“He said he might still change, you remember. The will is only made in case of accidents. It does seem strange to think of it lying there all the time, and that one peep at it would end all our wonderings. I should like to see it!” cried Ruth with an outspoken honesty which apparently shocked her companion.
“Be careful what you say, Miss Ruth! Farrell is just the sort of cross-grained old fellow to take all sorts of ideas into his head if he heard you. And, besides, you can surely guess for yourself what name you would find!”
Ruth lifted her face to his in quick inquiry. The brown eyes were for once fully open and looking down at her with an expression half smiling, half melancholy. “You know it would be your own!” he said softly, and she flushed in quick denial.
“No, no; it’s impossible to be certain. I hope, of course, but— At first I thought Uncle Bernard liked me best, but lately Mollie seems to have cut me out.”
“But we are told that liking has nothing to do with the great decision.”
“I know, and that does away at once with so many qualities with one fell swoop, that one can hardly tell what is left. It puts amiability out of the question, and unselfishness and cheerfulness, and—and tact, and everything which makes us care for a person or not. When they are gone, what is left?”
“A great many things, just as Mr Farrell’s knowledge of our characters and actions is far more extensive than you suspect. We meet at meals, and in the evening, and for the rest of the day one would imagine that we are beyond his ken, but I have discovered that to be a mistake. In some mysterious fashion he knows all that we do, and guesses fairly accurately what we think! ... Would you imagine, for instance, that he knew that this seat was our favourite resort, and that we have enjoyed some very pleasant tête-à-têtes here during the last few weeks? Would you imagine that he knew who gave me that white rosebud which I wore as a button-hole last night?”
Ruth’s face was a rose itself at that moment, a red, red rose, as the colour flew from her cheeks up to the roots of her hair. Her eyes wavered, and fell.
“How can he know? How do you know he knows?” she queried confusedly; and Victor shrugged his shoulders.
“How, I can’t tell you, but I suspect his man James is a useful source of information. I know that he knows, because of several caustic remarks which he has let fall from time to time, to which my legal experience easily gives me the clue. I have come to the conclusion that he knows pretty well what we are about every hour of the day!”