Three days later all that was mortal of Adam Brewster was laid away in the family vault in Greenwood Cemetery.
In the foremost carriage of the many which followed him to his last resting-place sat Allison, the once petted and idolized daughter, but now a lonely orphan, clad in deepest mourning, her fair face pale and tear-stained from heart-breaking grief and much weeping.
The faithful housekeeper, Mrs. Polard, who had been in the family for years, occupied the seat beside her, and John Hubbard the one opposite. He seemed in deep thought, and he scarcely took his eyes from the bereaved girl during the melancholy drive.
Immediately upon the return from this last tribute of respect to the late banker a few persons gathered in the elegant library, which would henceforth know his presence no more, to listen to the reading of his last will and testament.
Mr. Hubbard broke the seals in the presence of the gentleman’s pastor, two of the older officers of the bank, Allison and Mrs. Pollard.
The document was rather brief, considering the magnitude of the testator’s fortune, and to the point, and was dated some eight years previous.
It bequeathed all that he might die possessed of to his only and beloved child, Allison Porter Brewster, excepting certain bequests. “And I hereby appoint John L. Hubbard, my trusted attorney, to be her sole guardian—if he be living at the time of my demise—until she shall attain her twenty-fifth year, when she shall come into the unrestricted possession of her whole fortune,” read the will.
Allison listened attentively to the reading of the will, although she had flushed hotly upon learning that she was to be under the guardianship of John Hubbard during the next six or seven years.
She had never liked her father’s attorney, although he had always treated her with the utmost kindness and respect. But she knew that her father had long trusted him in business, and therefore, she tried to think that he must have considered him the most competent and trustworthy person to manage her property, or he would not have given him so much power.
Still, she would have preferred almost any one else; she felt that he might, at least, have consulted her, since she had grown old enough to think for herself, and not condemned her to such a long and wearisome bondage to one who was so uncongenial to her in every way.