“Shall I send for Carter Woodman?” said Joan.
“No, my dear. No more Carter Woodman for me just now. I shall have to find a new lawyer. But never mind that now. You write what I tell you.”
Then, slowly and painfully, the old man dictated a new will. “I have to make it simple,” he said. The new will left Joan the whole of his fortune, with the request that she should pay to all persons mentioned in the previous will, and still living, the sums there left to them, except that no sum should be paid to Carter Woodman. A further clause appointed Joan and Henry Lucas joint executors, and a third, an after-thought, provided for the payment of a small annuity to Helen Woodman. “There is no need for her to suffer for what he has done,” said Sir Vernon.
Two of the servants were then called in to witness the will, and Joan, at Sir Vernon’s command, took it downstairs and had it placed at once in the office safe of the Brooklyn Corporation.
“I am easier now in my mind,” said the old man, as Joan returned from her errand. “You will have to carry on the Brooklyn tradition now, Joan,” he added. Joan took his hand, and sat by him, and, in a few minutes he fell asleep. Joan sat by his side for a while. Then she quietly disengaged her hand, and left him sleeping. He was tired out; but she believed the exertion had done him good.
In the lounge Joan found Ellery, in a high state of excitement. “News, darling,” he said. “I have news for you, and it shows that I was right.”
“I have some news for you, too, my boy. It’s a most extraordinary thing that has happened. I’m not so sure as I was that you were wrong.”
“I think my news makes it simply certain I was right.”
“Bob, Sir Vernon has made a new will, cutting out Carter.”
“My dear, you don’t mean to say he suspects?”