'As she stood there reading it, absorbed, with flushed cheeks, with a beating heart, Mrs. Morgan called her hastily. 'Come, child,' she said, 'we shall have to give the cabman another sixpence for waiting!' but Rhoda read on, and Mrs. Morgan came up, vexed and impatient, and tapped her on the shoulder.
'Don't,' said Rhoda, impatiently, reading still, and she moved away a step.
'Are you going to keep me all day, Rhoda?' said Mrs. Morgan, indignant and surprised.
'Aunt Morgan,' said Rhoda, looking up at last, 'something has happened.' Her eyes were glittering, her lips were set tight, her cheeks were burning bright. 'It is all mine, they say.'
'What do you mean?' said the old lady. 'Were the keys in the box, Betty?' Rhoda laid her hand upon her aunt's arm.
'George Vanborough has left me all his money!' she said in a low voice. For a moment her aunt looked at her in amazement.
'But you mustn't take it, my dear!' said Mrs Morgan, quite breathless.
'Poor George! it was his last wish,' said Rhoda, gazing fixedly before her.
Mr. Tapeall was a very stupid old man, weaving his red tape into ungracious loops and meshes, acting with due deliberation. If an address was to be found in the Red Book, he would send a clerk to certify it before despatching a letter by post. When Dolly some time before had sent him George's will, he put it carefully away in his strong box; now when she wrote him a note begging him to do at once what was necessary, he deliberated greatly, and determined to write letters to the whole family on the subject.
Mrs. Palmer replied by return of post. She was not a little indignant when the old lawyer had announced to her that he could not answer for the turn which circumstances might take, nor for the result of an appeal to the law. He was bound to observe that George's will was perfectly valid. It consisted of a simple gift, in formal language, of all his property, real and personal, to Rhoda. By the late 'Wills Act' of 1837, this gift would pass all the property as it stood at his death; or, as Mr. Tapeall clearly expressed it, 'would speak as from his death as to the property comprised therein.' Mr. Tapeall recommended that his clients should do nothing for the present. The onus of proof lay with the opposite side. Mr. Raban had promised to ascertain all particulars, as far as might be: on his return from the Crimea they would be in a better position to judge.