Laid up in Lavender

"At that time?" I answered, looking him full in the face. "Upon a will, my lord."

He started and frowned, and abruptly resumed his walk up and down. But I saw that he had a better conscience than I had given him credit for possessing. My shot had not struck where I had looked to place it; and, finding this was so, I turned the thing over afresh, while I pursued my copying. When I had finished, I asked him-I think he was busy at the time cursing the absence of tact in the lower orders-if he would go through the instrument. And he took my seat.

Where I stood behind him, I was not far from the fireplace. While he muttered to himself the legal jargon in which he was as well versed as a lawyer bred in an office, I moved to it; and; neither missed nor suspected, stood looking from his bent figure to the blazoned shield, which formed part of the mantelpiece. If I wavered, my hesitation lasted but a few seconds. Then, raising my voice, I called sharply, "My lord, there used to be here-"

He turned swiftly, and saw where I was. "What the deuce are you doing there, sir?" he cried in astonishment, rising to his feet and coming towards me, the pen in his hand and his face aflame with anger. "You forget-"

"A safe-a concealed safe for papers," I continued, cutting him short in my turn. "I have seen the late Lord Wetherby place papers in it more than once. The spring worked from here. You touch this knob."

"Leave it alone, sir!" he cried furiously.

He spoke too late. The shield had swung outwards on a hinge, door-fashion; and where it had been, gaped a small open safe lined with cement. The rays of sunshine, that a few minutes before had picked out the gaudy quarterings, now fell on a large envelope which lay apart on a shelf. It was as clean as if it had been put there that morning. No doubt the safe was air-tight. I laid my hand upon it. "My lord!" I cried, turning to look at him with ill-concealed exultation, "here is a paper-I think, a will!"

A moment before the veins of his forehead had been swollen, his face had been dark with the rush of blood. But his anger died down at sight of the packet. He regained his self-control, and a moment saw him pale and calm, all show of resentment confined to a wicked gleam in his eye. "A will?" he repeated, with a certain kind of dignity, though the hand he stretched out to take the envelope shook. "Indeed, then it is my place to examine it. I am the heir-at-law, and I am within my rights, sir."

I feared that he was going to put the parcel into his pocket and dismiss me, and I was considering what course I should take, when instead he carried the envelope to the table by the window, and tore off the cover without ceremony. "It is not in your handwriting?" were his first words. And he looked at me with a distrust that was almost superstitious. No doubt my sudden entrance, my ominous talk, and my discovery seemed to him to savour of the devil.

"No," I replied unmoved. "I told your lordship that I had written a will at the late Lord Wetherby's dictation. I did not say-for how could I know? – that it was this one."

"Ah!" He hastily smoothed the sheets, and ran his eyes over their contents. When he reached the last page there was a dark scowl on his face, and he stood awhile staring at the signatures; not now reading, I think, but collecting his thoughts. "You know the provisions of this?" he presently burst forth, dashing the back of his hand against the paper. "I say, sir, you know the provisions of this?"

"I do not, my lord," I answered. Nor did I.

"The unjust provisions of this will?" he repeated, passing over my negative as if it had not been uttered.

"Fifty thousand pounds to a woman who had not a penny when she married his son! And the interest on another fifty thousand for her life! Why, it is a prodigious income, an abnormal income-for a woman! And out of whose pocket? Out of mine, every stiver of it! It is monstrous! I say it is! How am I to support the title on the income left to me, I should like to know?"

I marvelled. I remembered how rich he was. I could not refrain from suggesting that he had remaining all the real property. "And," I added, "I understood, my lord, that the testator's personalty was sworn under four hundred thousand pounds."

"You talk nonsense!" he snarled. "Look at the legacies! Five thousand here, and a thousand there, and hundreds like berries on a bush! It is a fortune, a decent fortune, clean frittered away! A barren title is all that will be left to me!"

What was he going to do? His face was gloomy, his hands were twitching. "Who are the witnesses, my lord?" I asked in a low voice.

So low-for under certain conditions a tone conveys much-that he shot a stealthy glance towards the door before he answered, "John Williams."

"Blind," I replied in the same low tone.

"William Williams."

"He is dead. He was Mr. Wigram's valet. I remember reading in the newspaper that he was with his master, and was killed by the Indians at the same time."

"True. I fancy that that was the case," he answered huskily. "And the handwriting is Lord Wetherby's."

I assented.

Then for fully a minute we were silent, while he bent over the will, and I stood behind him looking down at him with thoughts in my mind which he could no more fathom than the senseless wood upon which I leaned. Yet I mistook him. I thought him, to be plain, a scoundrel; and-so he was-but a mean one. "What is to be done?" he muttered at length, speaking rather to himself than to me.

I answered softly, "I am a poor man, my lord," while inwardly I was quoting "quem Deus vult perdere."

My words startled him. He answered hurriedly, "Just so! just so! So shall I be when this cursed paper takes effect. A very poor man! A hundred and fifty thousand gone at a blow! But there, she shall have it! She shall have every penny of it; only," he concluded slowly, "I do not see what difference one more day will make."

I followed his downcast eyes, which moved from the will before him to the agreement for the lease of the house; and I did see what difference a day would make. I saw and understood and wondered. He had not the courage to suppress the will; but if he could gain a slight advantage by withholding it for a few hours, he had the mind to do that. Mrs. Wigram, a rich woman, would no longer let the house; she would not need to do so; and my lord would lose a cheap residence as well as his hundred and fifty thousand pounds. To the latter loss he had resigned himself; but he could not bear to forego the petty gain for which he had schemed. "I think I understand, my lord," I replied.

"Of course," he resumed nervously, "you must be rewarded for making this discovery. I will see that it is so. You may depend upon me. I will mention the case to Mrs. Wigram, and-and, in fact, my friend, you may depend upon me."

"That will not do," I said firmly. "If that be all, I had better go to Mrs. Wigram at once, and claim my reward a day earlier."

He grew very red in the face at receiving this check. "You will not in that event get my good word," he said.

"Which has no weight with the lady," I answered.

"How dare you speak so to me?" his lordship cried. "You are an impertinent fellow! But there! How much do you want?"

"A hundred pounds."

"A hundred pounds for a mere day's delay? Which will do no one any harm?"

"Except Mrs. Wigram," I retorted drily. "Come, Lord Wetherby, this lease is worth a thousand a year to you. Mrs. Wigram, as you know, will not voluntarily let the house to you. If you would have Wetherby House you must pay me. That is the long and the short of it."

"You are an impertinent fellow!" he cried.

"So you have said before, my lord."

I expected him to burst into a furious passion, but I suppose there was a hint of power in my tone, beyond the defiance which the words expressed; for, instead of doing so, he eyed me with a thoughtful gaze, and paused to consider. "You are at Poole and Duggan's," he said slowly. "How was it that they did not search this cupboard, with which you were acquainted?"

I shrugged my shoulders. "I have not been in the house since Lord Wetherby died," I said. "My employers did not consult me when the papers he left were examined."

"You are not a member of the firm?"

"No, I am not," I answered. I was thinking that, if I knew those respectable gentlemen, no one of them would have helped my lord in this for ten times a hundred pounds.

He seemed satisfied, and taking out a note-case laid on the table a little pile of notes. "There is your money," he said, counting them over with reluctant fingers. "Be good enough to put the will and envelope back into the cupboard. To-morrow you will oblige me by rediscovering it-you can manage that, no doubt-and giving information at once to Messrs. Duggan and Poole, or to Mrs. Wigram, as you please. Now," he continued, when I had obeyed him, "will you be good enough to ask the servants to tell Mrs. Wigram that I am waiting?"

There was a slight noise behind us. "I am here," some one said. I am sure that we both jumped at the sound, for though I did not look that way, I knew that the voice was Mrs. Wigram's, and that she was in the room. "I have come to tell you, Lord Wetherby," she went on, "that I have an engagement at twelve. Do I understand that you are ready? If so, I will summon Mrs. Williams."

"The papers are ready for signature," the peer answered, betraying some confusion, "and I am ready to sign. I shall be glad to have the matter settled as agreed." Then he turned to me, where I had fallen back to the end of the room. "Be good enough to ring the bell if Mrs. Wigram permit it," he said.

As I moved to the fireplace to do so, I was conscious that the lady was regarding me with surprise. But when I had regained my position and looked towards her, she was standing near the window gazing steadily into the square, an expression of disdain rendered by face and figure. Shall I confess that it was a joy to me to see her head so high, and to read even in the outline of her form a contempt which I, and I only, knew to be so justly based? For myself, I leant against the edge of the screen by the door, and perhaps my hundred pounds lay heavily on my heart. As for him, he fidgeted with his papers, although they were all in order. He was visibly impatient to get his bit of knavery accomplished. Oh! he was a worthy man! And Welshman!

"Perhaps," he presently suggested, for the sake of saying something, "while your servant is coming, you will read the agreement, Mrs. Wigram. It is very short, and, as you know, your solicitors have seen it in the draft."

She bowed, and took the paper negligently. She read some way down the first sheet with a smile, half careless, half contemptuous. Then I saw her stop-she had turned her back to the window to obtain more light-and dwell on a particular sentence. I saw-God! I had forgotten the handwriting! I saw her eyes grow large, and fear leap into them, as she grasped the paper with her other hand, and stepped nearer to the peer's side. "Who?" she cried. "Who wrote this? Tell me! Do you hear? Tell me quickly! Who wrote this?"

He was nervous on his own account, wrapt in his own piece of scheming, and obtuse.

"I wrote it," he said, with maddening complacency. He put up his glasses and glanced at the top of the page she held out to him. "I wrote it myself, and I can assure you that it is quite right, and a faithful copy. You do not think-"

"Think! Think! no! no. This, I mean! Who wrote this?" she repeated, her voice hysterical with excitement. "This? This?"