“Where is this leading to, Mr. Renard?” Sir Clinton asked patiently. “I don't see your difficulty as yet, I must confess.”
“There is no difficulty. It is merely that I wish to lay some further information before you. Now, I proceed. My aunt had been ill for a long time. A disease of the heart, it was: angina pectoris. She was bound to die in a spasm, at a moment's notice. One expected it, you understand? And less than three weeks ago, she had the spasm which we had so long anticipated, and she died.”
Sir Clinton's face expressed his sympathy, but he made no attempt to interrupt.
“As I told Inspector Flamborough when I saw him last,” Renard continued, “the figure of her fortune came as a surprise to me. I had no idea she was so rich. She lived very simply, very parsimoniously, even. I had always thought of her as hard-up, you understand? Figure to yourself my astonishment when I learned that she had accumulated over £12,000! That is a great sum. Many people would do almost anything to acquire £12,000.”
He paused for a moment as though in rapt contemplation of the figures.
“Her testament was very simple,” he proceeded. “My sister Yvonne was her favourite. My aunt had always put her in front of me. I make no complaint, you understand? Someone must be preferred. I had a little bequest under my aunt's testament; but Yvonne secured almost the whole of my aunt's fortune. That was how things stood a fortnight ago.”
He hitched himself in his chair as though preparing for a revelation.
“My sister and I were the trustees under my aunt's testament. The lawyer who had charge of the will communicated with me and forwarded a copy of the document. These legal documents are not easy to understand. But I soon saw that my sister had acquired the whole of my aunt's capital in stocks and shares—about a million and a half francs. I am not very good at legal affairs. It took me some time to understand what all this meant; but I thought it out. It is really quite simple, very easy. My sister had gained £12,000 under my aunt's will; but if she died without any change in the circumstances, then under the will which she signed after her marriage, my brother-in-law would inherit the whole of that money. Figure to yourself, he had never even seen my aunt, and all that £12,000 would pour into his lap. And I, who had been almost like a son to my aunt, I would get nothing! I make no complaint, of course.”
Sir Clinton's face betrayed nothing whatever of his views on the question. He merely waited in silence for Renard to continued his story.
“When I understood the position,” Renard resumed, “I sat down and wrote a letter to my sister. ‘Here is the state of affairs,’ I said. ‘Our good aunt is dead, and she has named you as her heiress. A whole million and a half francs! To me she has left some little things, enough at least to buy a suit of mourning. I have no complaints to make: our good aunt had the right to dispose of her money as she chose.’ That was how I began, you understand? Then I went on thus: ‘Things are for the best for the present,’ I said, ‘but one must think of the future as well. Recall the will which you made at the time of your marriage. All is to go to your husband, should anything happen to you. Now,’ I wrote, ‘that seems to me hardly as it should be. If you should die—a motor accident might happen any day—then all the money of our aunt would pass into the hands of your husband, this husband with whom you have so little in common and who had no relations with our good aunt. And I, who am your nearest in kin, would receive not one penny. Think of that,’ I wrote, ‘and consider whether it would be fair. Is the fortune of our family to pass into the hands of strangers and we ourselves to be left without a share in it?’ ”