“Did he, Hester? Did he own me at last?” Roger’s voice rang through the room like a bell, its joyful tones thrilling even Mrs. Walter Scott, who was growing greatly interested in Hester’s narrative, while Frank stood perfectly spellbound, as if fearful of losing a word of the strange story.
“Yes, I’m pretty sure he did,” Hester said, in reply to Roger’s question. “Any way, he said he had forgiven your mother, and he would leave her letter with his, for you, in case he never see you, and I gin you your mother’s, but kept his, because that would have told you about the will, which I meant to hide. We both thought on’t to once, Aleck and me, but I spoke first, bein’ a woman, and mentioned the promise to consider Roger’s interest before any body’s else, and Jessie seemed to be there with us, and haunted me, with the great blue eyes of hern, till I made up my mind, and took the pesky thing and the letter, and put ’em away safe up in the garret under the floor, where I’d had a piece sawed out a spell before, so as to put pisen under there for the rats. Then I moved an old settee over the place, and chairs and things, so that it would look as if nobody had been there for ages. He must have begun another letter first and blotched it, for the sheet lay there, and I took it as a special Providence and kept it for Roger, as his father’s last words to him. I knew t’other will was not destroyed, for I’d seen it not long before, and I found it in his writing-desk, sealed up like a drum, and left it there, and then she came with her lofty airs, and queened it over us, as if she thought she was lord of all; but her feathers drooped a bit when the will was read, and she thought the old Harry was in it, and hinted, and snooped, and rummaged the very first night, for I found her there, with her night gownd on, and more than forty papers stickin’ in her hair, though why she thought ’twas there, is more than I know; but she’s hunted the garret ever since by turns, and I moved it twice, and then carried it back, and once she set Magdalen at it, she or he, it’s little matter which.”
Magdalen was a sore point with Roger, and he shuddered, when her name was mentioned, and thought of the letter, and wondered if she had it, and would ever bring it to him.
“I was easy enough when that woman wasn’t here,” Hester continued, “and I did think for a spell, she’d met with a change, she was so soft and so velvety and so nice, that butter couldn’t melt in her mouth if it should try. Maybe she’s forgot what she sprung from, but I knew the Browns, root and branch; they allus was a peekin’, rummagin’ set, and her uncle peeked into a money drawer once. She comes honestly by her snoopin’ that found the will.”
Mrs. Walter Scott had borne a great deal of abuse from Hester, and borne it quietly after her appeal to Frank, but now she could keep still no longer, and she half rose from her chair, and exclaimed:
“Silence, old woman, or I will have you put out of the house, and I hold Frank less than a man if he will hear me so abused. I never found the will. It was Magdalen Lennox who found it, just where you told her it was when you were crazy.”
“Magdalen found it, and brought it to you instead of burnin’ it up!” old Hester exclaimed, raising her hands in astonishment, and feeling her blood grow hot against the poor girl. “Magdalen found it, after all he has done for her! She’s a viper then; and my curse be—”
She did not finish the sentence, for both Roger and Frank laid a hand upon her mouth, and stopped the harsh words she would have spoken.
“You don’t know the circumstances. You shall not speak so of Magdalen,” Roger said, while Frank, glad of a chance to prove that he was a man even if he had allowed his mother to be abused, said sternly: “Mrs. Floyd, I have stood quietly by and heard my mother insulted, but when you attack Magdalen I can keep still no longer. She must not be slandered in my presence. I hope she will be my wife.”
Hester gave a violent start, and a sudden gleam of intelligence came into her eyes, as she replied, “Oh, I see now. She wasn’t content to have you alone, and I don’t blame her for that. It would be a sickening pill to swaller, you and that woman too but she must take advantage of my crazy talk, and find the will which makes her lover a nabob. That’s what I call gratitude to me and Roger, for all we’ve done for her. Much good may her money and lover do her!”