Can You Forgive Her? (83 page)

The funeral was very plain, and not a word was spoken by George Vavasor during the journey there and back. John Vavasor asked a few questions of the doctor as to the last weeks of his father’s life; and it was incidentally
mentioned, both by the doctor and by the attorney, that the old Squire’s intellect had remained unimpaired up to the last moment that he had been seen by either of them. When they returned to the hall Mrs Greenow met them with an invitation to lunch. They all went to the dining-room, and drank each a glass of sherry. George took two or three glasses. The doctor then withdrew, and drove
himself back to Penrith, where he lived.

‘Shall we go into the other room now?’ said the attorney.

The three gentlemen then rose up, and went across to the drawing-room, George leading the way. The attorney followed him, and John Vavasor closed the door behind them. Had any observer been there to watch them he might have seen by the faces of the two latter that they expected an unpleasant meeting.
Mr Gogram, as he had walked across the hall, had pulled a document out of his pocket, and held it in his hand as he took a chair. John Vavasor stood behind one of the chairs which had been placed at the table, and leaned upon it, looking across the room, up at the ceiling. George stood on the rug before the fire, with his hands in the pockets of his trousers, and his coat tails over his arms.

‘Gentlemen, will you sit down?’ said Mr Gogram.

John Vavasor immediately sat down.

‘I prefer to stand here,’ said George.

Mr Gogram then opened the document before him.

‘Before that paper is read,’ said George, ’I think it right to say a few words. I don’t know what it contains, but I believe it to have been executed by my grandfather only an hour or two before his death.’

‘On the day before
he died, – early in the day,’ said the attorney.

‘Well, – the day before he died; it is the same thing, – while he was dying, in fact. He never got out of bed afterwards.’

‘He was not in bed at the time, Mr Vavasor. Not that it would have mattered if he had been. And he came down to dinner on that day. I don’t understand, however, why you make these observations.’

‘If you’ll listen to me you
will understand. I make them because I deny my grandfather’s fitness to make a will in the last moments of his existence, and at such an age. I saw him a few weeks ago, and he was not fit to be trusted with the management of property then.’

‘I do not think this is the time, George, to put forward such objections,’said the uncle.

‘I think it is,’ said George. ‘I believe that that paper purports
to be an instrument by which I should be villanously defrauded if it were allowed to be held as good. Therefore I protest against it now, and shall question it at law if action be taken on it ‘You can read it now, if you please.’

‘Oh, yes, I shall read,’ said Mr Gogram; ‘and I say that it is as valid a will as ever a man signed.’

‘And I say it’s not. That’s the difference between us.’

The will
was read amidst sundry interjections and expressions of anger from George, which it is not necessary to repeat. Nor need I trouble my readers with the will at length. It began by expressing the testator’s great desire that his property might descend in his own family, and that the house might be held and inhabited by some one bearing the name of Vavasor. He then declared that he felt himself obliged
to pass over his natural heir, believing that the property would not be safe in his hands; he therefore left it in trust to his son John Vavasor, whom he appointed to be sole executor of his will. He devised it to George’s eldest son, – should George ever marry and have a son, – as soon as he might reach the age of twenty-five. In the meantime the property should remain in the hands of John
Vavasor for his use and benefit, with a lien on it of five hundred a year to be paid annually to his grand-daughter Kate. In the event of George having no son, the property was to go to the eldest son of Kate, or failing that to the eldest son of his other granddaughter who might take the name of Vavasor. All his personal property he left to his son, John
Vavasor. ‘And, Mr Vavasor,’said the attorney,
as he finished his reading, ‘you will, I fear, get very little by that latter clause. The estate now owes nothing; but I doubt whether the Squire had fifty pounds in his banker’s hands when he died, and the value of the property about the place is very small. He has been unwilling to spend anything during the last ten years, but has paid off every shilling that the property owed.’

‘It is as I
supposed,’ said George. His voice was very unpleasant, and so was the fire of his eyes and the ghastly rage of his scarred face. ‘The old man has endeavoured in his anger to rob me of everything because I would not obey him in his wickedness when I was here with him a short while before he died. Such a will as that can stand nowhere.’

‘As to that I have nothing to say at present,’ said the attorney.

‘Where is his other will, – the one he made before that?’

‘If I remember rightly we executed two before this.’

‘And where are they?’

‘It is not my business to know, Mr Vavasor. I believe that I saw him destroy one, but I have no absolute knowledge. As to the other, I can say nothing.’

‘And what do you mean to do?’ said George, turning to his uncle.

‘Do! I shall carry out the will. I have
no alternative. Your sister is the person chiefly interested under it She gets five hundred a year for her life; and if she marries and you don’t, or if she has a son and you don’t, her son will have the whole property.’

George stood for a few moments thinking. Might it not be possible that by means of Alice and Kate together, – by marrying the former, – perhaps, he might still obtain possession
of the property? But that which he wanted was the command of the property at once, – the power of raising money upon it instantly. The will had been so framed as to make that impossible in any way. Kate’s share in it had not been left to her unconditionally, but was to be received even by her through the hands of her uncle John. Such a will shut him out from all his hopes. ‘It is a piece of d—
roguery,’he said.

‘What do you mean by that, sir?’ said Gogram, turning round towards him.

‘I mean exactly what I say. It is a piece of d— roguery. Who was in the room when that thing was written?’

‘The signature was witnessed by –’

‘I don’t ask as to the signature. Who was in the room when the thing was written?’

‘I was here with your grandfather.’

‘And no one else?’

‘No one else. The
presence of any one else at such a time would be very unusual.’

‘Then I regard the document simply as waste paper.’ After saying this, George Vavasor left the room, and slammed the door after him.

‘I never was insulted in such a way before,’ said the attorney, almost with tears in his eyes.

‘He is a disappointed and I fear a ruined man,’ said John Vavasor. ‘I do not think you need regard what
he says.’

‘But he should not on that account insult me. I have only done my duty. I did not even advise his grandfather. It is mean on his part and unmanly. If he comes in my way again I shall tell him so.’

‘He probably will not put himself in your way again, Mr Gogram.’

Then the attorney went, having suggested to Mr Vavasor that he should instruct his attorney in London to take steps in reference
to the proving of the will. ‘It’s as good a will as ever was made,’ said Mr Gogram. ‘If he can set that aside, I’ll give up making wills altogether.’

Who was to tell Kate? That was John Vavasor’s first thought when he was left alone at the hall-door, after seeing the lawyer start away. And how was he to get himself back to London without further quarrelling with his nephew? And what was he to
do at once with reference to the immediate duties of proprietorship which were entailed upon him as executor? It was by no means improbable, as he thought, that George might assume to himself the position of master of the house; that he might demand the
keys, for instance, which no doubt were in Kate’s hands at present, and that he would take possession with violence. What should he do under such
circumstances? It was clear that he could not run away and get back to his club by the night mail train. He had duties there at the Hall, and these duties were of a nature to make him almost regret the position in which his father’s will had placed him. Eventually he would gain some considerable increase to his means, but the immediate effect would be terribly troublesome. As he looked up at the
melancholy pines which were slowly waving their heads in the wind before the door he declared to himself that he would sell his inheritance and his executorship very cheaply, if such a sale were possible.

In the dining-room he found his sister alone. ‘Well, John,’ said she; ‘well? How is it left?’

‘Where is Kate?’ he asked.

‘She has gone out with her brother.’

‘Did he take his hat?’

‘Oh,
yes. He asked her to walk, and she went with him at once.’

‘Then, I suppose, he will tell her,’ said John Vavasor. After that he explained the circumstances of the will to Mrs Greenow. ‘Bravo,’ exclaimed the widow. ‘I’m delighted. I love Kate dearly; and now she can marry almost whom she pleases.’

G
EORGE
when he left the room in which he had insulted the lawyer, went immediately across to the parlour in which his aunt and sister were sitting. ‘Kate,’ said he, ‘put on your hat and come and walk with me. That business is over.’ Kate’s hat and shawl were in the room, and they were out of the house together within a minute.

They walked down the carriage-road,
through the desolate, un-tenanted grounds, to the gate, before either of them spoke a word.
Kate was waiting for George to tell her of the will, but did not dare to ask any question. George intended to tell her of the will, but was not disposed to do so without some preparation. It was a thing not to be spoken of open-mouthed, as a piece of ordinary news. ‘Which way shall we go?’ said Kate, as
soon as they had passed through the old rickety gate, which swung at the entrance of the place. ‘Up across the fell,’ said George; ‘the day is fine, and I want to get away from my uncle for a time,’ She turned round, therefore, outside the hill of firs, and led the way back to the beacon wood through which she and Alice had walked across to Haweswater upon a memorable occasion. They had reached the
top of the beacon hill, and were out upon the Fell, before George had begun his story. Kate was half beside herself with curiosity, but still she was afraid to ask. ‘Well,’ said George, when they paused a moment as they stepped over a plank that crossed the boundary ditch of the wood: ‘don’t you want to know what that dear old man has done for you?’ Then he looked into her face very steadfastly.
‘But perhaps you know already,’ he added. He had come out determined not to quarrel with his sister. He had resolved, in that moment of thought which had been allowed to him, that his best hope for the present required that he should keep himself on good terms with her, at any rate till he had settled what line of conduct he would pursue. But he was, in truth, so sore with anger and disappointment,
– he had become so nearly mad with that continued, unappeased wrath in which he now indulged against all the world, that he could not refrain himself from bitter words. He was as one driven by the Furies, and was no longer able to control them in their driving of him.

‘I know nothing of it,’ said Kate. ‘Had I known I should have told you. Your question is unjust to me.’

‘I am beginning to doubt,’
said he, ‘whether a man can be safe in trusting any one. My grandfather has done his best to rob me of the property altogether,’

‘I told you that I feared he would do so,’

‘And he has made you his heir’

‘Me?’

‘Yes; you.’

‘He told me distinctly that he would not do that.’

‘But he has, I tell you.’

‘Then, George, I shall do that which I told him I should do in the event of his making such
a will; for he asked me the question. I told him I should restore the estate to you, and upon that he swore that he would not leave it to me.’

‘And what a fool you were,’ said he, stopping her in the pathway. ‘What an ass! Why did you tell him that? You knew that he would not, on that account, do justice to me.’

‘He asked me, George.’

‘Psha! now you have ruined me, and you might have saved
me.’

‘But I will save you still, if he has left the estate to me. I do not desire to take it from you. As God in heaven sees me, I have never ceased to endeavour to protect your interests here at Vavasor. I will sign anything necessary to make over my right in the property to you.’ Then they walked on over the Fell for some minutes without speaking. They were still on the same path, – that path
which Kate and Alice had taken in the winter, – and now poor Kate could not but think of all that she had said that day on George’s behalf; – how had she mingled truth and falsehood in her efforts to raise her brother’s character in her cousin’s eyes! It had all been done in vain. At this very moment of her own trouble Kate thought of John Grey, and repented of what she had done. Her hopes in that
direction were altogether blasted. She knew that her brother had ill-treated Alice, and that she must tell him so if Alice’s name were mentioned between them. She could no longer worship her brother, and hold herself at his command in all things. But, as regarded the property to which he was naturally the heir, if any act of hers could give it to him, that act ‘would be done. If the will is as
you say, George, I will make over my right to you.’

‘You can make over nothing,’ he answered. ‘The old robber has been too cunning for that; he has left it all in the hands of my uncle John. D— him. D— them both.’

‘George! George! he is dead now.’

‘Dead; of course he is dead. What of that? I wish he had been dead ten years ago, – or twenty. Do you suppose I am to forgive
him because he is dead?
I’ll heap his grave with curses, if that can be of avail to punish him.’