Chapter XXIV

The period of waiting ended very abruptly one day. It was by this time soft, Indian-summer weather; and Marion was seated in the garden with Helen one afternoon, mellow sunshine and brilliant masses of flowers all around them, when a servant appeared with the intelligence that Mr. Singleton was in the house and wished to see her.

"Mr. Singleton!" she repeated, a little startled. "What Mr. Singleton?"

"Mr. Tom, ma'am," repeated the servant, who had been accustomed to distinguish him in this manner during the life of the elder Mr. Singleton.

"Oh!" she said. And then she turned to Helen with a faint smile. "I don't know whether I am relieved or disappointed," she observed. "I thought it was the other."

"But the other would hardly be likely to come without warning--and alone," returned Helen.

"That is very true. But I wonder what this Mr. Singleton can want--if he has any news?"

"You can only find out by going to see," said Helen.

"Yes," assented Marion. She rose as she spoke, and made a few steps toward the house, then paused and looked back like one who is taking a farewell. "The crisis must be at hand," she said. "I feel as if I were on the verge of a great change. When I see you again, Helen, I may be dispossessed of all my riches."

"Don't talk nonsense!" said Helen, in a matter-of-fact way. "How can you be dispossessed in so short a time?"

The other laughed. "'If 'twere done when 'tis done, then 'twere well it were done quickly,'" she said, and so went on toward the house.

Mr. Singleton, who was awaiting her in the drawing-room, came forward and shook hands very cordially. They had always been good friends, and he had a very kind feeling toward the beautiful and comparatively friendless girl. This kindness had now an emphasis, which she perceived, together with something of compassion. She looked at him and smiled.

"Has the true heir appeared?" she asked; "and have you come to warn me to prepare for abdication?"

"How shrewd you are!" he said. But, in truth, he was much relieved that she was shrewd enough to divine the object of his visit,--a visit which it had required a considerable effort on his part to undertake. "The true heir--if you consider him so--_has_ appeared; but there is no question of abdication for you. He will be very glad if you consent to compromise, and so save him a contest over the will."

She sat down in a chair conveniently near, looking a little pale. Notwithstanding her question, she had not really anticipated such positive assurance at once; and recognizing this, Mr. Singleton regretted having been so abrupt.

"I thought you expected it," he said; "but I see that you were not quite prepared. I am sorry--"

She put up her hand with a gesture which stopped his words. "There is nothing for which to be sorry," she said. "Of course I expected it, but perhaps not so immediately or so positively. But I don't mean to be foolish: I intend to be quite cool and business-like. Mr. George Singleton has arrived, then. Have _you_ recognized him?"

"Perfectly. He has changed very little, considering all things, and there can be no question of his identity."

"Are the other members of the family, and friends of the family, as positive as yourself?"

"Yes: no one has a doubt but that it is George. In fact, no one could have a doubt who had ever known him. He was twenty years old when he went away, and of a very marked personal appearance. The change of sixteen years is by no means so great as might be imagined. Appearance, manner, habits--all prove that he is George himself. Indeed I must be quite frank and tell you that there is not even a peg on which to hang a doubt of his identity."

She looked at him for a moment in silence, her brow drawn together by the earnestness with which she seemed trying to read his face. At length she said, slowly: "I must trust your opinion; I have no one else to trust. And I do not think you would deceive me."

"I certainly would not," he answered, gravely. "Why should I? Putting honor aside, I have nothing to gain by espousing George Singleton's cause. As a matter of fact, I do not espouse it at all. I merely come to you as a friend, and tell you that he is certainly the man he claims to be. And, under these circumstances, I think your best plan will be to compromise with him as speedily as possible."

"Of that there is no question in my mind," she said, with her old air of pride. "If I could, I would not retain the fortune of a man whose son is living. Tell Mr. George Singleton that I will turn over his father's estate to him as soon as may be."

"But that," said Mr. Singleton, with energy, "can not be allowed. As one of the executors of the will, I should protest against it. Whether my uncle believed in the death of his son or not, we can not know, neither can we know how he would have acted if he had certainly been aware of his existence. All that we have to deal with is the simple fact that he left his fortune to you without even mentioning his son's name; and this being so, it is not demanded of you--it is neither just nor right--that you should turn it all over to him."

"But he is the natural and rightful heir to it, and no one shall ever say of me that I grasped or held what rightfully belonged to another."

"My dear young lady, you said a moment ago that you intended to be quite cool and business-like in discussing this matter. Allow me, then, to put it before you in its business-like aspect. You are at the present time the lawful possessor of my uncle's fortune by his direct bequest, and unless the courts set aside his will you must remain so. The issue of an attempt to set aside the will is, of course, uncertain; and the contest would be long, troublesome and costly to all concerned. Recognizing these facts, George Singleton says that he is willing to agree on a liberal basis of compromise. And, since my uncle certainly wished you to have _all_ his fortune why should you refuse to retain a part of it?"

"I have already told you, because in justice it belongs to his son; and why should I keep a part any more than the whole of what is not justly mine?"

Mr. Singleton had an air of saying to himself, "Heaven grant me patience!" but, possessing a good deal of that quality, he said aloud: "How in the name of common-sense can that be held to belong to George Singleton which has been given to you? Honestly, if you divide with him it is as much as you can be expected to do."

"It is something I should despise myself for doing," she said, with a sudden flush of color in her face. "You are very kind, Mr. Singleton, and I really believe that you are considering my interest in this matter. But you forget the position I occupy--that of an interloper who has come in to take a fortune away from its natural heirs, and who, no doubt, is held to have schemed to that end. _You_ know better than that, I am sure; but the world does not know better, and Mr. George Singleton does not know better. Now, I shall be glad to prove that, although I value wealth and desire wealth--why should I deny it?--I would not acquire it at the cost of my self-respect. Since you say Mr. Singleton's son is certainly living, I do not feel that I have any right to keep his fortune any longer than I can put it out of my hands. Pray be good enough to tell him so."

"My dear Miss Lynde, I can not agree to tell him anything of the kind. You must positively take time for consideration and advice."

She shook her head. "I do not need time, and I shall certainly not seek advice. I have already made up my mind what to do. Can you imagine that I have not considered this in the weeks that I have been waiting? If you decline to give my message to Mr. Singleton, I shall have to communicate with him directly myself."

"It would be best that you should communicate with him directly, if you could by that means be brought to look at the matter in a reasonable light, and see that there is no possible cause why it should not be arranged on the basis of a liberal compromise. Half a million is surely enough to divide."

She put out her hands, as if to push the proposal from her. "I will not hear of it," she said. "I will not seem to grasp money which is not mine. Do not argue the point further, Mr. Singleton. I appreciate your kindness, but I can not yield."

"Well," he said reluctantly, "I am sorry for it. Believe me you are making a great mistake, and one which, in the nature of things, you must regret as time goes on. We are not young and impulsive forever, and some day you will say, 'I had a right to my share of that fortune, and I was wrong to give it up.'"

"It may be," she answered; "but I can not keep it now--I can not! Where is Mr. George Singleton?--where can I address him, if you will not take my message to him? It is impossible for me to address him through his lawyer."

"He will have no use for a lawyer if you persevere in your intention," said Mr. Singleton, shrugging his shoulders. "As for his address, he is here in Scarborough, and quite ready to wait upon you at your convenience, if you will receive him."

She started. This was coming a little closer than she anticipated. And yet, she asked herself, why not? "'Twere well it were done quickly," and it seemed likely now to be done quickly enough. After a moment she said, steadily: "There is no reason why I should not receive him whenever he likes to come, since you assure me that he is really the man he claims to be."

"Of that there can be no doubt."

"Then let him come--the sooner the better. But do not let him bring Mr. Rathborne with him. That person I cannot receive."

"I will come with him myself," said Mr. Singleton. "I should not have thought of doing otherwise."

She held out her hand to him with a grateful gesture. "You are very good to me--very kind," she said. "I shall never forget it."

"I wish you would let me be of some use to you, by taking my advice," he answered.

But when he went away it was with the reflection that women are surely obstinate creatures; and, however charming they may be, they are, as a rule, quite devoid of reason. Marion had proved immovable in her resolution, as also in her determination not to take advice on it. Once fully assured that the man purporting to be Mr. Singleton's son was really so, her mind was made up what to do. She went back into the garden like one moving in a dream, and told Helen the news.

"The fairy tale is over," she said; "my fairy fortune is about to slip away from me. Am I sorry? I think I am more apathetic just now than either glad or sorry. It has not brought me one day of happiness, but I know the world well enough to be aware that it is better to be rich and unhappy than poor and unhappy. Poverty aggravates every other evil; and yet I am not grieved to have the opportunity to prove that I am not so mercenary as--some people doubtless believe me. Brian Earle will not think that I have schemed for his inheritance when he learns that I have voluntarily given it up to his cousin."

Helen looked up with a keenness of perception which was rather unusual in her soft eyes. "I think," she said, "that _that_ is the consideration which moves you chiefly. But is it altogether a right consideration? Mr. Earle does not injure you by believing what is untrue of you, but you will injure yourself by giving up everything, and surely you are not bound to do so. If Mr. Singleton had not desired you to have part at least of his fortune, he would never have left you all of it."

"One would think you had heard the arguments of the gentleman who has just gone away," said Marion, smiling. "Dear Helen, don't make me go over it all again. I fear that it is more pride than conscience which makes me feel that I must resign the fortune. But I can never recover my own self-respect until I have done so. And my own self-respect is not another name for the respect of Brian Earle. If I were conscious of being right I might not care that he thought ill of me; but my own judgment echoes his. I have been willing to barter everything of value in life for money, and now it is right enough that the money should be taken from me. I feel as if by giving it up altogether I might recover, not what I have lost--I do not dream of that,--but the right to hope for some form of happiness again."

Helen gravely shook her head. "You talk like a pagan," she said. "All this sounds like propitiating gods, and sacrificing to fate, and things of that kind. The fact is, you are trusting entirely to your own judgment in the matter, and that is strange; for there seems to me a point of conscience involved. Either you have a right to a part of this fortune, or you have not. If you have, why should you give it away to a man who does not ask it and does not need it? While if you have not a right, there would be no more to be said about it; you would have the consciousness of some firm ground under your feet, and no reason hereafter for regret."

"Helen, you astonish me!" said Marion, who certainly looked astonished at this unexpected view of the case. "How on earth did you contrive to get at the kernel of the thing in that manner?"

"Why, there is nothing surprising in that," remarked Helen. "It is the way any Catholic would look at it. Things like that never trouble us. There is always a plain right or a plain wrong."

"And where do you find the law or rule by means of which to tell what is right and what is wrong?"

"There is no difficulty in that," was the reply. "We have certain very clear rules given us, and if there is any difficulty in their application we know where to go to have the difficulty solved."

"To a priest, I suppose?"

"Yes, to a priest. You can not think that strange if you remember that the priest is trained in the most special and careful manner, as well as enlightened by God, in order to enable him to deal with such difficulties."

There was silence for a minute or two, while Marion, leaning back in her chair, looked up at the deep-blue sky, and some golden boughs that crossed it. Presently she said, in a meditative tone:--

"There do not seem to be any difficulties to speak of in this case, but I should not mind putting it before some one altogether outside of it, and without any interest in it. Still, I could not go to a priest, because I am no Catholic."

"You are more of a Catholic than anything else," said Helen. "You know that. And I think if you went to Father Byrne, and put the abstract question to him, he would tell you what is right."

"You forget that I have no right to go to him. It would be presumption on my part. Why should I, who do not belong to his people, trouble him with my personal affairs?"

Helen smiled. "You don't know Father Byrne," she answered. "He is always glad to serve any one. I know that, even as a friend, he would gladly advise you. I will ask him, if you consent."

"Ask him what?"

"To see you and tell you what he thinks."

"Helen, you should not tempt me to make myself a nuisance. Besides, Father Byrne does not like me, and that renders me more reluctant to trouble him."

"What has put such an absurd idea into your head? Why should he not like you?"

"Why? Ah! who can answer such questions? But realty in this case there is an easy answer. He thinks me an objectionable sort of girl; I used to see it in his face when we met at your mother's house. He would look at me sometimes with a mild but quite decided disapproval when I had been saying something particularly frivolous or satirical; and I did not blame him in the least. How could he approve of me? _You_ are the type of girl that he approves, and he is quite right."

"Marion, I wish you would not say such things."

"But they are true things. And, then, of course he knows the story of how your engagement ended, and very likely thinks me worse than I am in regard to that. Then I am worldly to the tips of my fingers; I have inherited a fortune to which I have no right, and--well, there is no good in going on. These are quite sufficient reasons why Father Byrne does not like me, and why I should not trouble him."

"All this is absolute nonsense; and I will prove that it is, if you do not positively object. I will go to him and ask him to see you, and you will find how quickly he will say yes."

Marion laughed a little--a laugh without any merriment, only a kind of sad self-scorn. "Upon my word," she said, "I am in so weak a frame of mind that a straw might influence me; and this being so, it is a comfort to trust to you, who will never lead any one wrong. Go to Father Byrne, if you will; but don't be surprised if he declines to have anything to do with me."