Hester was exonerating her late master from any neglect of herself and Aleck, and in so doing she made the lawyer forget to ask if she had ever heard of a second will made by Squire Irving. The old lawyer Schofield would have done so, but the son was young and inexperienced, and not given to suspecting everybody. Besides that, he liked Roger. He knew it was right that he should be the heir, and believed he was, and that Mrs. Walter Scott was altogether mistaken in her ideas. Still he suggested that there could be no harm in searching among the squire’s papers. And Mrs. Walter Scott did search, assisted by Roger, who told her of a secret drawer in the writing-desk and opened it himself for her inspection, finding nothing there but a time-worn letter and a few faded flowers,—lilies of the valley,—which must have been worn in Jessie’s hair, for there was a golden thread twisted in among the faded blossoms. That secret drawer was the sepulchre of all the love and romance of the old squire’s later marriage, and it seemed to both Mrs. Walter Scott and Roger like a grave which they had sacrilegiously invaded. So they closed it reverently, with its withered blossoms and mementos of a past which never ought to have been. But afterward, Roger went back to the secret drawer, and took therefrom the flowers, and the letter written by Jessie to her aged suitor a few weeks before her marriage. These, with the letter written on the sea, were sacred to him, and he put them away where no curious eyes could find them. There had been a few words of consultation between Roger and Lawyer Schofield, and then, with a hint that he was always at Roger’s service, the lawyer had taken his leave, remarking to Mrs. Walter Scott, as he did so: “I thought you would find yourself mistaken; still you might investigate a little further.” He meant to be polite, but there was a tinge of sarcasm in his tone, which the lady recognized, and inwardly resented. She had fallen in his opinion, and she knew it, and carried herself loftily until he said to Roger,— “I had an appointment to meet your father in his library the very evening he died. He wished to make a change in his will, and I think, perhaps, he intended doing better by the young boy, Frank. At least, that is possible, and you may deem it advisable to act as if you knew that was his intention, you have an immense amount of money at your command, for your father was the richest man in the county.” Frank had long ago gone back to the kitchen and the baby. He had no special interest in what they were talking about, nor was it needful that he should have. He was safe with Roger, who, to the lawyer’s suggestion, replied: “I shall do Frank justice, as I am sure he would have done me, had the tables been reversed.”