THE EBONY CASKET
AT five minutes to twelve the two Miss Thursbys, who prided themselves
on their punctuality, entered the drawing-room together, or rather, to
speak more correctly Miss Matilda entered first, with Miss Jane close
on her footsteps, this happening to be the former’s month for enacting
the part of elder sister, as a consequence of which she wore what might
be termed the “chain of office” with its pendant locket. That something
out of the common was on foot could not be doubted, seeing that at that
early hour of the day the sisters were already attired in their
puce-coloured lutestring gowns, and were wearing their “company caps”
and best lace mittens—a conjunction rarely, if ever, witnessed except
when some special visitors were expected at Vale View.
Earlier in the day—before breakfast, indeed—they had told each other
sadly and for the last time, as if their courage needed stimulating by
reiterated assurances, that a certain revelation must no longer be
delayed. It had been Matthew’s—their dead brother’s—wish that Ethel
should be told on her nineteenth birthday, and with them his wishes had
always been law. And yet it was a grievous thing to have to do. It
seemed to them that after to-day “the child,” as they still continued
to call Ethel between themselves, could never regard them with quite
the same eyes as heretofore. Very downcast they looked as they sat
there on the ottoman, side by side, waiting for the timepiece to chime
the hour of noon.
They were tall fair women, thin without being in the least degree
angular; with blue eyes, rather long straight noses, and a slight droop
at the corners of the mouth, which, when they were not engaged in
conversation, lent them an habitually pensive air, although, in
reality, they could be sprightly enough on occasion. When younger they
had been noted for their lovely pink-and-white complexions, and their
cheeks still retained the delicate ivory clearness of an arum lily. If
one had been asked to sum up in the fewest possible words the
predominant expression of the twin sisters—so strangely alike and yet
not without discernible points of difference—one would have said that
it was a mixture in equal parts of sweetness and goodness, and, in so
saying, one would not have been far wrong. How it had come to pass that
two such women—or neither of them—had never married, was one of those
delicate problems which no mere bystander is justified in trying to
solve. That they themselves could have told the reason why, had they
chosen to do so, is scarcely to be doubted.
On the centre table stood a quaintly carved ebony casket, clamped with
silver and having a silver plate let into the lid, on which, in Old
English characters, was engraved the monogram, “M. T.” Tamsin had
brought it in and placed it there a few minutes before the entrance of
the sisters.
Scarcely had the timepiece chimed the last stroke of twelve when the
door opened and Ethel entered the room. Miss Matilda rose and, crossing
to her, embraced her tenderly, an example which was at once followed by
Miss Jane. This ceremonious greeting, taken in conjunction with her
aunts’ “robes of state,” and the presence of the ebony casket, which
she had never seen opened, but which, as long as she could remember,
had been known to her as the depository of Uncle Matthew’s papers, all
sufficed to convince the girl that some momentous occasion was at hand.
Her cheeks paled perceptibly and her limbs began to tremble. Then she
drew in her breath, called herself a coward, and asked herself what she
had to fear. A moment or two she stood, and then she seated herself in
the pretty fancy-chair which she called her own. It had been her Aunt
Jane’s gift on her sixteenth birthday.
“My dear child,” began Miss Matilda—and then she was compelled to pause
for a few seconds before she could continue—“My dear child,” she
repeated, “your Aunt Jane and I have asked you to meet us in order that
we may reveal to you certain circumstances connected with your early
history of which you have heretofore been kept purposely in ignorance,
but which it was the desire of our dear brother should be made known to
you on your nineteenth birthday. That day has now arrived, and we are
here in order to carry out our brother’s wishes.”
Miss Matilda paused again, and glanced at her sister, who responded by
an encouraging nod, as much as to say, “Very nicely put, indeed.” Miss
Matilda resumed:
“My dear Ethel, you have been brought up to call my sister and me by
the title of Aunt—and very sweet, as coming from your lips, it has
sounded in our ears—and to the world at large you have passed as our
niece. But the time has now come when the truth must no longer be
withheld from you. My child, you are _not_ our niece, nor any relative
whatsoever. It grieves me to the heart to have to tell you this.”
Here the spinster’s voice quavered and broke; she turned away her face.
Miss Jane was biting her underlip in an effort to keep down her
emotion; one of her hands stole out and clasped a hand of her sister.
A low, inarticulate cry broke from Ethel. It was the cry of one not
merely wounded, but stunned. She half rose from her chair and then sat
down again and stared from one to the other, her eyes saying for her
that which her lips were powerless to utter. Then all in a moment her
tongue was loosened as if a cord had been cut. An instant later she was
on her knees in front of the sisters, pressing a hand of each “Then, if
you are not my aunts, whose child am I?” she cried aloud.
It was a quarter of an hour later. The sisters had mingled their tears
with Ethel’s. They had petted and made much of her till some measure of
composure had come back to her. She knew that she had not yet been told
all there was to tell; there was more to follow; but no second shock
could equal the first. The worst was known to her; it could matter
little—-or so just then it seemed to her—what still remained to be
told.
Presently Miss Matilda resumed her interrupted narrative.
“Many years ago—between nineteen and twenty, in point of fact—my
brother Matthew, by the death of a half-cousin who had made his home in
the United States, came in for a considerable legacy in the shape of
landed property in that country. As a consequence, Matthew deemed it
necessary that he should go out there in order to look after his
interests, and he kindly offered to take my sister and me with him for
a holiday. To this day Jane and I look back to that journey as the one
great event of our lives. We remained in the States about three months,
during which time we saw much, both of the country and the people. In
the hope that the longer sea voyage would prove beneficial to my
brother’s health, we came back by a sailing vessel named _The Pandora_,
instead of by steamer, as on our outward journey. It was in the course
of our return voyage that certain events happened in connection with
you, my dear child, having an important bearing on your future; an
account of which, later on, and when he felt that his time in this
world was growing short, my brother embodied in the form of a written
statement, which was placed by him in his ebony casket and the same
given into the custody of myself and sister a few hours before he
breathed his last. It is that statement which I shall now proceed to
place in your hands and which it has become your duty to open and
read.”
As she finished speaking, Miss Matilda rose and having selected one of
the keys which hung from her chatelaine, proceeded to unlock and open
the casket, which proved to be full of legal-looking documents—deeds,
securities and what not. From underneath these she presently drew forth
an oblong envelope which she handed to Ethel. It was fastened on one
side with a large red seal and on the other was endorsed, “To my
adopted Niece. To be opened by her on her nineteenth birthday, or
sooner should my sisters deem it advisable.—M. T.”
Ethel’s hands trembled in spite of her. She looked at Miss Matilda with
a pitiful smile. “Will not you open it and read it for me, dear
aunt—if”—with a little sigh—“I may still be allowed to call you by that
name?”
“My child, it is _your_ place, nay, your duty, to open it and read what
you will find written therein;” adding, with a touch of that
old-fashioned phraseology which became her so well: “And I have never
yet found my Ethel unresponsive to the call of duty.”
Ethel said no more, but at once broke the seal and drew forth the
enclosure, which consisted of a double sheet of letter paper closely
covered with writing in a bold, masculine hand. The sisters, sitting
bolt upright, one mittened hand laid across the other, looked on in
silence. Having laid aside the envelope and straightened out the
enclosure, Ethel said to Miss Matilda: “Do you wish me to read it
aloud?”
“My dear, that is entirely a matter for your own judgment. My sister
and I are already cognisant of the contents, our brother having
permitted us to peruse the paper previously to sealing it up.”
“Still, I think I should prefer to read it aloud.”
“As you please, my love.”
A faint wintry smile lighted up the faces of the sisters. It was
perhaps because they were so sad at heart that they smiled. It is a way
their sex sometimes have.
Without further preface Ethel began to read:—
“MY DEAR CHILD,—When these lines meet your eye the hand that penned
them will be dust.
“Having reason to feel assured that my remaining span of life will be a
brief one, I have deemed it best, in your interests, and with a view to
any contingencies which may arise in the future, to draw up a clear and
succinct statement of the circumstances which first served to bring you
under the notice of my sisters and myself, and led to our taking charge
of you, temporarily, as we thought at the time, and ultimately to your
adoption by us.
“In the autumn of the year 18— my sisters and I, after a brief sojourn
in the United States, took passage on our return voyage from New York
to London by the clipper ship _Pandora_. There were not more than a
score of passengers in addition to ourselves, but among them was a
certain Mrs. Montmorenci-Vane, with her child, a baby about six months
old. Her nursemaid, according to her account, having deserted her
within an hour or two of her coming on board, she engaged a young woman
from among the steerage passengers to look after her child during the
voyage. Unfortunately, when the voyage was about half accomplished,
Mrs. Montmorenci-Vane fell overboard one dark night and was lost. There
was no one on the Pandora who knew anything about her; she was a
complete stranger to every one. In this state of affairs, my sisters,
who had their maid Tamsin with them, took upon themselves the care of
the drowned woman’s babe for the rest of the voyage, in the expectation
that some one would meet the ship on its arrival—some relative or
friend—into whose hands they could transfer it.
“In point of fact, when the _Pandora_ reached the London Dock it was
met by a thin, shabbily-dressed, consumptive-looking man, who had come
to inquire for his sister, one Martha Griggs. There was no such person
on board, but, by means of a photograph, he recognised his sister in
the Mrs. Montmorenci-Vane, who had fallen overboard. Never did I see a
man more utterly dumfounded than he. His sister had been unmarried.
Only a few months before she had gone out to the States as maid to a
wealthy lady, who, a little later, had died there. She had written to
her brother that she was coming home by the _Pandora_, and had asked
him to meet the ship. But as to why she had chosen to call herself Mrs.
Montmorenci-Vane, why she had gone to the extravagance of paying for a
cabin passage, and whence she had obtained the child she passed off on
board as her own, he professed himself as being utterly unable to
comprehend. That the man’s wonder and amazement were genuine it was
impossible to doubt.
“He was a poor man, he averred, with a family of his own, and he would
have nothing to do with his sister’s child, which, according to his
account, was not hers at all. For anything he cared, it might go to the
workhouse. He went away like a dazed man, with a promise that he would
call on me the next morning; but he failed to do so, and I have never
set eyes on him from that day to this.
“That the child thus strangely thrown on our hands should be committed
to the tender mercies of the workhouse was not to be thought of. For
the time being it was put out to nurse, where my sisters were satisfied
that it would be well cared for. When, a couple of years later, they
went to reside permanently at St. Oswyth’s, they took the child with
them, they having decided to adopt it; and, in order that the tongue of
idle rumour and scandal might have no cause to wag, at my persuasion
they consented to the innocent ruse of passing the girl off to the
world as their niece.
“I need scarcely add that you, my dear Ethel, are the child in
question.
“In these few lines are summed up the whole of the facts bearing upon
your early history which are known to my sisters and myself. I may,
however, be allowed to record my firm belief that the person who called
herself Mrs. Montmorenci-Vane was not your mother. That, after this
length of time, the mystery of your birth and parentage will ever be
cleared up, seems to me exceedingly doubtful; but even should such
prove to be the case, who shall venture to say that the knowledge has
not been withheld from you for some wise purpose. That, should you be
spared, you will grow up to be a comfort and a blessing to those who
have made their home your home, and that you will return them love for
love, I feel fully assured.
“MATTHEW THURSBY.”