Twice had he uttered the same words in his lifetime, and twice had he changed his mind. It might well be that he would change his mind again. If the reputation he bore was justified, the morning would find him in another frame of mind.
“Stay over tomorrow,” he said at parting. “Bring me the draft at breakfast time.”
“At what hour?” asked Jack politely.
“At breakfast time,” roared the old man.
“What is your breakfast hour?”
“The same hour as every other civilised human being,” snapped the General “at twenty-five minutes to one. What time do you breakfast, for Heaven’s sake?”
“At twenty to one,” said Jack sweetly, and was pleased with himself all the way back to the hotel.
He did not see his train companion that night, but met him at breakfast the next morning at the Christian hour of half-past eight.
Something had happened in the meantime to change the equable and cheery character of the other. He was sombre and silent, and he looked worried, almost ill, Jack thought. Possibly there was a bad time for safe selling, as there was a bad time for every other department of trade.
Thinking this, he kept off the subject of business, and scarcely half a dozen sentences were exchanged between the two during the meal.
Returning to The Residency, Jack Frankfort found with surprise that the old man had not changed his mind over night. He was still of the same opinion; seemed more emphatically so. Indeed, Jack had the greatest difficulty in preventing him from striking off a miserable hundred pounds bequest which he had made to a northern dispensary.
“The whole of the money should be kept in the family,” said the General shortly; “it is absurd to fritter away little hundreds like this, it handicaps a man. I do not suppose he will have the handling of the money for many years yet, but ‘forethought,’ sir, is the motto of our family.”
It was all to Gilbert’s advantage that the lawyer persisted in demanding the restoration of the dispensary bequest. In the end the General cut out every bequest in the will, and in the shortest document which he had ever signed bequeathed the whole of his property, movable and immovable, to “my dear nephew” absolutely.
“He is married isn’t he?” he asked.
“I believe he is,” said Jack Frankfort.
“You believe! Now what is the good of your believing?” protested the old man. “You are my lawyer, and your business is to know everything. Find out if he is married, who his wife is, where she came from, and ask them up to dinner.”
“When?” demanded the startled lawyer.
“Tonight,” said the old man. “There is a man coming down from Yorkshire to see me, my doctor; we will make a jolly party. Is she pretty?”
“I believe she is.”
Jack hesitated, for he was honestly in doubt. He knew very little about Gilbert Standerton or his affairs.
“If she is pretty, and she is a lady,” said the old General slowly, “I will also make provision for her separately.”
Jack’s heart sank. Would this mean another will? For good or ill, the wires were dispatched.
Edith received hers and read it in wonder.
Gilbert’s remained on the hall table, for he had not been home the previous night nor during that day.
The tear-reddened eyes of the girl offered eloquent testimony to the interest she displayed in his movements.
XIV
The Standerton Diamonds
Edith Standerton made a quick preparation for her journey. She would take her maid into Huntingdon, and go without Gilbert. It was embarrassing that she must go alone, but she had set herself a task, and if she could help her husband by appearing at the dinner of his irritable relative she would do so.
She had her evening things packed, and caught the four o’clock train for the town of Tinley.
The old man did her the exceptional honour of meeting her at the station.
“Where is Gilbert?” he asked when they had mutually introduced themselves.
“He has been called out of town unexpectedly,” she said. “He will be awfully upset when he knows.”
“I think not,” said the old General grimly. “It takes a great deal to upset Gilbert—certainly more than an opportunity of being reconciled to a grouchy old man. As a matter of fact,” he went on, “there is no reconciliation necessary; but I always look upon anybody whom I have to cut out of my will as one who regards me as a mortal enemy.”
“Please never put me in your will.”
She smiled.
“I’m not so sure about that,” said he, and added gallantly, “though I think Nature has sufficiently endowed you to enable you to dispense with such mundane gifts as money!”
She made a little face at that.
He was delighted with her, and found her a charming companion. Edith Standerton exerted herself to please him. She had a style of treating people older than herself in such a way as to suggest that she was as young as they. I do not know any other phrase which would more exactly convey my meaning than that. She had a charm which appealed to this wayward old man.
Edith did not know the cause of the change in her husband’s fortunes. She knew very little, indeed, of his affairs; enough she knew that for some reason or other he had been disinherited through no fault of his own. She did not even know that it was the result of a caprice of this old man.
“You must come again and bring Gilbert,” said the General, before they dispersed to dress for dinner. “I shall be delighted to put you both up.”
Fortunately she was saved the
