"What have you got behind your back?" says Geoffrey, suddenly, going up to her.
She flushes, opens her lips as if to speak, and yet is dumb,—perhaps through excess of emotion.
"Mona, it is not—it cannot be—but is it?" asks he incoherently.
"The missing will? Yes—yes—yes!" cries she, raising the hand that is behind her, and holding it high above her head with the will held tightly in it.
It is a supreme moment. A deadly silence falls upon the room, and then Dorothy bursts into tears. In my heart I believe she feels as much relief at Mona's exculpation as at the discovery of the desired deed.
Mona, turning not to Nicholas or to Doatie or to Geoffrey but to Lady Rodney, throws the paper into her lap.
"The will—but are you sure—sure?" says Lady Rodney, feebly. She tries to rise, but sinks back again in her chair, feeling faint and overcome.
"Quite sure," says Mona, and then she laughs aloud—a sweet, joyous laugh,—and clasps her hands together with undisguised delight and satisfaction.
Geoffrey, who has tears in his eyes, takes her in his arms and kisses her once softly, before them all.
"My best beloved," he says, with passionate fondness, beneath his breath; but she hears him, and wonders vaguely but gladly at his tone, not understanding the rush of tenderness that almost overcomes him as he remembers how his mother—whom she has been striving with all her power to benefit—has been grossly maligning and misjudging her. Truly she is too good for those among whom her lot has been cast.