“You don’t suppose the old woman can have made a will giving Lally Bird her fortune?” whispered the Canterbury lawyer’s wife.
“No. I think she went off so suddenly at the last that she had no time to make a will. But if she did make one I stand as good a chance as any one of inheriting her money, even after all that has come and gone between her and us. She got her money from her husband, who was my uncle. The old woman had a stern sense of justice, and she would never have left her entire fortune away from her husband’s nephew, who had, as one may say, a claim upon it. No doubt she left her great-niece a legacy, but you’ll find that we come in for the best share of her money.”
Mr. Blight did not reflect that Mrs. Wroat’s “stern sense of justice” might cause her to leave her money away from him, instead of leaving it to him.
“No matter whether she leaves the girl fifty pounds a year or two hundred pounds a year,” said Mrs. Blight venomously, “she goes out of this house on the day after the funeral, bag and baggage, the artful jade! I won’t have her under my roof a night longer than I can help.”
“Quite right, Laura. We should have had the whole pile only for her.”
“I shall furnish the whole house new,” said Mrs. Blight reflectively. “Aunt Wroat had abominable taste, and the colors here quite ruin my complexion. Why don’t Peters or the housekeeper come? I shall discharge Peters—”
The last words were overheard by Peters herself, who came in in list slippers and a black gown, staid, angular, and sour-visaged as usual, with a warm heart nearly bursting with grief under her prim bodice. She courtesied to the self-invited guests, her lips tightly compressed, and an ominous gleam in her tear-blurred eyes.
“Ah, Peters at last!” said Mrs. Blight condescendingly. “We want to go up to our room, Peters, before we see the remains of our dear aunt. Why were we not sent for yesterday, Peters?”
“I suppose Mr. Harris forgot to telegraph to you,” said Peters grimly. “He spoke of doing so. Your room is ready, and I’ll send Buttons up to show you the way.”
“Toppen calls Miss Bird Miss Wroat—ha, ha!” laughed the Canterbury lawyer. “A queer idea, isn’t it, Peters? Does the girl call herself Miss Wroat?”