Notwithstanding the flagrancy of this attempt, Lady Mellasin flattered herself with the hopes of it's success; and, on Mr. Goodman's death, threw in a caveat against the real will, and set up this pretended one.
On the other hand, though one would imagine there needed but little skill for the detection of so gross an imposition, yet Mr. Goodman's lawyer thought proper to get all the help he could to corroborate the truth. This piece of forgery was dated about ten days before Mr. Goodman died; he knew that the elder Mr. Thoughtless came every day to visit him during the whole time of his sickness; and that Miss Betsy, at the time this will was supposed to be made, actually lived in the house, and that neither of these two could be totally ignorant of such a transaction, in case any such had been.
It was therefore at the lawyer's request, that Miss Betsy was sent for to her brother's house; she answered, with a great deal of readiness, to all the questions he put to her, according to the best of her knowledge; particularly as to that concerning the making the will: she said, that she had never heard the least mention of any lawyer but himself coming to Mr. Goodman's during the whole time of his sickness; and that she verily believed no will but that drawn up by him, and which all the family knew of, could possibly be made by Mr. Goodman's orders, or in his house; and as to the article in the pretended will, relating to Miss Flora, nothing could be a more palpable forgery, because Mr. Goodman had offered five hundred pounds with her in marriage to a linen-draper, not above six weeks before his parting with Lady Mellasin; 'Which,' added she, 'is a very plain proof that he never intended her for his nephew.'
All the time Miss Betsy staid, the whole discourse was on this affair; and she had no opportunity, as the lawyer was present, to acquaint her brothers with any thing concerning Sir Frederick Fineer, as otherwise it was her full intention to have done, after the surprizing injunction he had laid upon her of secrecy, in regard of his passion, and every thing relating to him.
CHAPTER XI
Is very well deserving the attention of all those who are about to marry
While Miss Flora was buoyed up with the expectation that her mother would soon be reconciled with Mr. Goodman, she abated not of her former gaiety, and thought of nothing but indulging her amorous inclinations with the man she liked: but when once those expectations ceased, her spirits began to fail; she now found it necessary, for her interest as well as pleasure, to preserve, if possible, the affection of her lover; she knew not what dreadful consequences the prosecution Mr. Goodman was about to exhibit against her mother, might be attended with, and trembled to think she must share with her the double load of infamy and penury; and rightly judged, that a man of Mr. Trueworth's fortune, honour, and good-nature, would not suffer a woman, with whom he continued a tender communication, to be oppressed with any ills his purse could relieve her from. The apprehensions, therefore, that she might one day be reduced to stand in need of his support, assisted the real passion she had for him, and made her feel, on the first appearance of his growing coldness towards her, all those horrors, those distractions, which her letters to him had so lively represented.
On his ceasing to make any fixed appointment with her, and from seeing her every day, to seeing her once in three or four days, gave her, with reason, the most terrible alarms; but when, after an absence of near a week, she had followed him to the coffee-house, the cool and indifferent reception she there met with, gave, indeed, a mortal stab to all her hopes; and she longer hesitated to pronounce her own doom, and cry out, she was undone.