She went to the window, and stood between the glass and the curtain,
with her left hand entangled among the cords of the Venetian blind. In
her nervousness it was necessary for her to take hold of something. Her
delicate fingers ran up the green strings and played with them, as
though they were the strings of a harp on which she was practising, and,
strangely enough, Philip felt within him every touch; when she twanged a
cord, some fibre in him quivered responsive, and was only lulled when
she clasped the string and stopped its vibration.
A faint tinge rose in her white face to the cheek-bones and temples,
touching them with more than colour, an apparent inner light, like the
Alpine glow after sundown on the white head of the Jungfrau. As she
spoke she did not look at Philip, but with eyes modestly lowered on the
ground, or out of the window looking sideways down the street.
'What I wished to say to you, Mr. Pennycomequick, will soon be said. I
shall not detain you long. I am sorry to differ from Mrs. Sidebottom,
but I cannot share her conviction that the body found last night is that
of your uncle.'
'You do not dispute that he is dead?'
'No,' she sighed; 'I think there can be no question about that.'
'Or that he was last seen on the canal bank at no great distance from
where the discovery was made?'
'No,' she said, and her fingers unconsciously played on the blind cords
the time of the melody in Chopin's 'Marche Funebre.'
'Why do you say no?'
'Mr. Pennycomequick was full dressed when he went out--that is to say,
he had on his great-coat and his boots and--in fact it was not possible
that he could be discovered in the condition in which the body recovered
from the canal was found.'
'It is, of course, difficult to account for it, but not impossible. My
aunt declares that she went up to the bedroom of my uncle the same
night, found the bed disturbed, and the dress clothes, or some of them,
on the chair. She concludes that he pulled on his overcoat and went out
half-dressed, that he got caught by the water somewhere in some place of
temporary refuge, and saw that his only chance of escape was to strip
and swim. That he drew on his great coat again as a protection against
the cold, till the proper moment came for him to make the plunge--but
she concludes that he never did start to swim, either his courage failed
him, or the flood rose too rapidly and carried him away before he had
removed the overcoat. This may be an over-ingenious explanation,
nevertheless it is an explanation that accounts for all.'
'Not for all--the body is not that of Mr. Pennycomequick.' Salome spoke
decidedly, and as she spoke her hand gripped the strings hard.
Philip stood by the table, resting his hand on it. The morning light
fell strong on her face, and illumined her auburn hair. Philip took
occasion to examine her countenance more closely than had been possible
before. She was like her sister in build, in feature and in tone of
colour, indeed strikingly like her, but in that only--certainly, Philip
thought, in that only.
All at once she looked up and met Philip's eyes.
'No--a thousand times no,' she said. 'That is not uncle. He was
brought here because Mrs. Sidebottom desired it, and is convinced of the
identity. No objection that I can raise disturbs her. I thought that
possibly, last night, I might have judged on insufficient evidence, and
so I went this morning into the room to look at the corpse. Mrs.
Sidebottom had sent last night for women who attended to it and it was
laid out in the spare room.' She began to tremble now as she spoke, and
her fingers played a rapid movement on the blind cords. 'I had made up
my mind to look at him, and I did.'
She paused, to recover the control that was fast deserting her, as the
delicate glow of colour in her face had now left it. 'It is not my
uncle. I looked at his hands. The head is--is not to be seen, nothing
is distinguishable there--but the hands are not those of Mr.
Pennycomequick.'
'In what does the difference consist?'
'I cannot describe it. I knew his hands well. He often let me take
them in mine when I sat on the stool at his feet by the fire, and I have
kissed them.' The clear tears rose in her eyes and rolled down her
cheeks. 'I am quite sure--if those had been his dear hands that I saw
on the bed this morning, I would have kissed them again, but I could
not.' She shook her head, and shook away the drops from her cheeks.
'No--I could not.'
'Miss Cusworth,' said Philip, 'you are perhaps unaware of the great
alteration that is produced by immersion for many hours.'
'They are not his hands. That is not uncle.'
She was so conspicuously sincere, so sincerely distressed, that Philip
relaxed his cold manner towards her, and said in a gentle tone:
'Did my uncle wear a ring? There was none on the hands of the man found
yesterday.'
'No; he wore no ring.'
'With what did he seal his letters?'
'Oh! he had a brass seal with his initials on it, with a handle, that
was in his pen-tray. He used to joke about it, and say he was a J.P.
without the Queen's commission.'
'For my own part,' said Philip, 'I am beyond forming an opinion, as I
have seen my uncle but once since I was a boy, and then under
circumstances precluding exact observation.'
Salome said nothing to this, but heaved a long breath. Presently Philip
said:
'Your mother--has she been taken upstairs?'
'Oh no!' exclaimed Salome, excited as by a fresh terror. 'You do not
know my mother. She has heart complaint, and we have to be most careful
not unduly to excite and alarm her. She has suffered much on account of
what has taken place; and the shock of seeing----' She shivered. 'It
cannot be.'
'And your sister?'
'She turned faint when brought to the door, and I could not persuade her
to enter. She has been much tried by the German invasion of France, and
her hurried journey.'
'Is there anything further you have to say?'
'No; Mrs. Sidebottom is wrong, that is all.'
Philip withdrew.
The girl had gained in his estimation. There was strength in her such
as lacked in her sister. She must have had courage and determination to
go by herself into the room where lay the mutilated corpse, and she had
formed her own opinion, independently, and held to it with a firmness
there was no breaking down.
Philip ascended the stairs thoughtfully. It had seemed to him at the
time that his aunt had rushed at identification with undue
precipitation; still, she was the sister of Uncle Jeremiah, and
therefore better capable than anyone else. Now he was himself
uncertain.
When he entered the study where Mrs. Sidebottom was, she saluted him
with:
'Well, so you have had your interview with Salome. She has been hanging
about the hall all the morning for the purpose of catching you.'
Philip made no reply. Her light tone jarred on his feelings, coming as
he did from the presence of a girl full of sadness.
'Has she gained you over to her side?'
'Upon my word, I do not know what to think.'
'Fiddlesticks!' said Mrs. Sidebottom; 'she has made eyes at you. Girls
with good eyes know how to use them; they are better advocates than
their tongues.'
'The difficulty to identification seems to me insuperable.'
'Pshaw! I have no doubt at all. He had been to bed; he went out
without his coat and waistcoat. He was last seen on the canal bank, not
so very far from the place where the corpse was found. The body is
discovered wearing the great-coat. I have told you how I explain that.
I suppose Salome has made a point to you that the nightshirt was not
that of Uncle Jeremiah? Her mother looked after his linen.'
'No; she said nothing of that.'
'But I identify the shirt.'
'You, aunt?'
'Yes; it is one I gave him.'
'You--gave him? An extraordinary present.'
'Not at all. I was his sister; and I know that an old bachelor's
wardrobe would be in a sad state of neglect. I intended to replenish
him with linen altogether.'
Philip was greatly surprised. He looked fixedly at his aunt, to make
out whether she were speaking seriously. She dashed off, however, at
once on another topic.
'That girl,' she said, 'naturally resisted the conclusions at which I
have arrived.'
'Why naturally?'
'Oh, you greenhorn! Because if it be established that Jeremiah is dead,
out goes the whole Cusworth brood. They have lived here and preyed on
him so long that they cannot endure the notion of having to leave, and
will fight tooth and nail against the establishment of his decease.'
'Not at all. You misjudge them. They allow that he is dead, but
disbelieve in the identity of the corpse found with my uncle who is
lost, which is another matter.'
'Out they shall go,' said Mrs. Sidebottom.
'It is painful for them to leave a house where they have been happy, and
in which the young ladies have grown up from childhood.'
'Other people have to undergo painful experiences,' said his aunt; and
again, 'Out they go.'
'Not at once.'
'As soon as the funeral is over.'
'But why act with such precipitation?'
'Because I cannot endure them. Do you remember the story of the
Republican judge, when a gentleman contended before him for his paternal
acres against a _sans-culotte_, who had appropriated them? "These
acres," said the plaintiff, "have belonged to my family for four hundred
years." "High time," said the judge, "that they should be transferred
to others;" and he gave sentence for the defendant. These Cusworths
have been in possession quite long enough. High time that they should
budge, and make room for me.'
'But you must consider the feelings of the old lady. You have no excuse
for acting peremptorily.'
'I shall inquire what wage she has received, pay her a month, and send
her off. That is to say,' added Mrs. Sidebottom on further
consideration, 'I will pay her as soon as I have got some of Jeremiah's
money out of the bank.'
'And that cannot be touched till his will has been proved.'
'There is no will.'
'How do you know that?'
'I have searched every drawer, closet, and chest. I have looked
everywhere. There is no will.'
'It will be at the lawyers'.'
'Jeremiah never had a lawyer. That was one of his fads.'
'Then at the bank.'
'I wrote to the bank the moment I heard of his death. I have received
an answer. There is no will at the bank.'
'There is time enough to discuss this later.'
'No, there is not,' said Mrs. Sidebottom peremptorily. 'The factory must
not be allowed to come to a stand, and the business to drift away. You
have no claim.'
'That remains to be seen. If there be no will, I shall have a claim,
and a pretty substantial one.'
'Your father withdrew his share from the concern. I did not. I have my
interest in the business, and will see that it be kept up. Where is
Lamb?'
'The captain will be here directly. Hush! I hear him in the hall.'
In another minute, Lambert Pennycomequick entered the room, very fresh,
well dressed, and pleasant.
'Lamb!' exclaimed his mother, 'there is no will.'
'Then, I suppose,' said the captain, 'we shall have to take out an
administration. I don't understand these things myself, but Cousin
Philip is here on the spot to manage for us.'
'If there be no will,' explained Philip, 'you, Aunt Louisa, as sole
surviving sister of Uncle Jeremiah, will have to act. You will have to
take oath that he is dead, and that he died intestate. Then you will be
granted administration as next of kin. If I had any doubt about his
death, I would enter a _caveat_ and prevent the grant; and then the
death would have to be proved in solemn form in court. But I have no
doubt that my uncle is dead, though I may think it an open matter
whether the body in the other room be his.'
'And, if I am granted administration as nearest of kin, all the property
comes to me?' said Mrs. Sidebottom.
'Not so--most certainly.'
'Why not? I am nearest. I alone have a stake in the mill. Yours was
withdrawn long ago. I am his sister, you only a half-nephew.'
'For all that, you do not take everything. I have my share.'
'Well, if it must be, we will divide into three. I take a third in
addition to what I have by my marriage settlement; Lamb has a third, and
you the remainder.'
'Wrong again, aunt. Lambert is out of the running. The estate will be
divided between you and me in equal portions.'
'This is monstrous. My Lambert is a nephew every whit as much as you.'
'Yes, but you intervene. Such is the law.'
Mrs. Sidebottom was silent for a moment. Then she said irritably: 'I
wish now, heartily, that there had been a will. I know what Jeremiah's
intentions were, and I would grieve to my heart's core to have them
disregarded. In conscience, I could not act differently from his
wishes. If he omitted to make a will, it was because he knew nothing of
law, and supposed that everything would devolve to me, his sister.
Philip, knowing the rectitude of your principles, I am sure you will
decline to touch a penny of your uncle's inheritance. You know very
well that he never forgave your father, and that he always regarded his
leaving the business as an acquittal of all further obligations towards
him.'
'I must put you out of doubt at once,' said Philip. 'I shall most
certainly take my share.'
'I do not believe that my brother died without a will. I never will
believe it. It will turn up somehow. These old fogies have their odd
ways. Perhaps it is at the mill in his office desk. What a world of
contrarieties we do live in! Those persons to whom we pin our faith as
men of principle are just those who fail us. However, to turn to
another matter. I presume that I am in authority here. You have no
_caveat_ to offer against that?'
'None at all.'
'Then out go the Cusworths, and at once.'
'Not at once. That is indecent. If you will have it so, after the
funeral give them notice. You must act with humanity.'
'The girl is insolent. She has the temerity to dispute my assertion
that the dead man is Jeremiah.'
'She is justified in forming her own opinion and expressing it.'
'Of course, you take her part. She has been ogling you with good
effect. Lamb, will you go down and call her up? I must have a word
with her at once, and ascertain the amount of wages her mother has
received, and how much is due.'
'Remember,' said Philip, 'that Mrs. Baynes has come here from Normandy,
and that Mrs. Cusworth is ill, and that houses are scarce at present in
Mergatroyd.'
'Then let them go elsewhere. To Jericho, for all I care.'
Philip was very angry. He was offended at his aunt's insinuations about
himself, and indignant at her want of feeling towards those who had been
companions and friends to his uncle.
Lambert had left the room as desired.
'Aunt Louisa,' said Philip, 'I insist upon your acting with courtesy and
consideration towards the Cusworths. I do not mean to threaten you; but
I shall not tolerate conduct that appears to me as ill-judged as unjust.
As you said yourself, we must remember and act upon the wishes of the
deceased; and it would be contrary to them that the old lady and her
daughters should be treated with disrespect and unkindness.'
'You leave me to deal with them,' said Mrs. Sidebottom, somewhat cowed
by his manner.
'You know my opinion. You will find it not to your advantage to
disregard it,' said Philip haughtily.
Mrs. Sidebottom shuffled her feet, and arranged her skirts, frowned, and
examined her pocket-handkerchief, where she discovered an iron-mould.
Then Lambert reappeared with Salome, and as they entered the door,
Philip turned towards it and took up his position near the girl, facing
his aunt, as if to protect Salome from insolence and injustice. Mrs.
Sidebottom understood the signification of the movement, bit her lips,
and said with constraint, looking on the ground: 'May I ask you, Miss
Cusworth, to favour us by taking a chair? There is no occasion for you
to stand in my presence. I have taken the liberty to send for you,
because my poor dear brother is dead, and as no reasonable doubt remains
in any unprejudiced mind that his body has been found----'
Salome's lips closed. She looked at Philip, but said nothing. She had
made her protest. One on this occasion would be superfluous.
'We desire in every way to act according to the wishes of my darling
brother, whom it has pleased a beneficent Providence'--she wiped her
eyes--'to remove from this vale of tears. As his sister, knowing his
inmost thoughts, the disposition of his most sacred wishes, his only
confidant in the close of life, I may say I know what his intentions
were as well as if he had left a will.'
'There is a will,' said Salome quietly.
'A will!--Where?'
'In my workbox.'
A silence ensued. Mrs. Sidebottom looked very blank.
'On the very night he died he gave it me to keep, and I put it away in
my workbox, as I had nothing else that locked up. My workbox is in my
room upstairs. Shall I fetch the will?'
'No,' said Philip, 'let it stay where it is till after the funeral.'
*CHAPTER XII.*
*SURPRISES.*
When the funeral was over, and the family of Pennycomequick was
assembled in the house of the deceased, or assumed to be deceased,
manufacturer, Mrs. Sidebottom sent her compliments to Salome, with a
request that she would favour her with an interview in the dining-room.
Mrs. Sidebottom was dressed in fresh black satin and crape that became
her well, as her hair and face were fair. Of this she was aware, and
she took the opportunity of surveying herself in every mirror that she
passed. Really in her mourning she looked young again. The black
seemed to produce on her much the same effect as the photographer's
stipple, wherewith he effaces the wrinkles of the negative. It was as
though the life of Pennycomequick were a capital of which, when Jeremiah
lost hold, his heirs had taken possession. Not Mrs. Sidebottom only,
but also her son seemed to have come in for a bequest of vitality. The
captain looked brighter, less languid than he had for long.
Philip's suspicious nature had been displeased by the statement of
Salome that the will was in her possession. It appeared to him strange
that the old man should have entrusted so important a document to the
care of a girl of nineteen or twenty. It roused in his mind that
mistrust which had been laid. He asked whether the fact of this
consignment did not show that the Cusworth family were deeply interested
in the will; whether this taking possession of it were not the
conclusion of a conspiracy to get the old man to make a testament
altogether in their favour.
He did not, on this occasion, move to meet Salome when she entered the
room, but took his position apart, with arms folded, and face
imperturbable, and set hard, as if a frost had congealed it.
Philip was not by any means unconcerned as to the disposition of his
uncle's property. He would have been raised above the passions and
ambitions of human nature had he been unconcerned, for the disposition
was likely to affect materially his whole after-life.
Philip was now aged thirty-four years, and was only a solicitor's clerk.
The utmost he could expect, without a windfall, would be when well
advanced in years to be taken into the firm of Pinch and Squeeze for his
mastery of the details of the business. He would be incapable of
purchasing a partnership, as he was wholly without capital. What means
his father had possessed had been thrown away, and therewith his
prospects.
Philip's only chance of recovering his proper position was through a
bequest from the uncle whose will was about to be read.
If Jeremiah had died intestate, he would have come in for a share of the
business, and for a good lump sum of money, for it is quite certain that
his uncle had saved money. He might then have either purchased a
partnership in a good legal house, or carried on the factory, remaining
at Mergatroyd.
It was true that he knew nothing of the technique of linen weaving, but
his training had taught him business habits, and he was confident that
in a short time he would be able to master the ramifications of the
business. There is a tool sold by ironmongers that contains in the
handle, saw, file, gimlet, turnscrew, chisel, bradawl, and punch. The
nozzle of the handle is provided with a grip that holds or discharges
such of the tools as are required or done with. Thus the instrument can
be converted at pleasure into whatever is desired.
A business education makes a man into such a convertible tool, ready, as
required, to be saw, file, turnscrew, or punch. Philip was conscious of
his mental flexibility, and confident that if he resolved to make a new
departure, he could fit himself to it. The knowledge that he had been
without means had not soured him as it had his father, but had hardened
him. His profession had conduced, as this profession does in many
cases, to foster in him a strong and touchy sense of rectitude. Brought
into contact with mankind in its ignoble aspects, seeing its sordidness,
selfishness, laxity of principle where self-interest is concerned, he
had framed for himself a rigorous code of honour, from which nothing
would make him swerve by a hair's-breadth.
In the past he had made no calculation on receiving anything from his
uncle, but now that the possibility of his getting something was
presented to him, he could not contemplate the decisive moment with
equanimity. The tiger that has tasted human blood, ever after disdains
the food that previously satisfied its maw; and the young lady who has
been through a London season, or only ventured into a first ball, will
not afterwards return to the sobriety and monotony of country life. If
Philip had been left to plod on at Nottingham without expectations, he
would have accommodated himself to his situation with dull resignation;
but now that a prospect of independence had been dangled before his
eyes, he could not return to his old career without intensified
distaste.
Yet he was far from forming great hopes. He knew that Jeremiah had been
a vindictive old man, never forgiving his brother a mistake which had
cost that brother more suffering than it had Jeremiah. It was more
probable that the old manufacturer would leave everything to his sister
and her son, with whom he had always maintained unbroken connection,
than that he should favour him. Whether Jeremiah liked and trusted his
sister and her son, and to what extent he liked and trusted them, Philip
had not the means of judging, that alone could be revealed by the will.
If he should be disappointed, his disappointment would be more grievous
to bear than he cared to acknowledge to himself. He was, indeed, angry
with himself for feeling any flutter of hope. If he should be
disappointed, he would return to Nottingham, to his former routine of
life, and spend the rest of it in a subordinate position, destitute of
that brightness and ease for which a man of education craves as an
atmosphere in which his soul can breathe and expand. He did not desire
ease because indolent, but to obtain scope for his faculties to develop
in other directions than those to which they were professionally turned;
and to polish the other facets of the inner self than those exposed to
the daily grindstone. He would like to buy books, to take a holiday on
the Continent, to purchase small artistic treasures, to be able to rise
out of the contracted circle of petty clerk-life, with all its small
prejudices and narrow interests.
For fifteen years he had lived this life that was uncongenial, and
unless his uncle's money gave him wings to rise out of it, he must
remain in this Stymphalian bog. Consequently it was with a beating
heart, and with inward fluctuations of hope and fear, that he awaited
the decision; but none of this unrest could be seen in his face, that
did not bear in it a sign of expectation.
As Salome entered, Mrs. Sidebottom waved to her to take a seat. The
girl, however, with a slight acknowledgment, stepped up to Philip, and
extending to him the will, said: 'It was given to me to keep safely,
should anything occur. I cannot even now resign it absolutely, as Mr.
Pennycomequick told me that I was to keep it and prove it.'
'You prove it!' exclaimed Philip, glancing at her suspiciously.
'You!' cried Mrs. Sidebottom. 'Fiddlesticks! That is to say,
impossible.'
'You must remain in the room, Miss Cusworth,' said Philip, 'whilst the
will is read, after which we will remit it to your charge.'
'I object to such as are not of the family being present,' said Mrs.
Sidebottom.
'Your objection must be put aside,' answered Philip. 'As Miss Cusworth
has been entrusted with the document, and required to prove it, she must
remain.'
Mrs. Sidebottom tossed her head.
Philip drew his penknife from his pocket, opened it, and leisurely cut
through the top of the envelope, extracted the document, and unfolded
it. He glanced at the heading, and then, with lawyer-like instinct, at
the end, then, with a sharp look of surprise at Salome, who waited with
lowered eyes, he said: 'This is worthless. The signature has been torn
away.'
'Torn away!' echoed Mrs. Sidebottom.
Salome looked up in astonishment.