Chapter VI: An Alarm

A FEW days later, father suddenly found that all was not quite so sure as he had thought about the five thousand pounds. For the son, who had expected the money, made up his mind to "dispute the will," as it is called. He went to the lawyers, and tried to prove that it was all a mistake, and that the money ought properly to go to him, not us. He wanted to make out that his old father had not been right in the head, at the time that he made the will. If he could show this to be the case, it would of course make all the difference.

I shall never forget seeing father come in, just after hearing that the will was to be disputed. It was Saturday morning, and we were going to have the Jenkinses and the Dickensons and the Raikes' to dinner, and afterwards there was to be an excursion of all of us together to a place called Sunny Point, where we were going to have a sort of picnic tea in some respectable tea-gardens.

There had been quite a struggle, because father was bent on a Sunday dinner to the neighbours, and grannie was set against it. Father was downright angry, and mother cried and fretted because grannie would not give in. Grannie did not say very much, for it wasn't her way to waste words; but she did say she would have nothing to do with the matter, for she couldn't on principle make God's day one of junketing and pleasure. But nothing could be done without her; for mother was a poor cook, and the dinner would just have been a failure altogether, if grannie had not cooked it. Then, when father was vexed and mother upset, grannie quietly asked why it could not be Saturday instead, and offered to do anything they liked for Saturday. And so it was settled.

Grannie and I had been hard at work, for I always helped her, and we had a beautiful dinner nearly ready. Grannie did not like the expense of it all; but having made a stand about the more important matter of Sabbath-breaking, she would not make a stir about this too. So there was to be for once a thorough good turn-out. Grannie had her Sunday dress ready to put on at the last moment, and I had put on mine already, and mother was in the parlour, wearing her new green silk, with bright glass buttons all down the front, and a cap with pink bows. She did look smart, and no mistake; and the blue sofa and chairs and the gay carpet helped to make her still smarter. I peeped in once or twice in the middle of my work, and saw her fidgeting about and making a grand rustling. But somehow it didn't seem like mother. I'd rather have had her as I was used.

Then I was back in the kitchen with grannie: and I was just lifting off a saucepan from the fire when I heard a shriek. It startled me so, that I very nearly dropped the saucepan; and well scalded I should have been if I had.

"Steady, Phœbe," grannie said. "One thing at a time, my dear. Put that down safely. Now go and ask what is the matter. I saw your father come in."

I rushed off to the parlour, and found mother in tears, with her face as red as fire. But father was the worst. I never saw father look so before. The first thought that came into my mind was that a wicked spirit must have got inside him. And though I tried to put the thought away, it came back. Father was talking fast in a loud fierce tone, and it made me tremble. I heard him use a bad word, and that frightened me, for I had never heard him say bad words. Grannie was so particular, and she had brought him up to be the same. He may have been different among other people; but before grannie and with us children, he had always been careful. I suppose he was in such a passion that he hardly knew what he was saying. And I just rushed back to the kitchen, and dragged grannie with me to the parlour.

"What is the matter?" said she, looking at them.

"Matter!" father said, and he turned round upon her, and said the words again, in a fierce sort of way. Grannie went up to him and put her hand on his shoulder.

"Miles," she said, "you never spoke so before me yet, and you won't again, if you don't want to break your old mother's heart."

"A man can't be always choosing his words," father said roughly, and he shook her hand off. "Here's a nice go! That fellow's setting to work to prove that the old man was mad when he made the will."

"I expected as much," grannie said. "And if they prove it?"

"They can't prove it. I'd defy all England to prove it,—without a pack of lies is to be taken as truth," father said in a passionate way. "The old man was as clear in the head as you or I."

Grannie didn't ask him how he knew this, since he had not seen Andrew Morison for years. She only said: "But if they do prove it?"

"They can't, I tell you. If they did, the money wouldn't come to us. But they can't-they shan't!" And father stamped his foot.

"The money is left to us, and it's ours. It's ours!"

"Maybe it'll be ours by-and-by," grannie said. "I hope it may be, if it's for our good. But it isn't ours yet, Miles, and I should be better satisfied, for my part, if you had waited, and not got all these things."

"I shouldn't," father shouted, seeming as if he wanted to drown everybody's speech except his own. "I shouldn't be better satisfied; and what's more, I shan't stop. The money's sure to come. Old Morison was as clear-headed as yourself, mother, and if there's any right and justice in the land, they'll give it so. It's like Jem Morison's sneaking ways to go and do this. But he'll fail. He'll fail, as sure as my name is Miles Murdock. I hope they'll saddle him with costs too, and serve him out."

"Somebody has to be disappointed, anyway," grannie said. "And it's worse for him than for you: for he's been expecting for years, and you've only thought about it a little while. But the meat'll be spoiling, if I don't go and see to it."

"And, oh dear me! there's the Dickensons coming, and it's half-past twelve, and I've got such a red face," mother said. "O dear me! I wish you hadn't gone and told us until they were gone. What shall we do, if the money don't come after all? You don't really think we shan't have it, do you, Miles?"

"No, I don't," father said shortly; but it was plain he didn't feel easy in his mind.

Grannie and I went back to the kitchen, and she did not abate one jot of care for all that had to be done; but presently she gave a sigh, and said to herself,—"How ever in the world folks can be so silly!"

"Father and mother?" I asked.

"I didn't mean that for you, Phœbe," said she. "It's no place of a child to blame her parents. But it is a want of sense. Supposing the money don't come after all?"

"Wouldn't you be very sorry?" I asked.

"Maybe so," she said. "Five thousand pounds has a tempting sound, and I like things to be easy and plentiful as well as others do. But I do say, and I mean it too, that I'd sooner it should never come at all, than have you all go wrong with its coming."

"But why should we, grannie?" I asked. "Why should we? Lots of folks have money, as much as that and more, and don't go wrong with it."

"True enough," she said. "But it's the sudden riches after being poor that's the danger, Phœbe. It isn't the keeping on with what one's used to. There's many a head been turned, and many a heart gone wrong, with sudden riches. I don't say but what there's grace enough to keep one through the danger, if we'll seek it—if we'll ask it, Phœbe."

And I knew she meant that father and mother were not thinking of danger, and were not asking to be kept through it.

Dinner had soon to be dished up and taken in. Grannie changed her dress in a hurry, for father would not have been happy without. The Dickensons and all the rest were come, and our little parlour was just stuffed full. I saw the neighbours eyeing mother's green silk; and one or two of them made faces at one another about it on the sly, and I thought they were jealous. But they need not have been, if they had known how we were thinking about that silk dress, supposing the money should not come! Mrs. Dickenson asked mother where she had got it; and Mrs. Jenkins wanted to know how much she had paid by the yard; and Mrs. Raikes fingered it and said she knew of better to be had at a less price. And I did not think all this was quite mannerly, somehow; but mother seemed to like it, and she became quite merry.

But father had a gloomy look, and I saw that he could not forget what he had heard. Just as we were sitting down to dinner, he spied me and said—

"Where is your necklace, Phœbe?"

"I didn't put it on, father," I said, getting red in the face.

"Then go and put it on this minute, Phœbe," he said angrily.

I could not help trembling a little, and I only just managed to get out the words,—"Grannie said—"

"I don't care what grannie said, nor anybody else neither. Go and put it on,—d'you hear?"

I looked at grannie, and she said, "Do as father tells you, Phœbe."

So I rushed off, and put it on. But I did not like doing so. I had a sort of feeling that it was bought with money which was not ours, and which never might be, and I seemed almost to hate the coral necklace. For I could not bear to see grannie sad, and father so unlike himself.

I don't think any of us enjoyed that Saturday very much, though to be sure there was plenty of talk and of laughing.