It was so true that the solicitor was not able to reply.
"When I think on her"--the great veins began to swell in the head
and neck of the lord of Strathfieldsaye--"I feel as if I'd like to
kill her. Did you see that picture in the _Morning Mirror_? And that
paragraph in the _Mail_? It's horrible, Mossop, horrible. And first and
last her education's cost me every penny of three thousand pound."
Mr. Mossop nodded appreciatively; then, sympathetically, he lifted
the lid of a silver box on a charming walnut-wood stand and asked his
visitor to have a cigar.
"No, I never smoke before my dinner," said Josiah sternly. "She hasn't
been home a month from Germany." The veins in his forehead grew even
more distended.
"Where--in Germany?"
"Eight months at Dresden. Pity she didn't stop there. Fact o' the
matter is she's over-educated."
The lawyer looked a little dubious.
"Oh, yes, Mossop. Not having a boy, I don't mind tellin' you I've
been a bit too ambitious for that gel. And over-education is what
this country is suffering from at the present time. It's the national
disease. And women take it worse than men. School--college--Paris--and
Germany on the top of 'em. I must have been mad. However ... there it
is! ... let me know when the document's ready and I'll look in at the
office and sign it."
The lawyer would have liked to continue his protest but the face of his
client forbade. He crossed to his writing table, took up a pencil and
a sheet of notepaper and said, "Miss Sarah's portion to Mrs. Cockburn
except----"
"Five thousand pounds to Gertrude Preston."
The lawyer made a brief note. "Right," he said gravely. "I hope a
codicil will be sufficient; we'll avoid a new instrument, if we can.
You shall know when it's ready."
Josiah gave a curt nod.
"Going to be war in Europe, do you think?" said the solicitor in
a lighter, more conversational tone. It was merely to relieve the
tension; somehow the atmosphere of the room was heavy and electric.
"Don't know," said Josiah. "But I'll not be surprised if there is--and
a big one."
Mr. Mossop showed a courteous surprise. This question of a coming big
war was a perennial subject for discussion in social and business
circles. It had been for years and it had now come to rank in his mind
as purely academic. He could not bring himself to believe in "the big
burst up" that to some astute minds had long seemed inevitable.
"Any particular reason for thinking so just now?" To the lawyer it was
hardly a live issue; somehow it was against all his habits of thought;
but it was an act of charity at this moment to direct the mind of his
client.
"Stands to reason," Josiah spoke with his usual decision. "Germany's
got thousands of millions locked up in her army. She'll soon be looking
for some return in the way of dividends."
"But one might say the same of us and our navy."
"That's our insurance."
"That's how they speak of their army, don't they?--with Russia one side
of them, France the other."
"I daresay, but"--there was a pause which, brief as it was, seemed to
confer upon Mr. Munt an air of profound wisdom--"mark my words, Mossop,
they're not piling up all these armaments for nothing. It's not their
way."
"But they are so prosperous," said the lawyer. "They are hardly likely
to risk the loss of their foreign markets."
"Nothing venture, nothing win. And they do say the German workingman is
waking up and that he is asking for a share in the government."
"One hears all sorts of rumors, but in these matters one likes to be an
optimist."
"I daresay," Josiah looked very dour. "But I'll tell you this. I'm main
glad I got out of all my Continental investments a year last March."
The solicitor had to own that that was a matter in which his client
had shown uncommon foresight. The present state of the market was a
remarkable vindication of his sagacity.
There was another little pause in which the solicitor, himself an able
man of business, could not help reflecting upon the native shrewdness
of this client so keen, so hardheaded, so self-willed. And then it was
broken by Mr. Munt taking a step towards the door and saying, "When are
you and the wife and daughter coming to see us, Mossop? Come to a meal
one evening, won't you?"
The invitation was point blank; but behind the lawyer's genial courtesy
was the trained fencer, the ready-witted man of the world. "Most kind
of you," he said heartily. "Only too delighted, but, unfortunately, my
womenfolk are going up to Scotland to-morrow"--he gave private thanks
to Allah that it was so!--"and I follow on Saturday, so perhaps if we
may leave it till our return"--the solicitor raised his frank and ready
smile to the stern eyes.
"Quite so, Mossop!" The client frowned a little. "Leave it open. But
I'd like you to see the house. And Mrs. M. would like to know your wife
and daughter."
"They'll like to know her, I'm sure." The air of sincerity was balm.
"But they've been so busy gadding about just lately"--the laugh was
charming--"that they've had to neglect their social duties."
Josiah was far too elemental to feel slighted, even if the lawyer had
not been so disarming. "But you people here on The Rise have the name
of being a stuck-up lot, especially some of you old standards. And I'm
bound to say, Mossop, my experience is that you seem to live up to it."
Lawyer Mossop laughed his soft rich note as he followed Mr. Munt across
the hall. He opened the front door for his client, and then, hatless as
he was, accompanied the visitor down the short drive as far as the gate.
"Nice things here, Mossop," Josiah pointed to the flower beds on either
side. "That a Charlotte Fanning?" A finger indicated a glorious white
rose whose dazzling purity of color stood out beyond all the rest.
Mr. Mossop said it was a Charlotte Fanning.
"Not sure you are going to beat mine, though."
Mr. Mossop said modestly that he did not expect to do that. Mr. Munt
had long been famous for his roses; and by comparison the lawyer
declared he was but a novice. The client was flattered considerably by
the compliment.
At the gate, the proprietor of the Duke of Wellington pointed to the
distant gables of Strathfieldsaye, and said, "Well, come round when you
get back. The garden won't be much of a show for twelve months yet, but
the house is first class. I designed it myself."
With the winning charm which even Josiah, who felt that he paid for it
on the High Court scale could not resist, Mr. Mossop promised that he
would come round when he got back.
"An' don't forget the wife and daughter."
The wife and daughter should come round too. And then as the lord of
Strathfieldsaye said, "Good-night, Mossop," and was about to turn away
from the open gate, he felt suddenly the hand of the solicitor upon
his shoulder and the impact of a pair of grave, kind eyes. "I wish, my
dear friend," said Lawyer Mossop, "you could see your way to taking a
fortnight to think over that little matter."
It was not mere conventional man-of-the-worldly good feeling. It was
the human father, and the sheer unexpectedness of the obtrusion through
the highly polished surface of the city's foremost solicitor caused his
client to take a sharp breath. But Josiah's strength had always been
that he knew his own mind. And he knew it now. "No, Mossop." A final
shake of the dour head. "That gel is comin' out of my will. Good-night."
The solicitor sighed gently and closed the gate. And then he stood a
moment to watch the slow-receding lurch of the elephantine figure up
the road.