“Well,” he said, “I suppose whatever we may think it wise to say, we have all begun to think of a possible conclusion. It can’t be put very delicately anyhow; but, after all, there’s a very necessary business side to it. What are we going to do about poor Vane’s affairs, apart from himself? I suppose you know,” he added, in a low voice to the lawyer, “whether he made a will?”
“He left everything to his daughter unconditionally,” replied Ashe. “But nothing can be done with it. There’s no proof whatever that he’s dead.” “No legal proof?” remarked Paynter dryly. A wrinkle of irritation had appeared in the big bald brow of Doctor Brown; and he made an impatient movement.
“Of course he’s dead,” he said. “What’s the sense of all this legal fuss? We were watching this side of the wood, weren’t we? A man couldn’t have flown off those high cliffs over the sea; he could only have fallen off. What else can he be but dead?”
“I speak as a lawyer,” returned Ashe, raising his eyebrows. “We can’t presume his death, or have an inquest or anything till we find the poor fellow’s body, or some remains that may reasonably be presumed to be his body.”
“I see,” observed Paynter quietly. “You speak as a lawyer; but I don’t think it’s very hard to guess what you think as a man.”
“I own I’d rather be a man than a lawyer,” said the doctor, rather roughly. “I’d no notion the law was such an ass. What’s the good of keeping the poor girl out of her property, and the estate all going to pieces? Well, I must be off, or my patients will be going to pieces too.”
And with a curt salutation he pursued his path down to the village.
“That man does his duty, if anybody does,” remarked Paynter. “We must pardon his—shall I say manners or manner?”
“Oh, I bear him no malice,” replied Ashe good-humoredly, “But I’m glad he’s gone, because—well, because I don’t want him to know how jolly right he is.” And he leaned back in his chair and stared up at the roof of green leaves.
“You are sure,” said Paynter, looking at the table, “that Squire Vane is dead?”