THE REVELATION TO LADY VERNER.
IN the drawing-room at Deerham Court, in their new black dresses, sat
Lady Verner and Decima; Lucy Tempest with them. Lady Verner held out her
hand to Lionel when he entered, and lifted her face, a strange eagerness
visible in its refinement.
"I thought you would come to me, Lionel!" she uttered. "I want to know a
hundred things.--Decima, have the goodness to direct your reproachful
looks elsewhere; not to me. Why should I be a hypocrite, and feign a
sorrow for Stephen Verner which I do not feel? I know it is his
burial-day as well as you know it; but I will not make that a reason for
abstaining from questions on family topics, although they do relate to
money and means that were once his. I say it would be hypocritical
affectation to do so. Lionel," she deliberately continued, "has Jan an
interest in Verner's Pride after you, or is it left to you
unconditionally? And what residence is appointed for Mrs. Verner?"
Lionel leaned over the table, apparently to reach something that was
lying on it, contriving to bring his lips close to Decima. "Go out of
the room, and take Lucy," he whispered.
Decima received the hint promptly. She rose as of her own accord. "Lucy,
let us leave mamma and Lionel alone. We will come back when your secrets
are over," she added, turning round with a smile as she left the room,
drawing Lucy with her.
"You don't speak, Lionel," impatiently cried Lady Verner. In truth he
did not; he did not know how to begin. He rose, and approached her.
"Mother, can you bear disappointment?" he asked, taking her hand, and
speaking gently, in spite of his agitation.
"Hush!" interrupted Lady Verner. "If you speak of 'disappointment' to
me, you are no true son of mine. You are going to tell me that Stephen
Verner has left nothing to me. Let me tell you, Lionel, that I would not
have accepted it--and this I made known to him. Accept money from _him_!
No. But I will accept it from my dear son,"--looking at him with a
smile--"now that he enjoys the revenues of Verner's Pride."
"It was not with money left, or not left, to you, that I was connecting
disappointment," answered Lionel. "There is a worse disappointment in
store for us than that, mother."
"A worse disappointment!" repeated Lady Verner, looking puzzled. "You
are never to be saddled with the presence of Mrs. Verner at Verner's
Pride, until her death!" she hastily added. A great disappointment, that
would have been; a grievous wrong, in the estimation of Lady Verner.
"Mother, dear, Verner's Pride is not mine."
"Not yours!" she slowly said. "He _surely_ has not done as his father
did before him?--left it to the younger brother, over the head of the
elder? He has never left it to Jan!"
"Neither to Jan nor to me. It is left to Frederick Massingbird. John
would have had it, had he been alive."
Lady Verner's delicate features became crimson; before she could speak,
they had assumed a leaden colour. "Don't play with me, Lionel," she
gasped, an awful fear thumping at her heart that he was _not_ playing
with her. "It cannot be left to the Massingbirds!"
He sat down by her side, and gave her the history of the matter in
detail. Lady Verner caught at the codicil, as a drowning man catches at
a straw.
"How could you terrify me?" she asked. "Verner's Pride is yours, Lionel.
The codicil must be found."
"The conviction upon my mind is that it never will be found," he
resolutely answered. "Whoever took that codicil from the desk where it
was placed, could have had but one motive in doing it--the depriving me
of Verner's Pride. Rely upon it, it is effectually removed ere this, by
burning, or otherwise. No. I already look upon the codicil as a thing
that never existed. Verner's Pride is gone from us."
"But, Lionel, whom do you suspect? Who can have taken it? It is pretty
nearly a hanging matter to steal a will!"
"I do not suspect any one," he emphatically answered. "Mrs. Tynn
protests that no one could have approached the desk unseen by her. It is
very unlikely that any one could have burnt it. They must, first of all,
have chosen a moment when my uncle was asleep; they must have got Mrs.
Tynn from the room; they must have searched for and found the keys; they
must have unlocked the desk, taken the codicil, relocked the desk, and
replaced the keys. All this could not be done without time, and
familiarity with facts. Not a servant in the house--save the Tynns--knew
the codicil was there, and they did not know its purport. But the Tynns
are thoroughly trustworthy."
"It must have been Mrs. Verner----"
"Hush, mother! I cannot listen to that, even from you. Mrs. Verner was
in her bed--never out of it; she knew nothing whatever of the codicil.
And, if she had, you will, I hope, do her the justice to believe that
she would be incapable of meddling with it."
"She benefits by its loss, at any rate," bitterly rejoined Lady Verner.
"Her son does. But that he does was entirely unknown to her. She never
knew that Mr. Verner had willed the estate away from me; she never
dreamed but that I, and no other, would be his successor. The accession
of Frederick Massingbird is unwelcome to her, rather than the contrary;
he has no right to it, and she feels that he has not. In the impulse of
the surprise, she said aloud that she wished it had been left to me; and
I am sure these were her true sentiments."
Lady Verner sat in silence, her white hands crossed on her black dress,
her head bent down. Presently she lifted it----
"I do not fully understand you, Lionel. You appear to imply
that--according to your belief--no one has touched the codicil. How,
then, can it have got out of the desk?"
"There is only one solution. It was suggested by Mr. Bitterworth; and,
though I refused credence to it when he spoke, it has since been gaining
upon my mind. He thinks my uncle must have repented of the codicil after
it was made, and himself destroyed it. I should give full belief to this
were it not that at the very last he spoke to me as the successor to
Verner's Pride."
"Why did he will it from you at all?" asked Lady Verner.
"I know not. I have told you how estranged his manner has been to me for
the last year or two; but wherefore, or what I had done to displease
him, I cannot think or imagine."
"He had no right to will away the estate from you," vehemently rejoined
Lady Verner. "Was it not enough that he usurped your father's
birth-right, as Jacob usurped Esau's, keeping you out of it for years
and years, but he must now deprive you of it for ever? Had you been
dead--had there been any urgent reason why you should not succeed--Jan
should have come in. Jan is the lawful heir, failing you. Mark me,
Lionel, it will bring no good to Frederick Massingbird. Rights,
violently diverted out of their course, can bring only wrong and
confusion."
"It would be scarcely fair were it to bring him ill," spoke Lionel, in
his strict justice. "Frederick has had nothing to do with my uncle's
bequeathing the estate to him."
"Nonsense, Lionel! you cannot make me believe that no cajolery has been
at work from some quarter or other," peevishly answered Lady Verner.
"Tell the facts to an impartial person--a stranger. They were always
about him--his wife and those Massingbirds--and at the last moment it is
discovered that he has left all to them, and disinherited you."
"Mother, you are mistaken. What my uncle has done, he has done of his
own will alone, unbiassed by others; nay, unknown to others. He
distinctly stated this to Matiss, when the change was made. No, although
I am a sufferer, and they benefit, I cannot throw a shade of the wrong
upon Mrs. Verner and the Massingbirds."
"I will tell you what I cannot do--and that is to accept your view of
the disappearance of the codicil," said Lady Verner. "It does not stand
to reason that your uncle would cause a codicil to be made, with all the
haste and parade you speak of, only to destroy it afterwards. Depend
upon it, you are wrong. He never took it."
"It does appear unlikely," acquiesced Lionel, after some moments of
deliberation. "It was not likely, either, that he would destroy it in
secret; he would have done it openly. And still less likely, that he
would have addressed me as his successor in dying, and given me charges
as to the management of the estate, had he left it away from me."
"No, no; no, no!" emphatically returned Lady Verner. "That codicil has
been _stolen_, Lionel."
"But, by whom?" he debated. "There's not a servant in the house would do
it; and there was no other inmate of it, save myself. This is my chief
difficulty. Were it not for the total absence of all other suspicion, I
should not for a moment entertain the thought that it could have been
my uncle. Let us leave the subject, mother. It seems to be an
unprofitable one, and my head is weary."
"Are you going to give the codicil tamely up for a bad job, without
further search?" asked Lady Verner. "That I should live--that I should
_live_ to see Sibylla West's children inherit Verner's Pride!" she
passionately added.
Sibylla West's children! Lionel had enough pain at his heart, just then,
without that shaft. A piercing shaft truly, and it dyed his brow fiery
red.
"We have searched already in every likely or possible place that we can
think of; to-morrow morning, places unlikely and impossible will be
searched," he said, in answer to his mother's question. "I shall be
aided by the police; our searching is nothing compared with what they
can do. They go about it artistically, perfected by practice."
"And--if the result should be a failure?"
"It will be a failure," spoke Lionel, in his firm conviction. "In which
case I bid adieu to Verner's Pride."
"And come home here; will you not, Lionel?"
"For the present. And now, mother, that I have told you the ill news,
and spoiled your rest, I must go back again."
Spoiled her rest! Ay, for many a day and night to come. Lionel
disinherited! Verner's Pride gone from them for ever! A cry went forth
from Lady Verner's heart. It had been the moment of hope which she had
looked forward to for years; and, now that it was come, what had it
brought?
"My own troubles make me selfish," said Lionel, turning back when he was
half out at the door. "I forgot to tell you that Jan and Decima inherit
five hundred pounds each."
"Five hundred pounds!" slightingly returned Lady Verner. "It is but of
at piece with the rest."
He did not add that he had five hundred also, failing the estate. It
would have seemed worse mockery still.
Looking out at the door, opposite to the ante-room, on the other side of
the hall, was Decima. She had heard his step, and came to beckon him in.
It was the dining-parlour, but a pretty room still; for Lady Verner
would have nothing about her inelegant or ugly, if she could help it.
Lucy Tempest, in her favourite school attitude, was half-kneeling,
half-sitting on the rug before the fire; but she rose when Lionel came
in.
Decima entwined her arm within his, and led him up to the fire-place.
"Did you bring mamma bad news?" she asked. "I thought I read it in your
countenance."
"Very bad, Decima. Or I should not have sent you away while I told it."
"I suppose there's nothing left for mamma, or for Jan?"
"Mamma did not expect anything left for her, Decima. Don't go away,
Lucy," he added, arresting Lucy Tempest, who, with good taste, was
leaving them alone. "Stay and hear how poor I am; all Deerham knows it
by this time."
Lucy remained. Decima, her beautiful features a shade paler than usual,
turned her serene eyes on Lionel. She little thought what was coming.
"Verner's Pride is left away from me, Decima."
"Left away from you! From _you_?"
"Frederick Massingbird inherits. I am passed over."
"Oh, Lionel!" The words were not uttered angrily, passionately, as Lady
Verner's had been; but in a low, quiet voice, wrung from her, seemingly,
by intense inward pain.
"And so there will be some additional trouble for you in the
housekeeping line," went on Lionel, speaking gaily, and ignoring all the
pain at _his_ heart. "Turned out of Verner's Pride, I must come to you
here--at least, for a time. What shall you say to that, Miss Lucy?"
Lucy was looking up at him gravely, not smiling in the least. "Is it
true that you have lost Verner's Pride?" she asked.
"Quite true."
"But I thought it was yours--after Mr. Verner."
"I thought so too, until to-day," replied Lionel. "It ought to have been
mine."
"What shall you do without it?"
"What, indeed!" he answered. "From being a landed country gentleman--as
people have imagined me--I go down to a poor fellow who must work for
his bread and cheese before he eats it. Your eyes are laughing, Miss
Lucy, but it is true."
"Bread and cheese costs nothing," said she.
"No? And the plate you put it on, and the knife you eat it with, and the
glass of beer to help it go down, and the coat you wear during the
repast, and the room it's served in?--they cost something, Miss Lucy."
Lucy laughed. "I think you will always have enough bread and cheese,"
said she. "You look as though you would."
Decima turned to them. She had stood buried in a reverie, until the
light tone of Lionel aroused her from it. "_Which_ is real, Lionel? This
joking, or that you have lost Verner's Pride?"
"Both," he answered. "I am disinherited from Verner's Pride; better
perhaps that I should joke over it, than cry."
"What will mamma do? What will mamma do?" breathed Decima. "She has so
counted upon it. And what will you do, Lionel?"
"Decima!" came forth at this moment from the opposite room, in the
imperative voice of Lady Verner.
Decima turned in obedience to it, her step less light than usual. Lucy
addressed Lionel.
"One day at the rectory there came a gipsy woman, wanting to tell our
fortunes; she accosted us in the garden. Mr. Cust sent her away, and she
was angry, and told him his star was not in the ascendant. I think it
must be the case at present with your star, Mr. Verner."
Lionel smiled. "Yes, indeed."
"It is not only one thing that you are losing; it is more. First, that
pretty girl whom you loved; then, Mr. Verner; and now, Verner's Pride. I
wish I knew how to comfort you."
Lucy Tempest spoke with the most open simplicity, exactly as a sister
might have done. But the one allusion grated on Lionel's heart.
"You are very kind, Lucy. Good-bye. Tell Decima I shall see her some
time to-morrow."
Lucy Tempest looked after him from the window as he paced the inclosed
courtyard. "I cannot think how people can be unjust!" was her thought.
"If Verner's Pride was rightly his, why have they taken it from him?"