Eleanor had been sitting at an open window busy with her work during this conversation; but she rose hastily as Launcelot spoke of her father. She was ready to do battle for him then and there, if need were. She was ready to fling off the disguise of her false name, and to avow herself as George Vane’s daughter, if they dared to slander him. Whatever shame or humiliation was cast upon him should be shared by her.
But before she could give way to this sudden impulse, Gilbert Monckton spoke, and the angry girl waited to near what he might say.
“I have every reason to believe that Maurice de Crespigny would have left his money to his old friend had Mr. Vane lived,” the lawyer said. “I never shall forget your uncle’s grief when he read the account of the old man’s death in a ‘Galignani’ which was put purposely in his way by one of your aunts.”
“Ah,” said Mr. Darrell, bitterly, “George Vane’s death cleared the way for those harpies.”
“Or for you, perhaps.”
“Perhaps. I have not come home to wait for a dead man’s shoes, Mr. Monckton.”
Mrs. Darrell had been listening to this conversation, with her watchful eyes fixed upon Gilbert Monckton’s face. She spoke now for the first time.
“My son is the proper person to inherit my uncle’s fortune,” she said; “he is young, and has a bright future before him. Money would be of some use to him; but it would be almost useless to my sisters.”
She glanced at the young man as she spoke; and in that one kindling glance of maternal pride the widow revealed how much she loved her son.
The young man was leaning in a lounging attitude over the piano, turning the leaves of Laura’s open music-book, and now and then striking his fingers on the notes.