Poor Mrs Underwood was taken entirely without preparation. She turned to her son with a gasp, clasping her hands together in dismay. She was a woman who had always been told what to do by somebody—her husband, her sister, her son, had managed her mind for her. When she knew what was expected of her she did it faithfully, holding by her consigne whatever happened. She had kept steadily to her orders under the most trying circumstances already: struggling against the glimmerings of right judgment in her own breast, even while silenced by Anna’s casuistry. Since Geoffrey grew up her course had been easier, though even with his support her sister’s older influence was sometimes too much for her. But now to be asked instead of being told—to have a decision demanded from her instead of made for her, took away her breath.
“Oh, Geoff,” she said, “my dear! how can you expect me to understand anything about the law? I should like to be kind to the girls, poor things. Of course I should like to be kind to them. I would not ruin them, poor fatherless children, for all the world. How could you think such a thing of me?”
“That is not what I am asking you, mother. If you are sure they ought to have the money, though they cannot prove it legally, what will you do?”
Mrs Underwood turned a frightened look towards her sister, who laughed; then her eyes returned to the face of her son, which was very serious, and gave her no guidance. “Do?” she murmured faintly, “I will do—whatever is thought right, Geoff.”
“But what do you think right, mother?”
Geoffrey felt that if he had not put a powerful control upon himself, he might have turned round upon the laughing spectator behind him and taken her by the throat.
“Poor Geoff!” said Miss Anna; “between his mother, who cannot understand, and I who understand better than a woman ought, he is in a hard case. You had better have it out with me. What shall we do in case there is no legal proof? You know very well there is but one thing to do. Keep ourselves on our guard and refuse any concession. What else? Fancy is one thing, but property is another. You can’t go chucking that about like a ball. It must stay in the hands it is in, until others have proved a right to it. You who were brought up for the bar, and you need me to tell you that?”
“This is how the case stands, mother,” said Geoffrey. “The money which is the greater part of our living was left to your cousin, Leonard Crosthwaite, and only to you failing him and his heirs. You thought he was dead, without heirs, and you have enjoyed it all this time with an easy mind. But a fortnight ago Leonard Crosthwaite appeared. You did not know him at first, but before he went away you were convinced it was he. Is not this all true?”
“She fancied it was he, being a silly woman who believes everybody’s story, and never knew a lie from the truth all her days.”
“And you, Aunt Anna,” said Geoffrey, turning upon her with quick impatience, “did you always know the truth from a lie?”