A Search For A Secret: A Novel. Vol. 3

by G. A. Henty

Mrs. Green interrupted her frequently with ejaculations of wonder and pity.

When Sophy had finished her story, she told her old nurse that she had come down for the express purpose of finding the will, by which she would become the heiress of Harmer Place; and that it was to this end that she had begged her to write, letting her know how Miss Harmer was, as—in the way in which she intended to attempt to find the will—it was useless for her to attempt anything as long as Miss Harmer was in good health.

"My dear," her old nurse said, shaking her head, "well or ill, it will make no difference. It is my belief, and always has been, that that woman has got a stone for a heart, and, well or ill, you might as well try to stop one of them engines which go running along the valley, as try and change what she has once resolved upon."

"I have no idea of changing her mind," Sophy said, quietly; "my opinion on that subject perfectly agrees with yours. I am going quite another way to work, and in this I require your help. I wish to get the place of servant to Miss Harmer's confessor."

This proposal so much roused Mrs. Green's indignation and amazement, that for a long time Sophy could not utter a word.

"What! Miss Sophy, who was the lawful mistress of the Hall, to go for a servant! and—most of all—as a servant to a Popish priest! What was she thinking of? A servant, indeed! She had thought, from the way Sophy had spoken of what she had been doing, that she had money; if not, it was of no consequence. She had two hundred pounds in the savings' bank, which she had laid by in the good times; and was it likely that, as long as that lasted, she would let her Miss Sophy go out as a servant? No, indeed!"

Sophy had to wait patiently till the storm was past, and she then explained to her nurse that it was not because she wanted money that she did this, for that she had an abundant supply; that she was very much obliged to her dear old Mammy Green for her offer, but it was not a question of money at all; and that it was absolutely necessary, for the recovery of the will, that she should enter the priest's service.

The nurse for a long time obstinately refused to do anything whatever to forward the design, and it was only by dint of coaxings and arguments innumerable, and, indeed, by the threat, if she would not assist her, that she must proceed—difficult as it would be—by herself, that she at last succeeded in persuading Mrs. Green into giving her assistance in the enterprise. At last, however, she gave in, and consented—although under protest that she disapproved of it all, and that she washed her hands of the whole affair—to do what Sophy desired of her.

Accordingly the next day Mrs. Green went down into the village, putting some eggs and a chicken into a basket, and under pretence of offering them for sale to the priest entered into conversation with his old servant. She mentioned to her that she had a friend down from London who had been in service there, but whose health was very bad, and who was ordered by the doctor to go down into the country and to take some very quiet situation there. Mrs. Green said that her friend had saved some money in service and would not mind paying handsomely for such a place as she wanted, as the doctor said her life depended upon it.

The old woman listened with great interest, and a day or two afterwards when Mrs. Green went down again with eggs, she told her that she should like very much to have a talk with her friend, for that she herself had been thinking of leaving service for some time, and of going to live with some relatives in a distant part of the country. Mrs. Green thereupon invited her to come up and take a cup of tea with her on the following evening—which invitation was accepted.