“To do with me?” she asked.
“With you—and with your family,” said Pratt. “And before we go any further, not a soul knows of it but—me.”
Mrs. Mallathorpe took another searching look at her visitor. Pratt was leaning over the corner of the desk, towards her; already he had lowered his tones to the mysterious and confidential note.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she said. “Go on.”
Pratt bent a little nearer.
“A question or two first, if you please, Mrs. Mallathorpe. And—answer them! They’re for your own good. Young Mr. Collingwood called on you today.”
“Well—and what of it?”
“What did he want?”
Mrs. Mallathorpe hesitated and frowned a little. And Pratt hastened to reassure her. “I’m using no idle words, Mrs. Mallathorpe, when I say it’s for your own good. It is! What did he come for?”
“He came to ask what there was in a letter which his grandfather wrote to me yesterday afternoon.”
“Antony Bartle had written to you, had he? And what did he say, Mrs. Mallathorpe? For that is important!”
“No more than that he wanted me to call on him today, if I happened to be in Barford.”
“Nothing more?”
“Nothing more—not a word.”
“Nothing as to—why he wanted to see you?”
“No! I thought that he probably wanted to see me about buying some books of the late Mr. Mallathorpe’s.”
“Did you tell Collingwood that?” asked Pratt, eagerly.
“Yes—of course.”
“Did it satisfy him?”
Mrs. Mallathorpe frowned again.
“Why shouldn’t I?” she demanded. “It was the only explanation I could possibly give him. How do I know what the old man really wanted?”
Pratt drew his chair still nearer to the desk. His voice dropped to a whisper and his eyes were full of meaning.
“I’ll tell you what he wanted!” he said speaking very slowly. “It’s what I’ve come for. Listen! Antony Bartle came to our office soon after five yesterday afternoon. I was alone—everybody else had gone. I took him into Eldrick’s room. He told me that in turning over one of the books which he had bought from Mallathorpe Mill, some short time ago, he had found—what do you think?”
Mrs. Mallathorpe’s cheek had flushed at the mention of the books from the Mill. Now, at Pratt’s question, and under his searching eye, she turned very pale, and the clerk saw her fingers tighten on the arms of her chair.
“What?” she asked. “What?”
“John Mallathorpe’s will!” he answered. “Do you understand? His—will!”
The woman glanced quickly about her—at the doors, the uncurtained window.
“Safe enough here,” whispered Pratt. “I made sure of that. Don’t be afraid—no one knows—but me.”
But Mrs. Mallathorpe seemed to find some difficulty in speaking, and when she at last got out a word her voice sounded hoarse.
“Impossible!”
“It’s a fact!” said Pratt. “Nothing was ever more a fact as you’ll see. But let me finish my story. The old man told me how he’d found the will—only half an hour before—and he asked me to ring up Eldrick, so that we might all read it together. I went to the telephone—when I came back, Bartle was dead—just dead. And—I took the will out of his pocket.”
Mrs. Mallathorpe made an involuntary gesture with her right hand. And Pratt smiled, craftily, and shook his head.
“Much too valuable to carry about, Mrs. Mallathorpe,” he said. “I’ve got it—all safe—under lock and key. But as I’ve said—nobody knows of it but myself. Not a living soul. No one has any idea! No one can have any idea. I was a bit alarmed when I heard that young Collingwood had been to you, for I thought that the old man, though he didn’t tell me of any such thing, might have dropped you a line saying what he’d found. But as he didn’t—well, not one living soul knows that the will’s in existence, except me—and you!”
Mrs. Mallathorpe was regaining her self-possession. She had had a great shock, but the worst of it was over. Already she knew, from Pratt’s manner, insidious and suggesting, that the will was of a nature that would dispossess her and hers of this recently acquired wealth—the clerk had made that evident by look and tone. So—there was nothing but to face things.
“What—what does it—say?” she asked, with an effort.
Pratt unbuttoned his overcoat, plunged a hand into the inner pocket, drew out a sheet of paper, unfolded it and laid it on the desk.
“An exact copy,” he said tersely. “Read it for yourself.”
In spite of the determined effort which she made to be calm, Mrs. Mallathorpe’s fingers still trembled as she took up the sheet on which Pratt had made a fair copy of the will. The clerk watched her narrowly as she read. He knew that presently there would be a tussle between them: he knew, too, that she was a woman who would fight hard in defence of her own interest, and for the interests of her children.
Always keeping his ears open to local gossip, especially where money was concerned, Pratt had long since heard that Mrs. Mallathorpe was a keen and sharp business woman. And now he was not surprised when, having slowly and carefully read the copy of the will from beginning to end, she laid it down, and turned to him with a businesslike question.
“The effect of that?” she asked. “What would it be—curtly?”
“Precisely what it says,” answered Pratt. “Couldn’t be clearer!”
“We—should lose all?” she demanded, almost angrily. “All?”
“All—except what he says—there,” agreed Pratt.
“And that,” she went on, drumming her fingers on the paper, “that—would stand?”
“What it’s a copy of would stand,” said Pratt. “Oh, yes, don’t you make any mistake about it, Mrs. Mallathorpe! Nothing can upset that will. It is plain as a pikestaff how it came to be made. Your late brother-in-law evidently wrote his will out—it’s all in his own handwriting—and took it down to the Mill with him the very day of the chimney accident. Just as evidently he signed it in the presence of his manager, Gaukrodger, and his cashier, Marshall—they signed at the same time, as it says, there. Now I take it that very soon after
