THE DEAD MAN'S BELONGINGS.
Mr. Temple's sudden death had also naturally created great excitement
both at Woodlea Hall and at the farm at Woodside. The squire had
breakfasted with his wife as usual on the morning it occurred, and
about an hour later Mrs. Temple had gone into the library to ask him
for some money she required, when to her surprise and alarm she found
him with his gray head lying on the writing-table before him, and his
arms hanging limply by his side.
"Phillip!" she exclaimed, and ran up to him, and laid her hands on his
shoulder.
But the face that had ever looked gently at her did not stir. Then
Mrs. Temple raised his head, and the moment she did so she gave a
wild shriek. For there was no mistaking the pallid gray hue of the
complexion, or the dull, glazed, half-open eyes. Mr. Temple was dead,
and Mrs. Temple, ever impulsive and excitable, ran screaming to the
door of the room to tell the news and summon the household.
They sent for the doctor, and the newly-made widow knelt by the
squire's side and chafed his cold hands, and wailed and wept for the
man to whom in his lifetime she had given no love. Now she regretted
this, she clung to him, and would fain have recalled him to her side.
And presently her mother arrived on the scene and then her father.
Mrs. Layton's first thought when she heard the squire was dead was to
speculate on how much he had left behind him, and to groan in spirit
at the idea that now her daughter would probably have to leave the
Hall.
"And that John Temple will be coming, I suppose," she whispered to her
husband, "and where will we all be?"
"My dear, to speak of such things in the presence of death--" began the
vicar, mildly. But Mrs. Layton turned her little eager face away from
him before he could complete his homily.
"I must see after things," she said, which meant a great deal to Mrs.
Layton's mind. First she had to induce her daughter to leave the dead
man's side and go to her own apartments. Then she ran from room to
room, picking up little things here and there that she thought at such
a time she could collect without remark. Nothing came wrong to Mrs.
Layton! A few sheets of note-paper, an envelope or two, anything in
fact that she could lay her hands on.
"They will never be missed; they are of no value," she told herself as
she gathered her spoil together. She was haunted by the idea that John
Temple might arrive at any moment, and that she would not have such
another opportunity.
The servants were all down-stairs talking of their master's sudden
death, and the whole household naturally disarranged. Mrs. Temple was
in a state of half-remorseful grief and excitement, and she also was
now thinking of the coming of John Temple.
"He will be master now, I suppose," she thought bitterly, "and I shall
be turned out."
She remembered, too, the morning he had left Woodlea through her
interference, and mentally saw again his pale, set face as he had told
her he would never return. He would return now, and would that girl
come with him? Mrs. Temple kept asking herself. For up to the time of
the squire's death nothing had been seen or heard at the Hall of John
Temple since the morning he quitted it. Mr. Temple had felt naturally
offended by his nephew's reticence, but at last, at Mr. Churchill's
earnest request, he had written to John Temple's bankers to ask if
they could tell him of his nephew's whereabouts. The bankers wrote to
inform the squire, in reply, that Mr. John Temple was abroad, and that
before leaving England he had taken out a considerable sum of money in
letters of credit. They wrote nothing more; they had, in fact, been
instructed by John Temple before he left England to give no information
if any inquiries were made about him. He had gone away a moody and
remorseful man, but Mr. Harrison, the solicitor, knew where to find
him, and also some officers of the police force. With these he had
left orders, which he believed now to be useless, that should anything
ever be heard of the lady who had disappeared from the Grosvenor Hotel
on such a date that he was at once to be communicated with. But John
Temple believed that May was dead; believed that in a sudden frenzy of
grief and shame she had destroyed herself. And many a dark and dismal
hour he had stood looking down into the murky river, moodily thinking
it was sweeping over the fair head of his young love. It was on one of
these miserable occasions that Kathleen Weir had seen him, and a sudden
feeling of hate and anger had swept through his heart at the sight of
her. And shortly after this encounter he had left England. He felt,
in truth, that he could bear the strain no farther; that the terrible
haunting memory of the young life he believed he had destroyed would
overthrow his reason if he remained any longer on the spot.
In the meanwhile Mr. Churchill, in spite of his own secret anxieties,
had gone about telling his neighbors that his daughter and her husband,
Mr. John Temple, were abroad. There was no one to contradict this, yet
somehow the impression got about that everything was not quite right.
Perhaps it was the way in which Mrs. Churchill drew in her firm lips
when her husband spoke of his daughter. At all events, she never spoke
of her, nor did she encourage her stepsons to do so.
At first the boys had been overjoyed when they heard of May's marriage,
and looked forward to many a happy day at the Hall. But when week
after week passed, and May never wrote to them, they could not
understand it.
What was to prevent her writing? they asked each other, doubtfully,
even if she were twenty times abroad. Then the banker's letter
confirmed the news that John Temple was abroad, and after that, all
through the winter months, neither at the Hall nor at the homestead,
was anything more heard of John Temple or May.
The squire died in the early spring-time, and the news reached Woodside
in less than an hour after Mrs. Temple had found her husband dead.
It naturally threw Mr. Churchill, and even his wife, into a state of
excitement.
"Now, we must hear from them!" cried Mr. Churchill.
"We will know the truth at last," said Mrs. Churchill, in a more
subdued tone.
"What truth?" answered her husband, sharply. "They were married, and
now Mr. John Temple is the squire of Woodlea, and May is his wife--but
all the same, I am sorry to hear the old squire has passed away."
"How will they let Mr. John Temple know that his uncle is dead, if they
do not know where he is?" suggested Mrs. Churchill in her practical way.
"I will see to that," replied Mr. Churchill, determinedly. "There
will be no one, I suppose, to look after things at the Hall now but
the stupid old parson and his skin-flint of a wife. Madam won't know
anything about business, so as May's father I will ride over at once,
and of course Mr. Temple, as heir, must be immediately telegraphed for.
His bankers, by this time, probably really do know where he is."
"I think you are quite right to go, William," said Mrs. Churchill, who,
in truth, was full of curiosity to know all about the matter.
So Mr. Churchill mounted his horse and speedily reached the Hall in
a state of scarcely suppressed excitement. And his coming was not
unnoticed. Mrs. Layton, from one of the upper windows, peered down
into the court-yard when she heard the sound of his horse's hoofs
below, and gave a kind of cry when she saw who it was.
"Here is the first of them!" she exclaimed aloud to herself, and then
she hastily looked round the room to see what she could pick up before
"the others arrived."
She caught up some trifle, and then hurried down to her daughter's
bedroom.
"Rachel!" she cried, "that Churchill has arrived; you must rouse
yourself, and lock up all the jewels and silver, or they will be laying
hands on everything."
"I'll do nothing of the sort," answered Mrs. Temple, coldly.
"What, you'll let them have the diamonds!" screamed Mrs. Layton, in
absolute despair.
"The diamonds are heirlooms, so I suppose John Temple's wife--if he has
one--has a right to wear them," answered Mrs. Temple, contemptuously.
"I will have nothing touched until John Temple arrives."
"Then you'll lose everything! Do you suppose that low people like these
Churchills will not seize whatever they can get? At all events, secure
the jewels and the money in the house."
"Will you go away and leave me alone!" cried Mrs. Temple, passionately.
"Surely on a day like this--" And then she suddenly burst into tears.
Even to her wayward mind, this greed was shocking in the house of death.
Her mother left her with uplifted hands after this outburst. But Mrs.
Layton was still determined not to waste her time. She therefore
hurried into the poor squire's dressing-room and snatched up and
secured on her person his diamond studs, which were lying in a tray on
the toilet table. Then she looked eagerly around for his keys. He was
sure to have money locked away somewhere, she was thinking. But she
could not find the keys, and after a vain search for them she opened a
linen drawer and turned out half a dozen or so of pocket handkerchiefs.
"Poor man, he will never want them more," she reflected; "and I have
such bad colds every winter they'll come in nice and handy, and the
servants were sure to have stolen them."
Having pocketed these also, she went down-stairs to see Mr. Churchill.
She found him closeted with her husband, the vicar. The two men were
discussing the best plan how immediately to inform John Temple of his
uncle's death. Mr. Churchill had told the vicar of the banker's letter,
and had suggested this as a means of communication with the new heir.
The letter would probably be in the drawers of the writing-table in the
library, Mr. Churchill had said, but the vicar--a timid man--had shrunk
a little back from approaching a spot where so lately had lain the poor
squire's gray head. Mr. Churchill, however, urged that it should be
done, and they were talking it over when Mrs. Layton entered the room.
She extended her thin, claw-like hand to Mr. Churchill, but coldly.
"This is a sad affair, madam," said Mr. Churchill as he took it.
"Not for everyone," she could not help replying, spitefully.
"I think for everyone," answered the farmer, sturdily; "we all have to
go, but the squire was a good man, and a good friend to all who knew
him. There was but one opinion about the squire."
"But one, I am sure," said the vicar, weakly.
"I have been talking to the vicar, madam," went on Mr. Churchill, still
sturdily, "about the best and quickest way of communicating with Mr.
John Temple."
"But you have not his address, I understood," said Mrs. Layton, quickly
and viciously.
"That will be soon found, madam."
"But I thought not," replied Mrs. Layton, yet more viciously. "I
understand that since Mr. John Temple quitted this house in such an
extraordinary manner, that neither he nor--your daughter have ever been
heard of."
Mr. Churchill's clear, brown face turned a dusky red.
"You are mistaken then," he said, sharply. "I saw and heard of them
both. I saw the register of their marriage and the clergyman who
married them and the two ladies who were present at the ceremony! But
I won't discuss it. Vicar, will you go with me to seek the banker's
letter in the squire's writing-table, or shall I go alone?"
"Of course you must go, James?" exclaimed Mrs. Layton. "There may be
family affairs in the writing-table not intended for Mr. Churchill's
inspection. But I think this haste is most indecent; the poor man not
cold yet, and everyone in such a hurry to get what is left! But we
could expect nothing else."
With this parting shot Mrs. Layton quitted the room, and half an hour
later the letter from John Temple's banker informing the squire that
his nephew was abroad, was found by Mr. Churchill and the vicar in one
of the drawers of the writing-table in the library. By this time the
dead man had been borne away, yet there were traces of his familiar
presence all around. The pen he had been using when his summons came;
an unfinished letter lying on the blotting pad; the keys Mrs. Layton
had coveted; the chair on which he had died!
Yet Mr. Churchill sat down there, and deemed he was doing his duty as
he did so, and deliberately wrote to John Temple, his successor. He
also wrote to the bankers, requesting them to forward the inclosed
letter to Mr. John Temple at once when they received it, if they knew
his address, and, at the same time, suggested that a telegram might be
sent immediately. Then, having done this, he looked around a little
sadly.
"Poor man," he said to the vicar, "everything reminds one of him--ah,
well, it's very sad."
But his heart was not sad as he rode home. He felt almost as though he
himself had come into some portion of the dead man's inheritance.