VI. A Broken Trust
“I am sure, Miss Bell, that there is much more in this than meets the eye. Mrs Wemysson’s conduct is so altogether unexpected and inexplicable that it can only be accounted for on the hypothesis of some peculiar development of events of which her daughter and myself are supremely ignorant.”
“Will you kindly recapitulate all the circumstances of the case to me, Mr Wigan?”
“Certainly. You see, Miss Alice Wemysson and I have known each other since we were children, and I can hardly remember the time when I did not dream of love in a cottage with Alice. Yes, it was really to be love in a cottage at first, for a more ambitious prospect did not disclose itself to us until lately. My father has too many claims upon his purse to be able to give his sons more towards a start in life than a good education. And, until he died, no one dreamed that Mr Wemysson possessed more than a modest competence.
“The attachment between Alice and myself was so patent to all our friends that our names have been coupled together for years. But no formal engagement existed between us, and though Mr Wemysson seemed to be rather fond of me than otherwise, he always insisted that his daughter was too young to know what was best for her, and that there was still plenty of time to decide her future.
“Things were in this position when Mr Wemysson died, and then it transpired that he was a comparatively rich man, having left ten thousand pounds to his wife, and ten thousand pounds to her in trust for Alice Wemysson, who was the daughter of the testator’s first wife. The young lady was then eighteen, and she was to be under the absolute guardianship of her stepmother until she was twenty-one. If she married contrary to the wishes of her guardian, she was to forfeit her inheritance.
“The last stipulation afforded nobody any uneasiness, for everyone knew Mrs Wemysson to be well disposed towards me, and could hardly understand why such a condition should have been made. As a matter of fact, Mrs Wemysson gave her cordial consent to the engagement soon after her husband’s death, but stipulated for the postponement of the marriage until the bride was of age.
“The first summer after this unfortunate event passed tranquilly enough. As winter approached my mother-in-law-elect developed a restless disposition, which culminated in a determination to travel and see the world.
“‘My means have always been too cramped to permit me to enjoy life properly,’ she remarked. ‘There is no reason, however, why I should make myself miserable now, and I mean to get all the pleasure I can this winter. Alice shall do the Continent with me; it will do her good to see something worth seeing, before she settled down to a humdrum married life.’
“To tell the truth, both Alice and I were rather shocked at this speech. It seemed to us to cast a reflection on the good man whom we had both loved and implied a certain feeling of elation at being relieved of the duties and ties of matrimony, which ill-befitted a woman who had always been treated with affection by her husband.
“But no serious objections to the proposed trip could be offered, and the day came when I bade farewell to my dear girl, never dreaming that aught could now intervene between us and our future happiness, or that the cloud which was to overshadow our destinies was already rising.
“I received my letters regularly. Alice was delighted with all she saw, and gave me wonderful descriptions of the places she and her mother visited. For many weeks all seemed to be going gaily with the travellers. Then a change came over the spirit of Alice’s letters. They were less spontaneously confidential, and a vague sense of impending trouble seemed to pervade them. But I could get no satisfaction until the travellers returned. It was in vain that I questioned. My questions were always parried evasively, and I am not at all sure that I was surprised when my darling broke down at sight of me, and welcomed me with tears instead of smiles.
“I had been waiting a long time at the station for them, my impatience leading me there a good while before the train was due. I was able to render Mrs Wemysson some little services, but could not help seeing that my attentions were unwelcome, and when I saw how harassed and ill Alice looked, I was filled with a vague foreboding of mischief to come.
“Nor was my foreboding unfounded. During the course of that same evening Mrs Wemysson informed me that I must consider my engagement with her daughter at an end, as she had other views for her.
“‘In fact,’ she said, ‘Alice is going to marry Mr Jackson, a gentleman whom we met abroad.’ Probably my anger got the better of my good manners, for I flatly contradicted the widow at this point. I pointed out that Mr Wemysson had always liked me; that she herself had consented to our engagement, and that I knew Alice to be true as steel from top to toe.
“‘Nevertheless, she will not marry you,’ I was coolly informed. ‘She knows that her father wished her to obey my judgment in the matter, and she is too good a daughter to act counter to his wishes. Besides, if she were to marry you, after I have forbidden her to do so, she would forfeit her fortune, and it is poor love that would reduce its object to poverty.’
“Now Alice certainly loved her father very much. But she is not exactly a girl to sacrifice herself without knowing the reason why. Her character is by no means as superficial and yielding as Mrs Wemysson imagines, and she vows that if she may not marry me, she will marry nobody, least of all this Mr Jackson, who is elderly, thin, bald, waspish-looking, and of altogether forbidding exterior. His face is also so indicative of craft one instinctively distrusts him.
“Now, as I have said before, Mrs Wemysson must have some powerful motive for wishing to substitute Mr Jackson for myself as her daughter’s husband, and I want you to unravel the mystery for me.”
I had listened to Mr Wigan’s story with some interest, and now proceeded to cross-question him.
“Who, or what, is this Mr Jackson?” I asked.
“He is a solicitor, with an office near Lincoln’s Inn Fields.”
“How long has Mrs Wemysson known him?”
“I should say that on and off she has known him ten years. He was the late Mr Wemysson’s solicitor, but was never on visiting terms with the family until recently.”
“Where did he meet the Wemysson’s lately?”
“At Monte Carlo. I believe the widow was alarmingly fond of the gaming tables there, and Alice suspects that she lost a lot of money.”
“Is Mr Jackson rich?”
“On the contrary, he barely subsists on a very poor business.”
“Then what was he doing at Monte Carlo?”
“He had to go over there on business for another client – to watch a scapegrace young spendthrift, I believe. While there he recognised Mrs Wemysson, and speedily became quite familiar. The widow at first professed to dislike him very much, but apparently got over her dislike, and entered no protest when he proclaimed himself madly in love with her ward.”
“Can you give me any clue to this man’s influence over the widow, Mr Wigan?”
“Not the slightest. I only know that the influence was very evident, and that although Mrs Wemysson’s temper became very trying towards Alice, she submitted very quietly to a somewhat impertinent reproof from Mr Jackson.”
“Concerning what did he reprove her?”
“He told her that she had lost quite enough at the tables, and that she had better not gamble any more.”
“What banker do the Wemysson’s patronise?”
“The National and Provincial Bank.”
“Thank you. I believe that is all I wish to ask you at present, Mr Wigan. I will look into the case, and let you know the results as soon as possible.”
When my client departed he did not look very hopeful of the results of my investigations, and although my plans were already laid, I was not at all sanguine as to their success.
But of two fundamental facts I felt certain. Mrs Wemysson had committed some indiscretion, in which the welfare of her step-daughter was involved. And Mr Jackson was not only cognisant of that indiscretion, but was determined to make capital out of it.
Now, whatever the indiscretion was, it had evidently had its origin at Monte Carlo. It was probably connected with Mrs Wemysson’s rashness at the gaming tables. But at this point the puzzle became more tangled. Even if she had been losing money heavily, this would not make marriage into her family desirable for an impoverished fortune-hunter, for that Mr Jackson had actually fallen in love with Alice Wemysson was, I concluded, hardly a likely supposition to entertain. I preferred to look upon his motives as entirely mercenary.
Suppose Miss Wemysson proved to be a greater matrimonial prize than she knew herself to be? This would explain the solicitor’s conduct in forcing his attentions upon an unwilling girl. But it made the widow’s behaviour all the more inexplicable.
With a view of satisfying myself as to Miss Wemysson’s financial position, I communicated with one of the employees of the bank in which her father had invested his money, and desired him to let me know how much of this money had been withdrawn. We make a point of having friends in all sorts of unlikely places, and their co-operation often simplifies our work wonderfully. In this case the information I got startled me considerably.
Of the twenty thousand pounds left by Mr Wemysson, there was barely five thousand left! Mrs Wemysson must have been completely carried away by the gambling demon, to risk her daughter’s little fortune as well as her own. Mr Jackson evidently knew of her breach of trust and was trading upon it. Now where did his profit come in?
I determined to know.
A few days later, having watched him leave his office, I interviewed the poor underpaid soul who served him as clerk. At first I could get little information from him. But, prompted by the promise of another situation, he showed me what a scoundrel his employer really was.
Mr Jackson knew that Mrs Wemysson had gambled her daughter’s money, and threatened to expose and ruin her if she did not insist upon Alice marrying him. He forebore to tell her that Mr Wemysson’s brother, of whom they had not heard for years, had died and left his niece a fortune of fifty thousand pounds. He, as the family solicitor, knew all about it, but was keeping the information back until he had secured the heiress for his wife.
My course was now plain. I paid a visit to Mrs Wemysson and proved to her that I knew more about her own and her daughter’s affairs than she did. She was very humble and repentant. She was also grateful when I undertook to smooth over the ruffled feelings of the injured lovers.
The latter are now happily married, and have sealed their forgiveness by augmenting Mrs Wemysson’s fortune to its original amount. They have, however, taken the precaution to place only the interest at her disposal. Every Christmas brings me some wonderful presents from Mr and Mrs Wigan, who will have it that I saved them from lifelong misery by exposing Mr Jackson’s schemes ere it was too late.
Mr Jackson himself has by this time discovered that shady ways don’t pay. He has been struck off the rolls, and Lincoln’s Inn Fields knows him no more.