The first was the certificate of marriage, between Richard Pencarrow Trevelyan, Captain in the Cornish Light Infantry, and Constance Devereaux of Montreal, duly by banns, at the chapel of Père Latour. Then followed the date, and attestation, to the effect, "that the above named parties were this day married by me, as hereby certified, at Ste. Marie de Montreal.
"C. LATOUR, Catholic Curé,
"BAPTISTE OLIVIER, Acolyte.
"DERRICK BRADDON, Private
Cornish Light Infantry.
"JEHAN DURASSIER, Sacristan."
About this document there could not be a shadow of a doubt—even the water-mark was anterior to the date, and the brow of Downie grew very dark as he read it; darker still grew that expression of malevolent wrath, and more swollen were the veins of his temples as he turned to the next document, which purported to be the "Last Will and Testament of Richard Pencarrow, Lord Lamorna," and which after the usual dry formula concerning his just debts, testamentary and funeral expenses, continued, "I give, devise, and bequeath unto Constance Devereaux, Lady Lamorna, my wife," the entire property, (then followed a careful enumeration thereof,) into which he had come by the death of his uncle Audley, Lord Lamorna, for the term of her natural life; and after her death to their children Denzil and Sybil absolutely, in the several portions to follow. The reader Downie (to whom a handsome bequest was made), General Trecarrel, and the Rector of Porthellick were named as Executors, and then followed the duly witnessed signature of the Testator, written in a bold hand LAMORNA, and dated at Montreal, about nine months before.
"Hah!" exclaimed Downie, through his clenched teeth; "here is that in my hand, which, were Audley a wicked or undutiful son, might effect wonders at Rhoscadzhel, and furnish all England with food for gossip and surmise; but that shall never, never be; nor shall son nor daughter of that Canadian adventuress ever place their heads under this roof tree of ours!"
And as he spoke, he fiercely crumpled up the will and the certificate together.
Then he paused, spread them out upon his writing table, and smoothing them over, read them carefully over again. As he did so, the handsome face, the honest smile and manly figure of his brother Richard came upbraidingly to memory; there were thoughts of other and long-remembered days of happy boyhood, of their fishing, their bird-nesting expeditions, and of an old garret in which they were wont to play when the days were wet, or the snow lay deep on the hills. How was it, that, till now forgotten, the old garret roof, with its rafters big and brown, and which seemed then such a fine old place for sport, with the very sound of its echoes, and of the rain without as it came pouring down to gorge the stone gutters of the old house, came back to memory now, with Richard's face and voice, out of the mists of nearly half a century? "It was one of those flashes of the soul that for a moment unshroud to us the dark depths of the past." Thus he really wavered in purpose, and actually thought of concealing the documents in his strong box, to the end that there they might be found after his death, and after he had enjoyed the title for what remained to him of life.
Would not such duplicity be unfair to his own sons, and to his daughter? was the next reflection.
And if fate permitted Denzil to escape the perils of the Afghan war, was the son of that mysterious little woman, or was her daughter—the daughter of one whom he doubted not, and wished not to doubt—had entrapped his silly brother into a secret marriage, in a remote and sequestered chapel, and whose memory he actually loathed—ever to rule and reside in Rhoscadzhel?
No—a thousand times no! Then muttering the lines from Shakespeare,—