Domestic fiction; Inheritance and succession -- Fiction; Wales -- Fiction
It was a moment of great triumph and of utter dismay,--of triumph
to Mr Apjohn, and of dismay to Cousin Henry. The two men at this
moment,--as Mr Brodrick was looking at the papers,--were struggling
together upon the ground. Cousin Henry, in his last frantic efforts,
had striven to escape from the grasp of his enemy so as to seize
the will, not remembering that by seizing it now he could retrieve
nothing. Mr Apjohn had been equally determined that ample time should
be allowed to Mr Brodrick to secure any document that might be found,
and, with the pugnacity which the state of fighting always produces,
had held on to his prey with a firm grip. Now for the one man there
remained nothing but dismay; for the other was the full enjoyment of
the triumph produced by his own sagacity. "Here is the date," said
Mr Brodrick, who had retreated with the paper to the furthest corner
of the room. "It is undoubtedly my brother-in-law's last will and
testament, and, as far as I can see at a glance, it is altogether
regular."
"You dog!" exclaimed Mr Apjohn, spurning Cousin Henry away from him.
"You wretched, thieving miscreant!" Then he got up on to his legs
and began to adjust himself, setting his cravat right, and smoothing
his hair with his hands. "The brute has knocked the breath out of
me," he said. "But only to think that we should catch him after such
a fashion as this!" There was a note of triumph in his voice which
he found it impossible to repress. He was thoroughly proud of his
achievement. It was a grand thing to him that Isabel Brodrick should
at last get the property which he had so long been anxious to secure
for her; but at the present moment it was a grander thing to have hit
the exact spot in which the document had been hidden by sheer force
of intelligence.
What little power of fighting there had ever been in Cousin Henry
had now been altogether knocked out of him. He attempted no further
struggle, uttered no denial, nor did he make any answer to the words
of abuse which Mr Apjohn had heaped on his head. He too raised
himself from the floor, slowly collecting his limbs together, and
seated himself in the chair nearest at hand, hiding his face with his
hand.
"That is the most wonderful thing that ever came within my
experience," said Mr Brodrick.
"That the man should have hidden the will?" asked Mr Apjohn.
"Why do you say I hid it?" moaned Cousin Henry.
"You reptile!" exclaimed Mr Apjohn.
"Not that he should have hidden it," said the Hereford attorney, "but
that you should have found it, and found it without any search;--that
you should have traced it down to the very book in which the old man
must have left it!"
"Yes," said Cousin Henry. "He left it there. I did not hide it."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Elsewhere in the archive
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account