“What a mystery! To think that he should adopt your name, be of your apparent age, and yet that you should come here to Rigsworth and make our acquaintance!”
“No mystery at all. You drag everything from me like a skilled lawyer. Strauss did more than borrow my name; he forged it. There was a police inquiry. I was called into it. My curiosity was aroused. I learned something of your sister’s story, and I took steps to meet you.”
“Introduced by Lord Vanstone!” murmured Mrs. Mordaunt.
“Yes, some one. I quickly forgot all else when I was granted the privilege of your friendship.”
And he took Violet’s hand and kissed it, with a delicate grace that was courtly in him.
Sharpe was announced. Mrs. Mordaunt sent Jenny away in a maid’s escort, and Violet knew that her hour of final yielding was near.
She still held the certificates. “Am I to keep these?” she asked, while her mouth quivered slightly. She was thinking, thinking, all the time, of David and Dibbin and of the queer collapse of Gwendoline which made that little Cockney woman her companion. But what plea could she urge now? She could only ask for a few days’ respite, just to clear away some lingering doubts, and then—But, for mother’s sake, no protests now, nor tears, nor questions.
Sharpe’s ferret eyes took in the altered situation. Yesterday’s clouds had passed. A glance from Van Hupfeldt brought him to business. There was a marriage settlement of five thousand pounds per annum, to be increased to twice the amount in the event of widowhood—and Sharpe explained the legal proviso that Violet was to be free to marry again, if so minded, without forfeiting any portion of this magnificent yearly revenue.
“Most generous!” Mrs. Mordaunt could not help saying, and even the girl herself, miserable and drooping as a caged thrush, knew that Van Hupfeldt was showing himself a princely suitor.
“And now follows a somewhat unusual document,” said Sharpe in his brisk legal way. “Mr. Van Hupfeldt has instructed me to prepare a will, leaving all his real and personal estate to Miss Violet Mordaunt, he being confident that she will faithfully carry out certain instructions of his own. Of course, this instrument will have a very brief life. Marriage, I may explain, Miss Mordaunt, invalidates all wills previously executed by either of the parties. Hence, it is intended only to cover the interregnum, so to speak, between to-day’s bachelordom and the marriage ceremony of—er—”