“Yes, and—”
“I will fight for that child!” Violet cried out impulsively. “I am sure his father’s cause is good. Where is the other claimant—the one you designate as Carlos?”
“Oh, there’s where the trouble is! Carlos is on the Mauretania, and she is due here in a couple of days. He comes from the East where he has been touring with his wife. Miss Strange, the lost will must be found before then, or the other will be opened and read and Carlos made master of this house, which would mean our quick departure and Clement’s certain death.”
“Move a sick man?—a relative as low as you say he is? Oh no, Mrs. Quintard; no one would do that, were the house a cabin and its owners paupers.”
“You do not know Carlos; you do not know his wife. We should not be given a week in which to pack. They have no children and they envy Clement who has. Our only hope lies in discovering the paper which gives us the right to remain here in face of all opposition. That or penury. Now you know my trouble.”
“And it is trouble; one from which I shall make every effort to relieve you. But first let me ask if you are not worrying unnecessarily about this missing document? If it was drawn up by Mr. Brooks’s lawyer—”
“But it was not,” that lady impetuously interrupted. “His lawyer is Carlos’s near relative, and has never been told of the change in my brother’s intentions. Clement (I am speaking now of my brother and not of my nephew) was a great money-getter, but when it came to standing up for his rights in domestic matters, he was more timid than a child. He was subject to his wife while she lived, and when she was gone, to her relatives, who are all of a dominating character. When he finally made up his mind to do us justice and eliminate Carlos, he went out of town—I wish I could remember where—and had this will drawn up by a stranger, whose name I cannot recall.”
Her shaking tones, her nervous manner betrayed a weakness equalling, if not surpassing, that of the brother who dared in secret what he had not strength to acknowledge openly, and it was with some hesitation Violet prepared to ask those definite questions which would elucidate the cause and manner of a loss seemingly so important. She dreaded to hear some commonplace tale of inexcusable carelessness. Something subtler than this—the presence of some unsuspected agency opposed to young Clement’s interest; some partisan of Carlos; some secret undermining force in a house full of servants and dependants, seemed necessary for the development of so ordinary a situation into a drama justifying the exercise of her special powers.
“I think I understand now your exact position in the house, as well as the value of the paper which you say you have lost. The next thing for me to hear is how you came to have charge of this paper, and under what circumstances you were led to mislay it. Do you not feel quite ready to tell me?”
“Is—is that necessary?” Mrs. Quintard faltered.
“Very,” replied Violet, watching her curiously.
“I didn’t expect—that is, I hoped you would be able to point out, by some power we cannot of course explain, just the spot where the paper lies, without having to tell all that. Some people can, you know.”
“Ah, I understand. You regarded me as unfit for practical work, and so credited me with occult powers. But that is where you made a mistake, Mrs. Quintard; I’m nothing if not practical. And let me add, that I’m as secret as the grave concerning what my clients tell me. If I am to be of any help to you, I must be made acquainted with every fact involved in the loss of this valuable paper. Relate the whole circumstance or dismiss me from the case. You can have done nothing more foolish or wrong than many—”
“Oh, don’t say things like that!” broke in the poor woman in a tone of great indignation. “I have done nothing anyone could call either foolish or wicked. I am simply very unfortunate, and being sensitive—But this isn’t telling the story. I’ll try to make it all clear; but if I do not, and show any confusion, stop me and help me out with questions. I—I—oh, where shall I begin?”
“With your first knowledge of this second will.”
“Thank you, thank you; now I can go on. One night, shortly after my brother had been given up by the physicians, I was called to his bedside for a confidential talk. As he had received that day a very large amount of money from the bank, I thought he was going to hand it over to me for Clement, but it was for something much more serious than this he had summoned me. When he was quite sure that we were alone and nobody anywhere within hearing, he told me that he had changed his mind as to the disposal of his property and that it was to Clement and his children, and not to Carlos, he was going to leave this house and the bulk of his money. That he had had a new will drawn up which he showed me—”
“Showed you?”
“Yes; he made me bring it to him from the safe where he kept it; and, feeble as he was, he was so interested in pointing out certain portions of it that he lifted himself in bed and was so strong and animated that I thought he was getting better. But it was a false strength due to the excitement of the moment, as I saw next day when he suddenly died.”
“You were saying that you brought the will to him from his safe. Where was the safe?”
“In the wall over his head. He gave me the key to open it. This key he took from under his pillow. I had no trouble in fitting it or in turning the lock.”
“And what happened after you looked at the will?”
“I put it back. He told me to. But the key I kept. He said I was not to part with it again till the time came for me to produce the will.”
“And when was that to be?”
“Immediately after the funeral, if it so happened that Carlos had arrived in time to attend it. But if for any reason he failed to be here, I was to let it lie till within three days of his return, when I was to take it out in the presence of a Mr. Delahunt who was to have full charge of it from that time. Oh, I remember all that well enough! and I meant most earnestly to carry out his wishes, but—”
“Go on, Mrs. Quintard, pray go on. What happened? Why couldn’t you do what he asked?”
“Because the will was gone when I went to take it out. There was nothing to show Mr. Delahunt but the empty shelf.”
“Oh, a theft! just a common theft! Someone overheard the talk you had with your brother. But how about the key? You had that?”
“Yes, I had that.”
“Then it was taken from you and returned? You must have been careless as to where you kept it—”
“No, I wore it on a chain about my neck. Though I had no reason to mistrust any one in the house, I felt that I could not guard this key too carefully. I even kept it on at night. In fact it never left me. It was still on my person when I went into the room with Mr. Delahunt. But the safe had been opened for all that.”
“There were two keys to it, then?”
“No; in giving me the key, my brother had strictly warned me not to lose it, as it had no duplicate.”
“Mrs. Quintard, have you a special confidant or maid?”
“Yes, my Hetty.”
“How much did she know about this key?”
“Nothing, but that it didn’t help the fit of my dress. Hetty has cared for me for years. There’s no more devoted woman in all New York, nor one who can be more relied upon to tell the truth. She is so honest with her tongue that I am bound to believe her even when she says—”
“What?”
“That it was I and nobody else who took the will out of the safe last night. That she saw me come from my brother’s room with a folded paper in my hand, pass with it into the library, and come out again without it. If this is so, then that will is somewhere in that great room. But we’ve looked in every conceivable place except the shelves, where it is useless to search. It would take days to go through them all, and meanwhile Carlos—”
“We will not wait for Carlos. We will begin work at once. But just one other question. How came Hetty to see you in your walk through the rooms? Did she follow you?”