missed," said Oswald, "and waited for too. It threw us pretty nearly half-an-hour behindhand. I should not like to keep a funeral waiting myself, Mark."
"Who was there?" asked Mark.
"The two relatives of Lady Oswald, Sir Philip and his son, Dr. Davenal and myself."
"Davenal was there, then. But of course he would be. Then he served to do duty for me and himself. And so Sir Philip came?"
"I should be surprised had he not come."
"Should you? He is a cranky sort of gentleman: an Oswald all over. You are another of them, Oswald. I wonder if you'll get cranky in your old age."
"Don't listen to him, Oswald," interposed Mrs. Cray. "He seems 'cranky' himself this morning."
Mark laughed good-humouredly, and tossed a late China rose to Caroline which he had brought home in his button-hole. "Did you hear the will read, Oswald?" he asked.
"Yes."
"Short and sweet!" cried Mark, alluding to the monosyllable, which it must be confessed was given in a curt, displeased tone, as if its speaker were himself displeased. "I think it is you who are cranky, Oswald."
Oswald smiled. "A thought was causing me vexation, Mark."
"Vexation at me?"
"Oh, no."
"Well, and who comes in for the money? The Stephensons?"
"No. The Stephensons come in for a very poor portion. It is left to Dr. Davenal."
"To Dr. Davenal!" echoed Mark in his astonishment. "No!"
"The bulk of the money is bequeathed to him. All of it, in fact, with the exception of a few trifling legacies. The Stephensons have fifty pounds each and the furniture."
Caroline had dropped her embroidery again and was gazing at Oswald, apparently unable to take in the news. "Are you telling us this for a joke?" she asked.
"The money is left to Dr. Davenal, Mrs. Cray," repeated Oswald, and certainly there was no sound of joking in his tone. "It surprised us all."
"What a lucky man!" exclaimed Mark. "I wonder if he had any prevision of this yesterday? We were speaking of money, he and I. It was about that field behind the doctor's stables, the one he has so long wanted to buy. The owner's dead, and it is for sale at last. I observed to the doctor that I supposed he'd secure it at once, but he said he should not buy it at all; he had had a heavy loss, and could not afford it----"
"It is not true, Mark!" interrupted his wife.
"It is true, Caroline. But don't you go and repeat it again. He said, moreover, he had great need himself of a thousand or two, and did not know where to turn to for it. Mind you, I believe he was betrayed, as it were, out of the avowal, I had been saying so much about the field: for he brought himself suddenly up as though recollection had come to him, and said, 'Don't talk of this, Mark!'"
And Mark's long tonguehadtalked of it! Oswald Cray listened to its every word.
"If he could but have foreseen then that this money had dropped to him! And yet--I should think he must have known it from Lady Oswald; or partially known it. How much is it, Oswald?"
"Six or seven thousand pounds. It would have been a great deal more but for certain losses. Wedderburn said she was persuaded to embark money in some speculation; and it failed."
"How stupid of her!" exclaimed free Mark. "I wonder, now whether the doctor did know of this! If he did he'd keep his own counsel. Did he appear surprised, Oswald?"
"He was not there. He left before the will was read, saying he had to attend a consultation."
"Well, so he had," said Mark; "I happen to know that much. It was for half-past twelve."
So far, then, Dr. Davenal had spoken truth. A doubt had been crossing Oswald's mind, amidst many other curious doubts, whether Dr. Davenal had made the excuse to get away, and so avoid hearing the will read, and himself named chief legatee.
He remained some time with Mark and his wife. They asked him to stay for dinner, but he declined. He had ordered a chop to be ready at the "Apple Tree," and was going back to London early in the evening--by that seven o'clock train you have before heard of.
"Had you any particular motive for absenting yourself from Lady Oswald's funeral!" he asked of Mark, as the latter accompanied him to the street-door on his departure.
"Not I," answered Mark, with the most apparent readiness. "It was very bungling of me to mistake the time. Not that I like attending funerals as a matter of taste: I don't know who does. Good-afternoon, Oswald. You must give us a longer visit when you are down next."
He stood at the Abbey door, watching his brother wind round the branching rails, for Oswald was taking the station on his way to his inn. Very cleverly, in Mark's own opinion, had he parried the questions of his purposed absence. His absencewaspurposed. With that chloroform on his conscience he did not care to attend the funeral of Lady Oswald.
And the afternoon went on.
It was growing dusk, was turned half-past six, and Oswald Cray was beginning to think it time to make ready for his departure. He had not stirred from the chair where he ate his dinner, though the meal was over long ago; had not called for lights; had, in fact, waved John Hamos away when he would have appeared with them. His whole range of thought was absorbed by one topic--his doubts of Dr. Davenal.
Yes, it is of no use to deny it; it had come to that with Oswald Cray--doubts. Doubts he scarcely knew of what, or to what extent; he scarcely knew where these doubts or his own thoughts were carrying him. On the previous night he had for a few moments given the reins to imagination; had allowed himself to suppose, for argument's sake only, that Dr. Davenal had given that chloroform knowing or fancying it might prove fatal, and he had gone so far as to ask what, then, could be his motive. There was no motive; Oswald glanced on each side of him to every point, and could discover no motive whatever, or appearance of motive. Therefore he had thrust the doubts from him, as wanting foundation.
But had the revelations of this day supplied the link that was wanting Had they not supplied it?The death of Lady Oswald brought a fortune to Dr. Davenal.
Almost hating himself for pursuing these thoughts, or rather for the obligation to pursue them, for they would haunt him, and he could not help himself, Oswald Cray sat on in the fading light. Ha said to himself, how absurd, nay how wicked it was of him, and yet he could not shake them off. The more he strove to do so, the more he brought reason to his aid, telling him that Dr. Davenal was a good and honourable and upright man, as he had always believed, the less would reason hold the mastery. Imagination was all too present in its most vivid colouring, and it was chaining him to its will.
What were the simple facts? asked reason. Dr. Davenal had caused Lady Oswald to inhale chloroform, having only some hours previously avowed to Oswald his belief that she was a most unfit subject for it, was one of those few to whom the drug proves fatal. It did prove fatal. There had next been some equivocation on the part of Mark, when questioned about it, and there had been the positive refusal of Dr. Davenal to afford any explanation. Next, there had been the discovery of the day--that Dr. Davenal was the inheritor. Well, it might all be explained away, reason said; it was certainly not enough to attribute to Dr. Davenal the worst social crime contained in the decalogue. But the more Oswald Cray dwelt on this view, or tried to dwell upon it, the more persistently rose up imagination, torturing and twisting facts, and bending them as it pleased.
There had been that hint of Neal's too! Oswald Cray honestly believed that Neal was one of those servants incapable of speaking ill for ill's sake; and he could not help wondering what he meant. Neal was not an ignorant man, likely to be deceived, to take up fancies: he was of superior intelligence, quite an educated man for his class of life. If----
Oswald's thoughts were interrupted by the entrance of his landlord. "I don't want lights, John; I told you I did not. I shall be going directly."
"It is not lights, sir. Mr. Neal, Dr. Davenal's servant, is asking to see you."
"Neal! Let him come in."
Neal came forward into the dusky room. He was the bearer of a note from his master. Oswald had a light brought in then, and opened it. It was written in pencil.
"My Dear Mr. Oswald Cray,--
"I very much wish to see you if you can spare me an hour. I thought perhaps you would have dropped in this lonely day and taken a knife and fork with us. Will you come down this evening?--Ever sincerely yours,
Richard Davenal."
"Neal, will you tell Dr. Davenal--he is expecting me, I find?"
"I think so, sir. He said to me before dinner that he thought you might be coming in. When he found you did not, and they were sitting down to table, he wrote this in pencil, and bade me call one of the maids to wait, while I brought it up to you."
"Tell the doctor that I am quite unable to come down. I have to return to London by the seven o'clock train."
"Very well, sir."
Neal was leaving the room, but Mr. Oswald Cray stopped him. He had taken a sudden resolution, and he spoke on the spur of the moment, without reflection. The perplexity of his mind may be his excuse.
"Neal, have you any objection to tell me what you meant last night by hinting that Lady Oswald had not come fairly by her death?"
Neal paused. He was a man of caution; he liked to calculate his words and his ways before entering on them. Neal would certainly speak if he dared. He was in a very bitter mood, for the day's doings had not pleased him. The news had reached him that her ladyship's money had been all left to Dr. Davenal; that he, Neal, was not so much as named in the will. And Neal had looked forward as confidently as had the Reverend Mr. Stephenson to the hope of some little remembrance being left to him. In his terrible anger, it seemed to him that the one enemy to prevent it had been the great inheritor, Dr. Davenal.
"Sir, if I speak, would you give me your promise first, to hold what I say sacred to yourself; to let it go no further? I know, sir, it is not the place of a servant to ask this confidence of a gentleman, but I should be afraid to speak without it."
"I will give it you," said Mr. Oswald Cray. "You may rely upon me."
And Neal knew that if there was one man more than another on the face of the earth who would never forfeit his word, upon whom implicit trust might be placed, it was Oswald Cray. Neal set himself to his task. First of all opening the door to make sure they were entirely alone, he dropped his voice to a safe whisper, and described what he had seen and heard on the Sunday night. It was certainly a startling narration, and as Oswald Cray listened to it in that darkened room,--for the one candle, now placed on a side-table behind, only served to throw out the shadows,--listened to the hushed tones, the unexplainable words, a curious feeling of dread began to creep over him. Neal, you may be very sure, did not disclose anything that could bear against himself; he contrived to come out well in it. He was standing outside for a moment before going to bed, hoping the air would remove the sad headache which had suddenly seized him upon hearing of the death of his late lady, when he saw the man come in in the extraordinary manner he had just described. Believing him to be nothing less than a housebreaker (and Watton, who had seen the man from her room upstairs, had come to the same conclusion), or an evil character of some sort, getting in plausibly on false pretences to work harm to Dr. Davenal, he had gone to the window to look in out of anxiety for his master's safety, and there had heard what he had stated, for the window was thrown open. He could not see the visitor, who was seated in the shade: he only heard sufficient to tell him that the business he had come on was Lady Oswald's death; and he heard Dr. Davenal acknowledge that it was murder, and that it must be hushed up at any price, even if it cost him his fortune. He, Neal, described the utterly prostrate condition of his master that night; both before and after the interview with the visitor, he was like one who has some dreadful secret upon the mind, some heavy guilt; Neal had thought so before ever the man, whoever he might have been, entered the house.
Will it be forgiven to Oswald Cray if in that brief confused moment he believed the worst--believed all that Neal said to him? His mind was in a chaos of perplexity, almost, it may be said, of terror. Nothing was clear. He could not analyse, he could not reason: Neal's words, and the doings of the night which the man was describing, seemed to dance before his mind in confused forms, ever changing, as do the bits of coloured glass in a kaleidoscope. Neal continued to speak, but he did not hear him distinctly now; the words reached his senses certainly, but more as if he were in a mazy dream. He heard the man reiterate that, wherever it was his master had gone to that night, remaining away until the Wednesday it was connected with the death of Lady Oswald; he heard him say that, whatever the mystery and the guilt, Miss Sara Davenal had been made the confidant of it by her father, he, Neal, supposed front some imperative motive which he did not pretend to understand. Oswald heard like one in a dream, the words partially glancing off his mind even as they were spoken, only to be recalled afterwards with redoubled force.
In the midst of it he suddenly looked at his watch, suspecting--as he found--that he had barely time to catch the train.
And he went out in a sort of blind confusion, his brain echoing the words of Dr. Davenal, only too accurately remembered and repeated by Neal. "Murder? Yes, the world would look upon it as such. I felt certain that Lady Oswald was one to whom chloroform, if administered, would prove fatal."
It was startling news to go forth to Hallingham--one of the nine days' wonders read of in social history. Lady Oswald had bequeathed her fortune to her physician, Dr. Davenal! Such things had been known before in the world's experiences, but Hallingham made as much of the fact as if that were the first time it had ever been enacted.
Upon none did the news fall with more complete astonishment than upon the doctor himself. Lady Oswald had more than once in the past few months mysteriously hinted to him that he would be rewarded some time for his care and attention to her; and it must be supposed that she had these hints in her mind when she said to Mr. Oswald Cray that "he" (the named inheritor of her money) knew that he would be rewarded. Upon Dr. Davenal the hints had never made any impression. Of a nature the very reverse of covetous, simple-minded, single-hearted, it never so much as crossed his imagination that she would be leaving her money tohim. He would have been the first to repudiate it; to point out to her the injustice of the act.
It is surely not necessary to premise that you, my intelligent and enlightened readers, cannot have fallen into the mistake made by Neal, or drawn that respected domestic's very absurd, though perhaps to a fanciful and prejudiced mind not unnatural deduction, that the night-visit to Dr. Davenal had reference to Lady Oswald's death. Being in the secret of who really did administer that fatal dose of chloroform to Lady Oswald, you will not connect it with Dr. Davenal's trouble. A heavy secret, involving disgrace, much misery, perhaps ruin, had indeed fallen that night on Dr. Davenal, but it was entirely unconnected with the death of Lady Oswald. The words which Neal had heard--and he heard them correctly--would have borne to his mind a very different interpretation had he been enabled to hear thewhole--what had preceded them and what followed them. But he did not.
Yes, this unhappy secret, this great misfortune, had nothing to do with Lady Oswald. Far from Dr. Davenal's having caused her to inhale an extra dose of chloroform as an experiment, on the strength that it might prove fatal, and so enable him to drop at once into that very desirable legacy named in her will, and which supposition, I am sure you will agree with me in thinking, belongs rather to the world of idealic wonders than of real life, the doctor had not the faintest suspicion that he should inherit a shilling. When the news was conveyed to him he could not believe it to be true,--did not believe it for some little time.
It was Mr. Wedderburn who carried it to him. When the lawyer's business was over at Lady Oswald's, he proceeded to Dr. Davenal's, and found him just come home from the consultation, to attend which he had hurried away before the reading of the will. Mr. Wedderburn told him the news.
"Left to me?" exclaimed the doctor. "Her money left to me! Nonsense!"
"It is indeed," affirmed Mr. Wedderburn. "After the legacies are paid you take everything--you are residuary legatee."
"You are joking," said the doctor. "What have I to do with the money? I have no right to it."
With some difficulty Dr. Davenal was convinced that he, and he alone, was named the inheritor. It did not give him pleasure. Quite the contrary; he saw in it only a good deal of trouble and law business, which he much disliked at all times to engage in.
Richard Davenal was one of those thoroughly conscientious men--and there are a few such in the world--who could not be content to enjoy money to which another has more right. It was a creed of his--it is not altogether an obsolete one--that money so enjoyed could not bring pleasure in the spending, or good in the end. Lady Oswald had legitimate relations, who had looked for the money, who needed the money, needed it with a far deeper need than Dr. Davenal, and who possessed a claim to it, so far as relationship could give it them. Even as the conviction slowly arose to him that the news was true that he had been made the inheritor, so there arose another conviction, or rather a resolution, with it,--that he would never accept the money, that it should go over to its legitimate owners, no matter what trouble it involved. A resolution from which he never swerved.
Never. Not even in the moment when a tempter's voice arose within him, whispering how well this legacy would serve to replace that great sum, the savings of years, which he had been obliged to part with only that very week. Partly to satisfy a debt of which until then he had known nothing, had he parted with it; partly as hush-money, to keep down that terrible secret whispered to him on the Sunday night. The thought certainly did arise--that it almost seemed as if this money had been sent to him to replace it; but he did not allow it to obtain weight. It would have been simply impossible for Dr. Davenal to act against his conscience.
"I shall refuse the legacy," he remarked to Mr. Wedderburn. "I have no right to it."
"What did you say?" asked the lawyer, believing he did not properly catch the words.
"I shall not accept this money. It is none of mine. It ought to be none of mine. It must go to Lady Oswald's relatives."
"But it is yours, Dr. Davenal. It is bequeathed to you in the will."
"I don't care for the will. I should not care for ten wills, if I had no right to the money they bequeathed me. I have no right to this, and I will not touch a farthing of it."
Mr. Wedderburn's surprise could only expend itself in one long stare. In all his lawyerly experience he had never come across an announcement so savouring of chivalry. The legatees he had had the pleasure of doing business with were only too eager to grasp their good fortune, and if any little inconvenient pricks of conscience were so ill-mannered as to arise, they were speedily despatched back again by the very legal thought--If I do take it I but obey the will.
"There never was such a thing heard of as the refusing of a fortune legally bequeathed," cried the lawyer.
"I daresay there has been, many a time. If not, this will be a precedent."
"You'll be so laughed at," persisted Mr. Wedderburn. "You'll be set down--I'm afraid people will be for setting you down as a lunatic."
"Let them," said the doctor. "They shan't confine me as one without my own certificate. Mr. Wedderburn," he continued in a graver tone, "I am serious in this refusal. I feel that I have no right whatever to this money of Lady Oswald's. She has paid me liberally for my services----"
"If you only knew how many thousands inherit money daily who have no right to it," interrupted Mr. Wedderburn.
"Doubtless they do. I was going to observe that it is not so much my having no right to it, that would cause me to decline, as the fact that others exist who have a right. I----"
"But the will gives you a right," interposed the lawyer, unable to get over his surprise.
"A legal right, I am aware it does. But not a just one. No, I will not accept this legacy."
"What will you do about it, then?"
The doctor was silent for a minute. "I should wish the money to be appropriated just as though there had been no Dr. Davenal in existence. You say this will was made but about six months ago. It must have superseded another will, I presume?"
"It may be said that it superseded several," was the reply. "Lady Oswald was constantly making wills. She had made some half-dozen before this last one."
"And each one disposing of her property differently?" quickly asked the doctor.
"Yea, or nearly so. Twice she bequeathed it to her nephews, the Stephensons. Once it was left to Mr. Oswald Cray; once to charities; once to Sir Philip Oswald. She has been exceedingly capricious."
"All the more reason why I should not take it now," warmly cried Dr. Davenal. "She must have left it to me in a moment of caprice; and had she lived a few months longer this will would have been revoked as the rest have been. Mr. Wedderburn, were I capable of acting upon it, of taking the money, I should lose all self-respect for ever. I could not, as a responsible being, responsible to One who sees and judges all I do, be guilty of so crying an injustice."
Mr. Wedderburn suppressed a shrug of the shoulders. He could only look at these affairs with a lawyer's eye and a lawyer's reasoning. Dr. Davenal resumed--
"What was the tenor of the will which this last one supersede? Do you recollect?"
"Perfectly. We hold the draft of it still. It was as nearly as possible a counterpart of the present one, excepting as relates to your share in this and that of the brothers Stephenson. In that last will they took your place. The furniture was bequeathed to them, as in this, and also the bulk of the property."
"My name not being mentioned in it?"
"Yes, it was. The diamond ring bequeathed to you now was bequeathed then. Nothing more to you."
"Then that's all right. Now, Mr. Wedderburn, listen to me. That diamond ring I will accept with pleasure, as a reminiscence of my poor friend and patient; but I will accept nothing else. Will you be so kind as to destroy this last will, and let the other be acted upon? I am scaring you, I see. If that cannot legally be done, I must let the money come to me, but only in transit for the rightful owners, the Reverend Mr. Stephenson and his brother, and I'll make them a present of it. You will manage this for me. Being at home in law details, you know of course what may and what may not be done. All I beg of you is to effect this, carrying it out in the simplest manner, and in the quickest possible time."
Mr. Wedderburn drew a long face. He had no more cause to wish the money to go to Dr. Davenal than to the clergyman and his brother, but it was altogether so unusual a mode of proceeding, would be so very unprofessional a transaction, that he regarded it as an innovation hardly to be tolerated, a sort of scandal on all recognised notions in the legal world, of which Mr. Wedderburn himself was little better than a machine.
"I cannot undertake it without your giving me instructions in writing, Dr. Davenal," he said glumpily. "I'd not stir a peg in it without."
"You shall have them in full."
"Well, sir, you know best, but the time may come when your children will not thank you for this. It is folly, Dr. Davenal, and nothing less."
"I hope my children will never question any act of mine. I am doing this for the best."
Nevertheless, as Dr. Davenal spoke, there was some pain in his tone. The lawyer detected it, and thought he was coming round. He would not speak immediately, but let the feeling work its way.
"It is a large sum to relinquish," the lawyer presently said; "to throw out of one's hand as if it were so much worthless sand."
"What is the sum?--what has she left?" asked Dr. Davenal, the remark reminding him that he was as yet in ignorance.
"I expect, when all the legacies and other expenses are paid, there will be little over six thousand pounds. There ought to have been double. Lady Oswald lost a large sum a few years ago, quite as much as that. She put it into some prosperous-looking bubble, and it burst. Women should never dabble in business. They are safe to get their fingers burnt."
"Men have burnt theirs sometimes," was the answer of Dr. Davenal, spoken significantly. "Six thousand pounds! I should have thought her worth much more. Well, Mr. Wedderburn, you will carry out my instructions."
"Of course, if you order me. Will you be so kind as to write those instructions to me at your convenience, posting them from this town to my house. I am going back home at once."
"Won't you see Mr. Stephenson and his brother first, and impart to them the fact that I shall not take the money?"
"No," said the lawyer, "I want to go home by the next train. I wish, Dr. Davenal, you would allow me to give you just one word of advice."
"You can give it me," said Dr. Davenal. "I don't promise to take it."
"It might be the better for you if you would," was the reply. "My advice is, say nothing to the Stephensons, or to any one else, today. This is a very strange resolution that you have expressed, and I beg you to sleep upon it. A night's rest may serve to change your mind."
The lawyer departed. It was close upon the hour for Dr. Davenal to receive his indoor patients, and he could not go out then. He went to look for his daughter, and found her in the garden parlour with her aunt. It was not often that Miss Bettina troubled that room--she had been wont to tell Sara and Caroline that its litter set her teeth on edge.
They began to talk to him of the funeral. It was natural they should do so. In a country place these somewhat unusual occurrences of everyday life are made much of. Miss Bettina was curious.
"Were the people from Thorndyke there?" she asked.
"Sir Philip and his eldest son."
"And Oswald Cray?"
"Of course. He came down on purpose."
"My goodness! And so they met! How did they behave, Richard?"
"Just as the rest of us behaved. Did you suppose they'd start a quarrel?"
"I was sure of it. I knew they would never meet without starting one. Nothing less could come of Oswald Cray's proud spirit and the manner they have treated him."
"At sea as usual, Bettina. Do you think they'd quarrelthere?--on that solemn occasion? Oswald Cray and Sir Philip are proud enough, both of them; but they aregentlemen--you forget that, Bettina. I think Oswald Cray is about the least likely man to quarrel that I know, whether with Sir Philip or with anybody else. Your proud man washes his hands of people whom he despises; but he does not quarrel with them."
How singularly true were the words in regard to Oswald Cray! It was as though Dr. Davenal had worn in that moment the gift of prevision; "Your proud man washes his hands of people whom he despises."
"And how is her money left?" continued Miss Bettina. "To the Stephensons?"
"No, she has not made a just will. It is left to----to a stranger. A stranger in blood."
"Indeed! To whom? I hopeyouhave been remembered with some little token Richard?"
"To be sure I have been. You know those two splendid diamond rings of hers: I have one, Oswald Cray the other. And that's all he has got, by the way, except a silver coffee-pot, or so. Sara, come with me into the garden, I wish to have a little chat with you."
"You have not told me who the stranger is," shrieked out Miss Bettina.
"I'll tell you by-and-by," called back the doctor.
"I did not think it likely she would leave anything to Oswald Cray, papa," Sara remarked, as they paced the garden path.
"I think I should, had I been in her place. A matter of five hundred pounds, or so, would have helped him on wonderfully. However, there was no obligation, and it is a question whether Oswald would have accepted it."
"You said it was not a just will, papa?"
"I could have gone further than that, Sara, and stigmatised it as a very unjust one. Those poor Stephensons, who have been expecting this money--who had a right to expect it--are cut off with a paltry fifty pounds each and the furniture."
"O papa! And are they not very poor?"
"So poor, that I believe honestly they have not always bread to eat; that is, what people, born as they were, designate as bread; proper food. They carry the signs of it in their countenances."
"And for Lady Oswald to have left her money away from them! To whom has she left it?"
"To one who has no right to it, who never expected it."
"I suppose you mean Sir Philip?"
"No, it is not left to him. But now, give me your opinion, Sara. Let us for argument's sake put ourselves in the position of this fortunate legatee. Suppose--suppose, my dear it were left toyou: this money to which you have no claim, no right--to which others have a claim, how should you feel?"
"I should feel uncomfortable," replied Sara. "I should feel that I was enriched at the expense of the Stephensons; I am sure that I should feel almost as though I had committed a fraud. Papa," she added more eagerly, the idea occurring to her, "I should like to give the money back to them."
"That is the very argument I have been using myself. Wedderburn, Lady Oswald's lawyer, has been here, talking of the matter, and I told him that were I the man to whom it was left, I should give it back, every shilling of it, to the channel where it ought at once to have gone--the brothers Stephenson. Wedderburn did not agree with me: he brought forward the argument that the man's children might reproach him afterwards. What do you think?"
"I think, papa, that were I the man you speak of, I should act upon my own judgment, and give it back without reference to the opinion of my children."
"That is precisely what he has resolved to do. Sara, the money is left to me."
Sara Davenal, taken completely by surprise, halted in her walk and looked at the Doctor, not knowing how to believe him.
"It is true, Sara. I find I am the favoured legatee of Lady Oswald: knowing at the same time that I have no more right to be so than have those espalier rose-trees at your side. I have resolved to refuse the money; to repudiate the will altogether, so far as my share in it goes; and to suffer a previous will to be acted upon, which gives the money to the Stephensons. I trust my children will not hereafter turn round and reproach me."
"O papa!"
She spoke the words now almost reproachfully, in reproach that he could ever think it.
"Yes, I shall do it, Sara. And yet," he added, his voice insensibly sinking to a whisper, "I have heavy need for money just now, and the help these thousands would be to me no one but myself knows."
Sara was silent. A shiver passed over her face at the allusion. She did not dare reply to it. The subject was too painful; and, besides, she was kept partially in the dark.
"But I cannot tamper with my conscience," resumed Dr. Davenal. "Were I to take this money, it would only lie like a weight upon it for my whole future life. I believe--and, Sara, I wish you to believe it and treasure it as an assured truth--that money appropriated by ourselves, which in point of right, of justice, belongs to others,nevercomes home to us with a blessing. However safely the law may give it us and the world deem our claim to it legitimate, if we deprive others of it, whose it is by every moral and--may I say it?--divine right, that money will not bless us or our children. Sara, I speak this from the experience of an observant life."
"I am sure you are right, papa," she murmured. "Do not keep this money."
"I shall not. But, Sara,"--and Dr. Davenal stopped in his walk, and his voice grew solemn in its tone as he laid his hand upon her--"things have changed with me. I cannot now foresee the future. I thought I was laying up a competency for my children; not a great one, it is true, but one that would have kept them above the extreme frowns of the world. This I have had to fling away--my hard-earned savings. It may be that I shall now have to leave you, my cherished daughter, to the world's mercy; perhaps--I know not--compelled to work for your living in it. Should this come to pass, you will not cast back a reflection on your dead father, and reproach him for a rejection of these thousands."
The tears were streaming down her cheeks. Her pleading hand, her loving look, was his first answer. "You could not keep the money, papa. It would not be right in God's sight. Do not hesitate."
"I have not hesitated, Sara. My mind has been made up from the first. But I preferred to speak to you."
Neal came forward to summon Dr. Davenal. His patients were waiting for him. Sara turned to rejoin her aunt.
"You can tell her about this legacy to me, Sara; it will be the talk of the town before the day's out. And explain to her why I decline it."
The afternoon drew to its close. Dr. Davenal, engaged with a succession of patients, scarcely noticed its elapse. A wish was running through his mind to see Mr. Oswald Cray, and he hoped he would be calling. When dinner-time came and he had not come, that note, previously mentioned, was pencilled, and Neal despatched with it.
The man brought the message back in due course "Mr. Oswald Cray was unable to call upon the doctor, as he was departing for London." Dr. Davenal was disappointed; he had wished to explain to Oswald Cray his intentions respecting the money; he considered it due to him, Oswald, to do so.
How is it that there are times when an idea, without any apparent cause to lead to it, any reason to justify it, takes sudden possession of the mind? Even as Neal spoke, such an idea seated itself in Dr. Davenal's. He fancied that Oswald Cray was in some way not pleased at the disposition of Lady Oswald's property, as regarded Dr. Davenal; was in a degree, more or less, resenting it. It only made the doctor doubly desirous of seeing him.
But there was no chance of it at present, Oswald Cray having left Hallingham. Dr. Davenal put on his hat and went out to take a walk as far as Lady Oswald's.
He found the Rev. Mr. Stephenson alone. His brother had departed. The clergyman received him somewhat awkwardly. He had been brooding over his disappointment all by himself; had been thinking what a crying wrong it was that the money should be left to the flourishing and wealthy physician, Dr. Davenal, who put as many guineas into his pocket daily as would keep him and his family in their humble way for months. He was casting his anxious thoughts to the future, wondering how his children were to be educated, foreseeing nothing but embarrassment and struggle to the very end of his life; and I am not sure that his heart at that moment towards that one man was not full of envy, hatred, malice, and all uncharitableness. Ministers of the gospel are but human, swayed at times by evil passions, just as we are.
But, being in this frame of mind, it a little confused the reverend gentleman to see the object of his envy standing before him. Dr. Davenal drew forward a seat.
"I daresay, Mr. Stephenson, if the truth were known, you were at this very moment bestowing upon me plenty of hard names."
It was so exceedingly like what Mr. Stephenson had been doing, that all the reply he could make was a confused stammer. Dr. Davenal, who, for the interview, appeared to have put away from the surface his hidden care, resumed in a frank, free tone--
"I have no right to the money, have I? It ought to have gone to you and your brother?"
"Well, sir--perhaps you had been led to expect it by Lady Oswald," was the clergyman's answer. Of a timid and refined nature, he could not, to Dr. Davenal's face, express his sense of the wrong. With Dr. Davenal before him, cordial and open, he began to think the wrong less. That is, that it was not so much the doctor's fault as he had been angrily deeming.
"No, she never led me to expect anything of the sort; and you cannot be more surprised than I am at its being left to me," said the doctor. "When Mr. Wedderburn came to me with the news, I could not believe him. However, it appears to be the fact."
"Yes," meekly rejoined the clergyman; "it is."
"And I have now come to inform you, that I shall not take the money, Mr. Stephenson. Not a stiver of it. The will, so far as it concerns me, may be regarded as a dead letter, for all practical use. I have desired Mr. Wedderburn to transfer the money to you and your brother; and if this may not legally be, if I must, despite myself, accept the money, I only take it to restore it to you. You will not be too proud to accept it from me?"
Was he listening to fact?--or was he in a dream? The words, to the minister's ear, did not savour of reality. His pale face grew moist with emotion, his trembling hands entwined their thin fingers together. He did not dare to ask, Was it real? lest the answer should dissolve the spell, and prove it but illusion.
"I could not accept of this great sum to the prejudice of others who have a right to it," resumed Dr. Davenal. "I should fear its proving something like ill-gotten gains, that bring evil with them, instead of good. The money shall be yours and your brother's, Mr. Stephenson, just as surely as though it had been left to you by Lady Oswald. The diamond ring I shall keep and value, but not a shilling of the money. I thought I would come up and tell you this."
The tears were welling into that poor gentleman's eyes, as he rose and clasped the hand of Dr. Davenal. "If you could see what I have suffered; if you could only imagine the struggle life has been to me, you would know what I feel at this moment. Heaven send its blessings on your generosity!"
The doctor quitted him. He had found a heavy heart, he left a glad one. He quitted him and went forth into the stillness of the autumn night.
He glanced towards the bright stars as he walked along, thinking of the future. And a prayer went up from his heart to the throne of heaven--that, if it was God's will, his children might not feel hereafter the sacrifice he had made--that God would bless them and be merciful to them when he should be gone. The last few days had been sufficient to teach Dr. Davenal, had he never known it before, in how great need the apparently safest amongst us stand of this ever-loving mercy.