Chapter XII: Miss Vandeleur's Heir

IT was a long time before the Egertons heard from Frances again, or even knew where she and Miss Vandeleur were. About three years later, Honora had a letter from some town in Russia, in which Frances said that she was well, and begged for news of all her sisters.

"If you write at once I may get the letter."

The same thing happened several times at long intervals, and Honora always wrote.

Violet wrote pretty regularly, and seemed very happy in her German home, where music seemed to be the thing most thought of.

Daisy and her husband came home after a time, but went out again. She had no children, and candidly said she thought they would be a great bore. Her talk was all of balls and picnics and races, her husband's riding and polo playing. There had never been much in common between Daisy and Honora, and there was less now. Daisy was nearly as childish as when she left S. Canice. Honora thought of Marian, and tried to make Daisy think of her too.

"Oh yes, dear Marian, she was so good! But you know she was very ill; she knew she could not live. So it was natural." And Daisy yawned.

"And I didn't shake her," Honora said when telling this story to her husband.

Annie wrote constantly. She had a houseful of children, and if she had trials, she said nothing about them. But she was evidently very happy.

And so, after those two or three years together, the Vandeleurs drifted apart again, and the years went on. Went on and on, and Honora's slight figure was not so slight as of old, nor her vivid blush so pink or so frequent. But the beauty of her eyes and her smile was unchanged, and her husband found her lovely still, which was enough for her.

Her boys—she had five—adored her. Piers got on steadily in his profession, and all went well. The one grief was the loss of her two little girls, the youngest of her children. The boys were all happily at school, save one; all at home had scarlatina, and the boy lived. But little Marian and Honora lie near their grandparents, in the churchyard of S. Canice.

It was not very long after this loss that Honora heard again from Frances, who announced that at last they were coming home. Miss Vandeleur had been seriously ill, and was advised to put herself under the care of a certain London specialist.

Honora ran down to the consulting-room and knocked. Piers was alone for a wonder.

"Oh, Piers, only think! Frances and Miss Vandeleur are coming home. Read the letter. I must not stay, I suppose?"

"There's no one waiting, but I expect a patient in a few minutes. What a time they have been wandering about! Fifteen years, I think."

"More, a little. Piers Van is fifteen, and he was not born when they left Florence."

"Yes; that's true. Honora, tell me true—you've had much work and little play, and you've never had much money to spend as you like. Have you ever thought how different your life would have been if you had gone with Miss Vandeleur?"

"I have, frequently," she said, with a whimsical laugh. "Don't be a donkey, sir. When I reckon up my blessings, and cry a little over our sorrow, do you think I wish myself a second edition of the 'other Miss Vandeleur'? Poor Frances! I wonder what she is like now?"

"And the 'other Miss Vandeleur.' You know, Honourbright, that's a bad account of her."

"I thought so. And she was not the kind of person one can fancy being very ill. I wonder, has she forgiven me yet?"

Miss Vandeleur never reached England. She was advised to travel by sea, and at Ceylon, on her homeward voyage, she died. Frances wrote to say that she would come on by the next mail, "and could Honora take her in for a few days?"

The sisters met at the railway station, whither Honora was escorted by her eldest son, Piers Van (short for Vandeleur), a fine-looking lad, the image of the elder Piers. The pair ran briskly along the line of carriages, and presently Honora stopped and jumped actively into one, crying—

"Oh, Frances, I'm so glad!"

"Honora, I could not believe that that was you, running along like— And don't tell me that this tall youth is your son?"

"Yes; the eldest. Come out and let me see you. Are you quite well, Frances?"

"Quite. I have had a very trying time of late, that is all."

"Here's the brougham. Piers Van, get all your aunt's things—have you a list, Frances?—and bring them home in a cab."

"Thank you; here is my list. I am glad to be at home again. I think I shall never care to travel any more."

Frances was still a beautiful woman, but her lovely complexion was utterly lost. She was somewhat sunburnt, and, save for that, very colourless.

"Now," said Honora, when Frances had had some refreshment and had changed her dress—"now I've given orders to say that I am engaged, and I've told the boys not to come near me; and you and I will have a good talk. Oh, Frances, do you remember our talks round the fire at S. Canice, and dear Marian's quiet smile at our chatter?"

"I do remember. But I was a discontented girl in those days. I am not one to whom poverty comes easy to bear. It will suit me better to be the rich Miss Vandeleur. I shall not marry; a rich woman, no longer a mere girl, is a fool if she marries. Single women are so independent now that there is no temptation to marry. I mean to be what Miss Vandeleur might have been—'would' have been but for your declining her offer—a great lady, a personage—a real influence in society. I shall enjoy all that, and I have plenty of time before me, for I am perfectly healthy and very strong."

"I shall be begging from you for some of Piers' poor people," Honora said pleasantly.

"I shall have plenty of people coming on that errand. Honora, are you in mourning, or do you dress in black by choice?"

"Last summer—a year ago, we lost our two dear little girls. It was scarlatina. Hugh had it too."

"I am sorry I asked that question, my dear. I thought your mourning might be for old Mr. Egerton, or for Miss Vandeleur, though we were very distant relations."

"Mr. Egerton has been dead these five years. He left all he could to his widow and young family, and we had to let Eltringham. When Piers Van is of age, it will be sold."

"Have you—were there only two girls?"

"Only two. I have five boys."

"Yes, but I don't want a boy."

"Want a boy?" Honora echoed.

"No. I thought I should like to adopt a girl of yours, call her Vandeleur, and, if possible, secure a third Miss Vandeleur to succeed me."

Honora gave her head a little shake, and Frances smiled and said—

"I don't believe you are as silly now as when you lost your own chance. And at all events, Piers would not be such a fool. Honora, will you sell S. Canice?"

"Sell it? Oh no; we all love it. We spend a little time there whenever we can."

"Well, I should like to be Miss Vandeleur of S. Canice. But I can keep the place Miss Vandeleur never would live in. But I shall live principally in town. What an oddity she was, to be sure! From the first, I was aware that she was odd, but you've no idea how it increased. She became very hard to live with. One had to give in to her in everything great and small, and I really think she used to say things that she knew would annoy me on purpose to make me angry. And so reckless about danger to life and limb, and utterly careless of her health. More than careless, in fact; one would almost think she wanted to kill herself."

"A sad, sad life," said Honora.

Frances as usual was thinking only of her own share of it. She replied—

"It was, indeed. But it is all over now, and I am sure I earned all she could give me. I must go into mourning for her, I suppose? In any case, I want some clothes. But the first thing to be done is to see Miss Vandeleur's man of business. He has her will."

"Oh, Frances, I took it for granted that you had seen the will."

"Did you? Why?"

"You seemed so certain. But I suppose she would keep her promise to you."

"Nonsense!" said Frances, sharply. "There was no need for a promise; we never spoke of one. The will was made just before we went to India after the two girls were married. And when she was sending home directions to this lawyer, she said to me, 'If you remain with me, you will find yourself handsomely provided for. But if you leave me, you will always have the two hundred a year which I shall pay you from this time."

"But did she never say definitely that you were her heir, for that is what she said to me?"

"What she said meant that. She always said she was quite done with Violet, Annie, and Daisy; she never spoke of you, for she never forgave you. To whom could she leave it, then, but to me?"

"I do hope you are right, but people do such strange things. Quite lately an old lady, a patient of Piers', died. She was very rich, and had a granddaughter who lived with her. She left the child five hundred a year, and the rest to different charities."

"Miss Vandeleur cared nothing for charities. Oh, believe me, I am all right. Every one, wherever we went, always spoke of me as her heir, and she never contradicted it."

"Spoke to her of it?" asked Honora.

"No, the papers; and I know she saw them."

"Tell me, Frances, did she know that she was dying?"

"Yes. She told the doctor she consulted in Calcutta that she would not live to reach England, if he was right in his opinion. And she said to me, 'Remember, where I die, I am to be buried.'

"I think she suffered a good deal, but one did not dare to ask. She gave me the key of a fire-proof closet in the City, where she left her jewels. She gave them to me, and a list of them, with a few lines to prevent my having to pay legacy duties on them."

Honora made no further remark. But in telling Piers all that had passed, she said—

"I cannot think that this present looks as if Frances was the heir; and I always thought Miss Vandeleur was fond of Daisy."

"Ah," said Piers, "only to think that but for your obstinate independence, I might now be—it does not go so far as a millionaire—but a rich man!"

Honora laughed. "Don't get grasping in your old age, Piers. It would not make us happier, it would not bring back our little girls, or even cure the ache in our hearts. I often say that you and I are a shocking example to the boys, for we took our own way and married when we were by no means well off, and we've never repented either."

"Let me catch you repenting," said Piers.

Next day Honora and her husband went with Frances to the chambers of Miss Vandeleur's solicitor, Mr. Attwater. They were all strangers to him, but Piers introduced himself, and then Frances.

"And Miss Vandeleur, my sister-in-law, tells me that you have Miss Vandeleur's will in your keeping."

"Yes," he said; "and a large part of her fortune is under our charge still. It is a great pity that my client should have spent such immense sums of late in her curious love of remote travelling. I suppose you know that she sold all her landed property, and of the sums thus realized nothing remains? Indeed, she does not leave behind her such a fortune as she inherited. Still, no doubt her heir—" here he bowed to Honora—"will be a rich woman."

"I am Mrs. Egerton," said Honora. "This is Miss Vandeleur."

"Yes. Ah, here comes my clerk with the will. Shall I read it to you, Mrs. Egerton, or shall I tell you briefly the contents?"

"I have nothing to do with it," Honora said hastily.

"Excuse me, madam. You inherit everything except a handsome legacy to Miss Frances Vandeleur, if she were still with Miss Vandeleur at the time of her death."

There was a moment's perfect silence. Then Frances turned to her sister and said, in a low tone of concentrated fury—

"You knew this all the time."

"Oh no, Frances! Indeed, I do not believe it even now. Mr. Attwater, there is some mistake. I vexed my cousin, refused her offers, and we parted in anger. Frances has been with her for years, nursed her, and—"

"Hush, Honora," Piers said gently. "This is quite useless. Read it, Mr. Attwater."

Yes; everything was left to "my cousin Honora Egerton, formerly Vandeleur;" ten thousand pounds to Frances, and no conditions or restrictions of any kind.

Honora looked frightened and confused. Mr. Attwater stared at her in unaffected amazement. Frances had walked to the window, and Piers rather hated himself for remembering Stasy Ridd's story of the girl who gnawed the bed-post. After a few moments, she came back to the table.

"You cannot deceive me," she said. "This was what you meant by your warning. You knew this all the time."

"Frances, I did 'not!' I never imagined such a thing for a moment!"

"Mrs. Egerton could not possibly know," said Mr. Attwater. "I never saw her before, and no one on earth knew the contents of this will but myself and the testatrix. I was bound to secrecy."

"Oh, you don't know her! She is very clever—very clever. Honora, I will never see your face again."

"When the first shock has passed, Miss Vandeleur will see that Mrs. Egerton—"

"Never mind defending my wife, Mr. Attwater. No one who really knows her—who is 'capable' of knowing her—will suspect her of a word that is less than utterly true. Be reasonable, Frances, and don't make a public show of yourself."

Frances made for the door. "Don't follow me," she said.

"Oh, Piers, run after her! Tell her—"

"Quiet, my darling. Let her go; she will come to her senses better alone. And remember, too, that you'll make a far better use of all this than she meant to do. You have five boys, and now we can educate them to the uttermost, and let them choose their professions. You can help Annie about that genius of hers; you can set my consumptive hospital going. And Frances is very well off, and if she made sure of being the heir, she was not deceived into thinking so. Mr. Attwater, did any man but myself ever have to work so hard to console his wife for being made rich?"

"It may help you if I tell you that the late Miss Vandeleur told me that she had been careful to let her cousin Frances understand that she did not take the place once offered to you. She meant then to leave you nothing, but the last time I saw her, she said, 'It will have to be Honourbright or a hospital for cats.' She was really fond of you, Mrs. Egerton."

The Egertons went home, to find that Frances had hurriedly packed up her things and left the house. She went that night to Dublin, where she has lived ever since. After many kind letters had been written by Honora, all correspondence was dropped, as Frances never answered them.

But after some years, she wrote to say that she forgave the Egertons. And I do not think Piers had ever been seen in a passion till he read that letter.

Of the good that Piers and Honora have done and are doing with the money which had brought so little happiness to either of the Frances Vandeleurs, I cannot linger to tell you. And, save the loss of her baby girls, Honora has known no great sorrow.

Anxiety! Who that has boys escapes anxiety? But for the little girls, there can be none. They were dear; they were lovely; they are safe. And they live in their mother's heart, and yet she is still "Honourbright." Piers calls her by no other name.