Elders and Betters (22 page)

“It would only be a thought that would occur to them at intervals during their lives,” said Anna.

“And the other will become entwined with their every experience,” said Bernard.

“Well, if Anna likes to look forward to that!” said Esmond.

“I have done with any thoughts of the future,” said Anna, resting her head on her hand. “I can only live in the moment; I am quite tired out. And I foresee that the moment will be enough.”

JESSICA'S GREETING OF her brother showed no thought of anything but their common grief, and her manner did not change when she turned to his children. Her trouble about her sister's state of mind overwhelmed all others. Anna, who had risen in vague apprehension, drew back and took no part in the talk. Tullia bore herself as if all eyes were watching the effect of her bereavement, and was fortunate in being in error, as the result was hardly what she thought. She held it beneath her to talk or think of money, and assumed it was always there, which would indeed have disposed of its problems. Thomas showed a simple indulgence in the matter. His daughter asked little for herself, and had a right to spurn what she did not need. Thomas and his son behaved as usual; indeed any change in them appeared in an especial care to be themselves. Claribel stood with her eyes darting from face to face, and her mouth slightly open, as if she would speak when the words came. Jenney and Reuben watched the scene in the spirit of spectators at a play, and indeed wore this expression. Thomas was the first to broach the matter in their minds.

“Well, Anna, my dear, we congratulate you on your aunt's feeling. As for the way she chose of showing it, you are already placed above material troubles.”

“Am I?” said Anna, awkwardly. “I don't know if that is the case. With this swarm of developing brothers about me, I should hardly have thought so. You must ask Father. I suppose it was not Aunt Sukey's view. But thank you for what you say about her feeling. I am glad to have deserved that, or somehow to have won it. We can't give an account of these things.”

“That is the reason of their value,” said Jessica. “I too
congratulate Anna, and almost envy her. I would give much for the certainty and peace of her memory.”

“Oh, I don't know if it is as much as that,” said Anna, looking away. “I also have my moments of compunction and doubt. I can't stop wondering if I should have left Aunt Sukey on that last morning. But she wanted to be left to sleep, and I knew that Father was coming. I could not foresee what was going to happen; I don't see what else I could have done.” She raised her eyes to her uncle in mute appeal.

“You could have done only what you did,” he said. “It worked out well for our sister, and we can only thank you. You can have a mind at rest.”

“I don't think Aunt Sukey had any feeling that she was worse that morning,” said Anna, in a tone that seemed to reassure both herself and other people. “I don't think she had any inkling that things were as they were. I only thought she was suffering from some sort of shock or strain. I had no other idea. And her mind was quite at rest when she went to sleep. I am sure you need not fear that she was keeping anything from you.”

Thomas and his wife looked at each other, almost without knowing that they did so. The interplay of thought was hardly conscious, but Jessica's eyes were more direct on her niece.

“You know that my sister had made a fresh will more than once before,” she said, in a more natural tone than anyone else could have used on such a subject; “and that each time she destroyed it. It was one of her ways of easing her mind; her life had become too much for her. But she never altered the one that was kept in her desk. She never laid a hand on it, except to use it as a basis for another.” Jessica's faint smile was as open as it was pitiful. She was as honest on her feelings for her sister, as she was on anything else; a want of sincerity would have seemed to her wrong. “It seems to me that she must have made a mistake. How does it seem to you?”

“I have not thought anything about it,” said Anna, looking into her aunt's eyes for one swift moment. “I knew nothing about her wills; I believe I had never thought about people's making them. I have heard about this one, of course; Father told us when he came home; but I had no idea what Aunt Sukey had to leave, or if she had anything. I believe I had a sort of notion that she lived at the expense of the household; something seemed somehow to suggest it. I don't know much more now. I know no more than he said. How could I?”

“You could not, of course. But now you know what I have told you.”

“I don't feel that I know much,” said Anna, putting back her hair once again. “It seems to me that no one can know anything. It must be all conjecture and imagination, anything one tries to construct. I think it is better not to build up theories. They only lead one further from the truth.”

“But we need not neglect what we know to be the truth,” said Thomas.

“We are not neglecting it, are we? But we know so little. Just that Aunt Sukey was burning papers, and only left this will behind. Just that and no more.”

“Even if she burnt the old will on purpose,” said Jessica, in the same tone, “it seems that it was essentially a mistake. A mistake in the sense that she would have rectified it, when she was herself. Do you not agree with me, my dear?”

“I don't understand all these thoughts and feelings about wills,” said Anna, in a bewildered tone. “I had never thought about such things; I don't remember that we ever talked about them. I suppose Mother made a will; indeed I know she did, because she left most of her money to Father, and just a little to each of us. But we never thought of disputing it; we just accepted it as it stood, even though she was ill when she made it, as I believe she was. I suppose people often are ill, when they come to do that particular
thing. I thought people simply accepted wills. I thought it was the law, in so far as I thought about it at all.”

“For a person who thought so little, you came to sound conclusions,” said Thomas. “No one would dispute this will; there is no ground for doing so. We could not say that your aunt was mentally unsound; we do not think so. But we feel that she was not herself, when she made this change. And we want to find out what her real wishes were; and we want you to help us, so that we can carry them out together.”

“But, how can I do anything? I know absolutely nothing. Aunt Sukey never spoke to me about such things. I wish I had had her full confidence, but I had not. And I can't make things up; I am not a person who can do it. I only find myself floundering deeper in the mire. And you are sneering at me already. I will not commit myself by another word.”

“Making things up would clearly not lead us to the truth,” said Jessica.

“Not to the real truth, of course. It depends where people want to be led. As regards the real truth, I can say no more. Aunt Sukey was clear about what she had done. She would not have slept, if she had been in doubt. You know her well enough to realise that.”

“We cannot assume anything about her state, an hour before her death,” said Thomas. “She could hardly have been in a normal one, and her actions may not have been her own.”

“Her feelings may have gone further than usual,” said Jessica, in a musing tone. “But they had passed when I left her. I know that I saw them pass. If she did not burn the wrong will by accident, which is the most likely solution, she must have hidden her mind in a way quite foreign to herself. It is another proof that she was in an unnatural state. If I were not sure beyond doubt, I would not say a word of it.”

“I know you would not,” said Anna; “I don't suppose
anyone would, or anyhow anyone here. No one would build on anything that was not real evidence. There would be no end to the constructions that could be made.”

“She would have wished to put right what she had done,” said Jessica, half to herself. “And so Anna must wish to do it for her. I cannot see it in any other way, and so I do not suppose she can. She can make over the money by deed of gift; it will be no trouble for her.” Jessica did not suggest, or mean to suggest, that generosity would be involved. Her niece might shrink from perplexing formalities, but would do the only thing to be done.

“By deed of gift,” said Anna, seeming inclined to laugh. “I never heard that phrase before, but it sounds a very good one. That would be a neat way of dealing with bequests, as they arose; just to render them null and void.” She laughed again, as if she could not help it.

“What do your brothers think about it?” said Thomas.

“We did not know Aunt Sukey well enough to have an opinion,” said Bernard.

“What do you think, Benjamin?”

“As Bernard does, though it may seem strange for me to say it. I thought I knew my sister, but there may have been things that I did not know. When I came back into her life, I found that there were. I was surprised by the will, but I have been surprised by wills before. Indeed I have never met a will that did not surprise someone. I have no ground on which to advise my daughter. Many people would alter their wills, if they died at some other time.”

“What does Mr. Terence think?” said Anna, in an almost rallying tone.

“I knew Aunt Sukey too well, to take any view but my mother's. But I do not feel that adjustment must necessarily follow.”

“Did you know her so well?” said Anna, looking at him as if in some curiosity.

“Yes, I went through your stage with her, and remained in it longer. But it came to an end with me, as it would have with you.”

“I never felt it was a stage,” said Anna, speaking to herself in the manner of Jessica.

“She could not stay the course with anyone,” said Terence.

“Ought not that to be put the other way round?”

“I daresay it ought in a sense. She wore us all down, as you say.”

“I never knew such a family for giving turns and twists to people's minds and phrases,” said Anna, in a bewildered manner. “I said and meant nothing of the sort. She never wore me down. I felt that I should come to see her every day of my life. I had no thought of its all breaking up so soon. And Father felt the same. It is only fair to her to say it.”

“It is, my dear,” said Jessica. “And it is good for us to know it; good in two senses, you might say. We have dealt with the matter now; and when you have judged it in the light of what you have heard, you will tell me. And if you say nothing, I shall know we are not of one mind.”

“What does Tullia think?” said Anna, looking at her cousin.

“I have not followed the matter,” said the latter, withdrawing her eyes from the window. “I hardly grasp what it has been about. Wills and bequests and other kindred things. I thought they were managed by lawyers behind the scenes. I did not know they came into the light of day.”

“They are the affair of people who have gone,” said Bernard. “That puts them out of harmony with those who are left.”

“Something does,” said his brother.

“Well, are there no other topics of conversation?” said Tullia.

“I was beginning to wonder that,” said Anna. “I was going to ask for a photograph of Aunt Sukey. Even Father
has not one of her. She was going to give me one, but the subject passed off somehow.''

“Was she?” said Jessica, looking at her niece. “She never had her photograph taken. She thought she photographed badly, and she destroyed all those we had in the house. And they did not do her justice. She had not been taken for thirty years. I don't know what she could have meant by that.”

“Or have I got it twisted in some way? That would be rather in my character. I asked her if she would have her portrait painted. And she said she would give me a photograph of it, if she ever did. I think that was it. She did not seem so averse from that. It is like me to turn a little matter the wrong way round. Happily, I get a better grasp of big ones.”

“That must seem a painfully apposite metaphor,” murmured Esmond.

“We shall always regret that that was not done,” said Jessica. “I wish we had made a point of it.”

“But why didn't you?” said Anna, in an insistent tone. “It would have been a satisfaction to Aunt Sukey to feel there was a record of her. And now it would be an advantage to everyone.”

“We had her with us herself then. It is more natural to want the record of her now.”

“When it is too late,” said her niece.

“We cannot live on the edge of someone's grave,” said Terence, “and keep the person herself looking down into it.”

“Another distortion of my thoughts and feelings,” said his cousin. “I wonder you ever get a right impression of anyone. I don't suppose you ever do.”

“It is a time when we are shaken out of ourselves,” said Jessica. “We owe so much to each other, and we give so little.”

“Another pointed metaphor,” said Esmond.

“Will you be able to use the room now?” said Anna,
with awkward suddenness, as if her mind had passed to another subject. “Aunt Sukey's room, I mean. Or will it be established as a sort of shrine? I don't think I could ever go into it again.”

“Then it does not matter to you what purpose it is to serve,” said Esmond.

“Well, will you make a habit of frequenting it, yourself?”

“I shall make it into a study for your uncle,” said Jessica, addressing them both. “He has always wanted a west room, and has never been able to have one. He will not like the room any less for its memories.”

“Gracious, that is a quick way of using up what is left,” said Anna, dropping her voice and raising her brows towards her brothers. “It is an ill wind that blows nobody any good.”

“As you have found, yourself,” said Esmond.

“Well, I said it, didn't I?”

“With regard to other people you did.”