She grew serious, and said in a low, cheerful tone: "I think he's going on pretty well."

Edwin was startled.

"D'you mean he's getting better?"

"Slowly. He's taking food more easily. He was undoubtedly better this morning. I haven't seen him since, of course."

"But the matron seemed to think----" He stopped, for the dimples began to reappear.

"Matron always fears the worst, you know," said Nurse Faulkner, not without irony.

"Does she?"

The matron had never held out hope to Edwin; and he had unquestioningly accepted her opinion. It had not occurred to him that the matron of a hospital could be led astray by her instinctive unconscious appet.i.te for gloom and disaster.

The nurse nodded.

"Then you think he'll pull through?"

"I'm pretty sure he will. But of course I've not seen the doctor--I mean since the first night."

"I'm awfully glad."

"His brother came over from Darlington to see him yesterday evening, you know."

"Yes. I just missed him."

The nurse gave a little bow as she moved up the road.

"Just going to the pillar-box," she explained. "Dreadful weather we're having!"

He left her, feeling that he had made a new acquaintance.

"She's in love with a parson, I bet," he said to himself. And he had to admit that she had charm--when off duty.

The news about Ingpen filled him with bright joy. Everything was going well. Hilda would soon be home; George's eyes were not seriously wrong; the awful funeral was over; and his friend was out of danger--marvellously restored to him. Then he thought of the will. He glanced about to see whether anybody of importance was observing him.

There was n.o.body. The coaches were a hundred yards in front. He drew out the envelope containing the will, managed to extract the will from the envelope, and opened the doc.u.ment,--not very easily because he was holding his umbrella.

A small printed slip fluttered to the muddy pavement. He picked it up; it was a printed form of attestation clause, seemingly cut from Whitaker's Almanac:--"Signed by the testator (or testatrix as the case may be) in the presence of us, both present at the same time," etc.

"She's got that right, anyhow," he murmured.

Then, walking along, he read the will of Auntie Hamps. It was quickly spotted with raindrops.

At the house the blinds were drawn up, and the women sedately cheerful.

Maggie was actually teasing Bert about his new hat, and young Clara, active among the preparations for tea for six, was intensely and seriously proud at being included in the ceremonial party of adults.

She did not suspect that the adults themselves had a novel sensation of being genuinely adult, and that the last representative of the older generation was gone, and that this common sensation drew them together rather wistfully.

"Oh! By the way, there's a telegram for you," said Maggie, as Minnie left the dining-room after serving the last trayful of hot dishes and pots.

Edwin took the telegram. It was from Hilda, to say that she and George would return on the morrow.

"But what about the house being cleaned, and what about servants?" cried Edwin, affecting, in order to conceal his pleasure, an annoyance which he did not in the least feel.

"Oh! Mrs. Tams has been looking after the house--I shall go round and see her after tea. I've got one servant for Hilda."

"You never told me anything about it," said Edwin, who was struck, by no means for the first time, by the concealment which all the women practised.

"Didn't I?" Maggie innocently murmured. "And then Minnie can go and help if necessary until you're all settled again. Hadn't we better have the gas lighted before we begin?"

And in the warm cosiness of the small, ugly, dining-room shortly to be profaned by auctioneers and furniture-removers, amid the odours of tea and hot tea-cakes, and surrounded by the family faces intimate, beloved, and disdained, Edwin had an exciting vision of the new life with Hilda, and the vision was shot through with sharp flitting thoughts of the once gorgeous Auntie Hamps forlorn in the cemetery and already pa.s.sing into oblivion.

After tea, immediately the children had been sent home, he said, self-consciously to Albert:

"I've got something for you."

And offered the will. Maggie and Clara were upstairs.

"What is it?"

"It's Auntie's will. Breeze had it. He gave it to me in the cemetery.

It seems he only knew this morning Auntie was dead. I think that was why he came up."

"Well, I'm----!" Albert muttered.

His hand trembled as he opened the paper.

Auntie Hamps had made Edwin sole executor, and had left all her property in trust for Clara's children. Evidently she had reasoned that Edwin and Maggie had all they needed, and that the children of such a father as Albert could only be effectually helped in one way, which way she had chosen. The will was seven years old, and the astounding thing was that she had drawn it herself, having probably copied some of the wording from some source unknown. It was a wise if a rather ruthless will; and its provisions, like the manner of making it, were absolutely characteristic of the testatrix. Too mean to employ a lawyer, she had yet had a magnificent gesture of generosity towards that Benbow brood which she adored in her grandiose way. And further she had been clever enough not to invalidate the will by some negligent informality. It was as tight as if Julian Pidduck himself had drawn it.

And she had managed to put Albert in a position highly exasperating.

For he was both very pleased and very vexed. In slighting him, she had aggrandized his children.

"What of it?" he asked nervously.

"It's all right so far as I'm concerned," said Edwin, with a short laugh. And he was sincere, for he had no desire whatever to take a share of his aunt's modest wealth. He shrank from the trusteeship, but he knew that he could not avoid it, and he was getting accustomed to power and dominion. Albert would have to knuckle down to him, and Clara too.

Maggie and Clara came back together into the room, noticeably sisterly.

They perceived at once from the men's faces that they were in the presence of a historic event.

"I say, Clary," Albert began; his voice quavered.

CHAPTER XX

THE DISCOVERY