“Our thought does go to the family there,” said Madeline. “And it meets a sad enough picture.”
“Well, miss, if his thought did not go to them, there is no call on anyone else’s.”
“They may feel they have a moral claim to what he left.”
“Well, miss, the other sort of claim is the one that is followed, in my experience. And experience is not a a thing I am without,” said Mrs. Duff, as she withdrew.
“What power money has!” said Madeline, with a sigh. “You would hardly expect it to loom so large to Mrs. Duff.”
“Why not?” said Angus. “The results of having it or not are before her eyes.”
“She is such a useful and respected person. It seems that would be enough.”
“Usefulness benefits other people,” said Roberta. “And earning respect does much the same. It is when we serve ourselves that we tend to lose it. I hope Hermia will not want too much.”
“We know little as yet,” said Sir Robert. “Further light may come. It is a strange position. We hardly know if we are glad of it. We will control our thoughts. It is not the time to give rein to them.”
“I felt it was,” said Roberta. “I have given rein to mine. And I am being carried away by them. We must render to Hermia the things that are Hermia’s, and I am rendering them.”
“She has a right to what she inherits,” said Eliza. “What is the good of a will if it is not to be carried out? It might as well not be made.”
“She has a legal right,” said Sir Robert. “It could be said that there are others. We must wait to hear her view.”
“Which will be her own, and unaffected by yours or mine. We may as well not take one.”
“Well, I hardly feel sure of mine.”
“What a dubious mood we are in!” said Angus. “One of us inherits great riches and we take it like this. And we were brave over losing our ancestral home. We seem only to be attuned to misfortune.”
“We are in doubt about the moral issue,” said Madeline. “It deprives the matter of zest.”
“Well, the problem is Hermia’s,” said Eliza. “That is how she will see it. She has always been a person apart. And she is old enough to deal with it herself. Of course she is behind with family events. She does not know we are to leave the house. There has been no time for the news to reach her.”
“No, don’t connect two different things,” said Sir Robert. “They do not bear on each other. Each stands by itself.”
“It does,” said Angus. “But they have come so near together. And guilty though the thought is, they seem to fit each other. How much does Hermia inherit? Is it known?”
“Not exactly,” said his father. “But these things are never quite unknown. A fortune came to Grimstone, and has been accumulating. Hermia is not in an easy place.”
“What do you feel she should do?” said Eliza.
“I have said. I find it hard to be sure.”
“I don’t find anything hard. I am fully capable of certainty. Things should be left to women. They are so much more equal to them than men.”
“Well, this matter is left to a woman. And to one who may well be more equal to it than this man.”
Chapter X
“Well, here is the heroine,” said Eliza, “the heiress, or whatever she is. I don’t know what to call her. I hardly expected her to look the same. But I can’t see any change.”
“It is soon for that,” said Sir Robert. “But change is on the way. It is the event of a lifetime and must be going deep. We will see it as it is.”
“I have hardly done so yet,” said Hermia. “It was sudden, and I was unprepared. And I had given up hope of change. But this is not the old sameness with a surface difference. Change is the real word here.”
“I hope not too much the word,” said Madeline. “The matter should not go too deep. Money is an accidental thing.”
“Not in the case of a will,” said Roberta. “The rendering up of all we have. There is no element of accident there. I daresay there is almost everything else.”
“How did you hear the news?” said Eliza. “We heard it in a roundabout way. I suppose it came formally to you?”
“Yes, from Hamilton Grimstone’s lawyer. There was a letter and a copy of the will. I had not heard of his illness. It all seemed so distant from me, for so much to come of it. More and more, as I come to think. It makes a break across my life. I hardly know in which part I live and breathe.”
“I can tell you. In the second part. That is to be the one now. The other will sink into the past. This is a matter for the future and must take you forward. You will be another person with another life.”
“She will not to me,” said Sir Robert. “She has been what she is for too long. She will be the same person with another part to fill. It is true that she will be that. This is a turning-point, and should be seen as such. We will not shut our eyes to it.”
“We will not,” said Angus. “We will keep them riveted to it. They don’t often have such an object.”
“I am half-inclined to shut mine,” said Madeline. “Money is simply itself to me. I put it and leave it where it should be.”
“You do well,” said Roberta. “For we find that is where it is. In the pocket and purse of Hermia.”
“I wonder what Miss Murdoch thinks about it. I feel she might see it as I do. I suppose she was very surprised?”
“I am sure she sees it as you do,” said Eliza. “And of course she was surprised. No one could be anything else. But it will make no difference to her. There will be no change in her life.”
“Well, there will in a way,” said Hermia. “I am giving up the school. This has somehow led me to it. I don’t quite know how or why. I can’t give a reason.”
“I can,” said Eliza. “All this fills your horizon and leaves no room for anything else. It is natural. I should have expected it.”
“Now I hardly should,” said Madeline. “I feel rather sorry in a way. It seems that your feeling for the school was hardly what we thought.”
“It was not what I thought myself, and the thing itself not what I hoped. I needed something, and it was what was there. I will return the money to Father, and the matter can sink into the past. Miss Murdoch can transfer the partnership; and if there is a mild money loss, it hardly matters, as things are.”
“So the legacy is large,” said Eliza. “The loss would probably not be mild to us.”
“It is large. The figures took me aback. I hardly like to state them. I will give them to Father later.”
“How I shall like to hear them!” said Angus. “I am so seldom taken aback. Things are always what I expect. I have so much knowledge of life.”
“I have even more,” said Roberta. “I have tried to avoid it, and that gives us more than anything. It makes us suspicious, and suspicions are always justified.”
“I have my share of it,” said Madeline. “And of course money is a part of life. I grant it its own place.”
“We can trust it to take it. I think it seems to know it. It does not need any help.”
“Oh, come, it is not a live thing.”
“It is not,” said Sir Robert. “But it underlies live things. It is involved with them. We have to accept it.”
“What are you going to do with it, Hermia?” said Madeline. “I know the time has been short. But have you any plans?”
“You do give it its place,” said Eliza, “and are the first to do so. The future must have time to take its shape. It can’t form in a moment.”
“It is taking it,” said Hermia. “It seems to do it of itself. I hardly have to think of it.”
“There is the question of the Grimstones,” said Madeline. “What do you think about them? They must feel their position is a strange one.”