“I don’t think you ought to do that,” said Jenney. “It would not be what Miss Donne wished. It would be no good to make a will, if people did not abide by it. And people never do give up anything, do they?”
“The will has caused surprise,” said Benjamin to his children. “We must recognise that. Your Aunt Jessica knew that her sister had made it, but believed she had destroyed it and kept an old one in her own favour. It seems that she had done such things before, as a means of relieving her feelings. Her last chapter was indeed a hard and sad one.”
“And did she destroy the old will in this case?” said Esmond.
“It appears that she must have done so. She had been burning papers, when Anna saw her, and there was no sign of it in her desk. We can only conclude that she did.”
“It might have saved trouble to keep a few odd wills by her for regular use,” said Bernard.
“Perhaps she burnt the wrong one by mistake.” said Claribel.
“That is what I was going to say,” said Anna. “But she was too much mistress of herself for that. I only know that she had been burning something; and whatever it was, it was a weight off her mind. And I was glad she had got to the stage of relief, as she had clearly been in a different one. Poor Aunt Sukey, she ought not to have had that kind of end.”
“Neither ought the family who had housed her,” said Esmond.
“There was a smell of burning in this house, when I came back for some books,” said Reuben.
“It could hardly have carried from Aunt Sukey’s room,” said Esmond.
“There was a live coal on this rug,” said Anna. “It spurted out of the fire. It was a good thing I was here to stop it from smouldering. I had just come back from Aunt Sukey, and could have dispensed with being startled at that moment.”
“But you didn’t know that she was dead,” said Reuben.
“No, but I knew she was ill and exhausted. It gave me a sort of nervous feeling to be with her. It seems that I ought to have guessed more than I did. But I went back with Father, full of faith and hope in the result of my soothing and reading and all of it. It makes me feel foolish now. It did, when I met the family and heard the truth.”
“The shock makes you exaggerate things,” said Jenney. “Dear me, what a day it has been! Well, it is not all bad news; that is one thing.”
“Isn’t it?” said Anna, looking at her with her brows drawn. “Oh, you mean the bequest or whatever it is. Well I must say I think the bad news preponderates.”
“You are right that it is a bequest,” said Esmond. “You will have to meet Aunt Jessica and all of them, in the character of usurper of their dues.”
“You seem to take a questionable pleasure in the awkward side of my situation.”
“Well, a pure pleasure could only come from being in it himself,” said Bernard.
“I wonder what Terence will think,” said Reuben. “I don’t think that he will mind as much as the others.”
“And surely Aunt Jessica will not mind,” said Anna. “If she does, her attitude to things is a strange pose enough.”
“Terence never feels like anyone else. I think he will just be amused because people mind.”
“Why should there be all this minding?” said Anna, looking perplexed. “They are not so fond of money, are they? I should not have supposed that they would give a thought to that aspect of Aunt Sukey’s death.”
“Then what actuated our uncle in the course he took, on learning of it?” said Esmond.
“Oh, I expect he had to find out about the business side of things. He would feel he must do the part of a man at such a time. You know what you would feel, yourself.”
“We do, now you tell us,” said Bernard. “And I am better adapted to the part than I thought. But I don’t think it often needs to be done.”
“Anna has done a woman’s part,” said Claribel. “And now she has the human part of accepting the reward.”
“I wish you would all stop talking about me, as if I were some kind of criminal,” said Anna. “Why am I a worse person than any of you? And why is Uncle Thomas a culprit, because he does something that has to be done, without making any bones about it? It had to be done at some time, and it may have been the best opportunity.”
“It was,” said Esmond; “it was the first.”
“You have not come out so well under the test,” said his sister, looking at him. “You have shown yourself as jealous and grudging as could well be. You would rather that I had nothing, than something you did not share. And I did not want it to happen as it has. I should have preferred some remembrance of Aunt Sukey, chosen for me by herself. But 1 was not asked what I would have. No thought was given to my personal feelings. I don’t even know what the inheritance is; I suppose investments or something. Even Reuben could only suggest that I should give it up. I believe no sister ever had such curmudgeonly brothers. Bernard is the best of you.”
“Oh, I am,” said the latter. “Much the best.”
“You may make too much of it, my daughter,” said Benjamin. “I looked to hear your brothers congratulate you, but I understood that they had done it in their own way.”
“I do it now in the ordinary way,” said Bernard.
“If I had been left ten times as much, it would not have been my fault,” said Anna. “I have had no more to do with the will than the rest of you. And I suppose that is not much.”
“If you had, I wonder if it would have killed Esmond,” said Bernard.
“I thought all ordinary congratulations went without saying,” said Claribel.
“You must see that you were mistaken,” said Benjamin.
“What is the good of belonging to a family, if every formal convention has to be observed?”
“Perhaps Anna has not found it much good.”
“We ought to begin to rejoice,” said Jenney, in an uncertain manner. “It is right to appreciate what comes to us, even if it does come from people’s trouble. Money never comes, except from a death, does it?”
“Perhaps that accounts for the sinister touch about it,” said Bernard. “It is really death that is the root of all evil. I have always thought it was.”
“If there wasn’t any death, we shouldn’t ever inherit anything,” said Reuben.
“That is what Jenney said,” said Bernard. “We see why people are reluctant to make their wills. It is odd that we should be surprised by it. It does not bring death any nearer, but it shows it as a possibility, and that is enough. And of course we talk about generous benefactors by will. Ungenerous people would never imagine their goods going to someone else. It explains why so many people die intestate. Bequeathing is a great test.”
“One that Aunt Sukey will hardly be thought to have passed.” said Esmond.
“Which would you rather, Anna?” said Reuben. “Have the money, or have Aunt Sukey alive again?”
“The second, of course, if she could be well enough to find her life worth while.”
“We should keep two things apart,” said Benjamin. “Anna is glad of what has come to her, and grieved for the loss that occasions it.”
“Would you rather that the money had come to you, or come to Anna, Father?”
“The first,” said Benjamin, in an almost stern tone, that he softened in his pleasure that his son should address him. “It seems that I should have more use for it, and that it would be better in my hands. But I am glad it has come to any one of us, and glad of the reason.”
“Poor Father!” said Anna. “You had done more to earn it than I had.”
“I think we should say that itwas not earned, but given.”
“Well, I like it better as a gift.”