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

by G. A. Henty

She was quiet for a while again, and lay with no expression beyond a thoughtful wonder in her eyes, gradually she closed them again, and I hoped that she was going to doze off. But presently they opened suddenly, and she said, in a voice so loud and sharp in comparison with that in which she had before spoken, that it quite startled me, "Where is the will?"

"It is quite safe, dearest; all is well; do not think more about it now, you shall hear all in good time."

Sophy lay quiet for a while, but I could see that she was not satisfied; and then she asked again, "where is it?"

"In Mr. Petersfield's hands, dear, so you need not feel uneasy about it. It will never be lost again."

A look of pleasure came across Sophy's face. "Thank God," she murmured, and then closed her eyes, and was soon asleep again.

From that time Sophy recovered rapidly; in ten days she was able to be removed from barracks, and in a month was strong enough to be taken up to London, to stay with me at Polly's, where her little boy was to meet her.

Upon the very day when life was coming back to Sophy, and she was snatched as it were from the grasp of death, Miss Harmer passed away.

How she died I never heard, but I have no doubt bravely and trustfully. She had, according to her light, fought for eighty years, a good fight, and had held the faith; and although the battle was in the end lost, and the purpose of her life frustrated, still I doubt not that she died, if angry and grieved, as I can well believe she was, at the failure of the schemes from which she had hoped so much, yet of good conscience and a fair hope that she would reap the reward of a life spent in the service of her beloved Church, and at length, after her long weary life's struggle, attain peace in the world to come.

Mr. Petersfield, at her death, wrote to her lawyers, inclosing a copy of the will, and took the necessary steps for proving it. Of course delays and difficulties arose, but as there was no one to oppose, it took less time to arrange matters than might have been anticipated, more especially with respect to the accumulations. But it appeared, that strangely enough—probably with the constant dread before her eyes, that the secret would be some day supernaturally disclosed to Polly, and the will discovered—Miss Harmer had never touched one penny of the rents or interest arising from the property left by her brother; but by her direction a separate account had been opened at the bank, to which these moneys had been regularly paid in, and in these seven years the property had accumulated to nearly a third more than the original account. In consequence our shares had increased from £25,000 each to over £32,000.

From the order and regularity with which everything had been kept, and the absence of any opposition whatever, in about two months from the time of Miss Harmer's death, Mr. Petersfield, who had exerted himself very much in the matter, told us that it now only required our signatures to obtain our respective shares of the property.