I wasn’t proof against her pretty, dictatorial ways, and I agreed to take the steps she desired.
She went on to tell me how she was placed:
Not only in possession of a considerable fortune of her own, Amos Gately’s will left her a goodly additional sum, and also the house in which they had lived.
“So you see,” Olive said, “I shall continue to live here,—for the present. I have Mrs. Vail now with me,—as a duenna, for propriety’s sake. She is a dear old lady, and is of a pliable, manageable sort. I chose her for that reason, largely. Also, she is pleasant and cheerful, and I like to have her about. I was fond of Uncle Amos, Mr. Brice, but we had many dissensions. If he had allowed me a little more freedom, I could have got along with him beautifully,—but he treated me as a child. You see, he took me to live with him when I was a child, and he never realized that I had grown up and had an individuality and a will of my own. I am twenty-two years old, and he acted as if I were twelve!”
“And now, absolutely your own mistress?”
“Yes; doesn’t it seem strange? And it is all so strange! This house, without him, is like a different house. And the dreadfulness of his death! Sometimes I think I can’t stay here,—I must get into other surroundings. But the thought of moving out of here is too much for me, at present, anyway. Oh, I don’t know what to do! I can’t realize that he is gone!”
Olive did not cry. She sat, dry-eyed and tearless, looking so pathetically lonely and so unable to cope with her new responsibilities, that I gladly promised her all possible assistance that I could give, both in legal matters and in any personal or friendly ways.
“Don’t think me helpless,” she said, reading my thoughts; “I shall rise to the situation, I shall adapt myself to my changed circumstances, but it will take a little time, of course.”
“Yes, indeed,” I agreed, “and don’t attempt to do too much at first. Take plenty of time to rest and to let yourself react from the shock and the awful scenes you have been through.”
It was clear to me that the girl had no thought that she was suspected, or that the police were watching her. I wondered whether it would be kinder to give her a hint of this or to leave her in ignorance, when just then a servant entered, saying Mr. Hudson wished an interview with Miss Raynor.