"Yes, the court will recognize her claim—to all appearance, it is indisputable; and now I can understand what puzzled and troubled me when Mr. Dinsmore was so helplessly ill," Mr. Graves said, reflectively. "You doubtless remember how distressed he was when he tried to make me understand something in connection with his will."
"Yes," said Mona with streaming eyes. "Oh, poor Uncle Walter!"
"Doubtless he knew that his wife was still living," Mr. Graves resumed, "and that she would be likely to claim his property. He wanted you to have it—that I know—and he must have suffered untold anguish because he could not make me understand that he wanted to have me insert something in his will, which would provide against this woman's demands. Even if he had been able to sign the document which I drew up, she could have broken it, because she was not mentioned and remembered in it, and he knew this, of course."
"Then she will have all—I am not to have anything?" said Mona inquiringly, but without being able to realize, in the least, what such utter destitution meant.
"My poor child, she utterly refuses to release a dollar of your uncle's money to you. I have fought hard for you, Mona, for I could not bear to come to you with this wretched story; but she is inexorable. She seems, for some reason, to entertain a special spite—even hatred—against you, and asserts, through her counsel—I have not had the honor of meeting this peculiar specimen of womanhood—that you shall either work or beg for your bread; you shall have nothing of what legally belongs to her."
"Then I am absolutely penniless!" said Mona, musingly. "I wonder if I can make myself understand what that means! I have always had everything that I wanted. I never asked for anything that Uncle Walter did not give me if he could obtain it. I have had more money than I wanted to spend, and so I have given a great deal away. It will seem very strange to have an empty purse. I wonder where I shall get my clothes, when what I have are worn out. I wonder how I am to get what I shall need to eat—does it cost very much to feed one person? Why, Mr. Graves!" putting her hand to her head in a half-dazed way. "I cannot make it seem real—it is like some dreadful dream!"
"Mona, my dear child, do not talk like that," said the man, looking deeply distressed, "for, somehow, I feel guilty, as if I were, in a measure, responsible for this fresh calamity that has befallen you; and yet I could not help it. If I had only known that Mr. Dinsmore's wife was living, I could have made the will all right. Ah! no, no! what am I saying? Even if I had, he could not have signed it, for his strength failed. Still, I know that he wanted you to have all, and it is not right that this woman should get it from you."
"Must I go away from my home and from all these lovely things of which Uncle Walter was so fond?" Mona asked, looking about the beautiful room with inexpressible longing written on her young face. "Will she claim his books and pictures, and even this dear chair, in which I loved to see him sit, and which seems almost like a part of himself, now that he is gone?" and unable to bear the thought of parting from these familiar objects, around which clustered such precious associations, the stricken girl bowed her face upon the arm of Mr. Dinsmore's chair, and burst into a passion of tears.
"My dear girl, don't!" pleaded the tender-hearted lawyer, as he gently stroked her rich, brown hair with one hand, and wiped the tears from his own eyes with the other, "it almost breaks my heart to think of it, and I promise that you shall at least have some of the treasures which you prize so much. You shall not want for a home, either—you shall come to me. Mr. Dinsmore was my dear and valued friend, and for his sake, as well as your own, you shall never want for enough to supply your needs. I have not great wealth, but what I have I will share with you."
Mona now lifted her head, and wiped her tears, while she struggled bravely to regain her self-possession.