The Greatest Murder Mysteries - G.A. Henty Edition. G. A. Henty
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Here was my little sister Polly, whom I had always looked upon as a mere child, thinking and talking like a woman, and a very sensible, loving woman, too. I felt that in that half hour's conversation my child-sister was gone for ever, and that I had gained in her place a dear friend in whom I could trust and confide every secret of my heart. As for Harry, he was completely silenced.
"Well, oh most sapient brother," Polly asked, turning to him in her old laughing way, "do you confess that all this never entered into your mind; indeed, that you knew no more about it than the man in the moon?"
"By Jove!" Harry said with a great effort, "I confess you have fairly astonished me, as much by yourself as by your story. I think that you are right, and that in these matters you are more of a woman than I am of a man. How you found this all out I cannot conceive; it certainly never entered into my head. I thought of the effect which the money would have upon myself, and upon you, but Agnes I hardly took into consideration. I thought of her marriage with Percy as a sort of settled thing, and knowing him to have a handsome allowance, I never gave her case a second thought. But I see you are quite right, and that we must, of course, accept this money."
"Indeed, we will not," I said; "with my consent, this money shall never be accepted."
"That is not fair, Agnes," Polly said. "You know we agreed that two votes should carry the day."
"I did, Polly; but I have a right to say what I think about it before it is put to the vote. I acknowledge all that Polly has said about my affairs to be true. I allow that I do believe that my marriage with Percy depends upon this will being found. But for all that, I say we cannot take this money. These women have robbed us of £25,000 each; they have robbed Sophy of £75,000; robbed us as actually as if they had stolen it from our possession—and now they offer, as a gift, £10,000 each to us. If we take it, it is on an understanding that we renounce all further claim, that we receive it as a free gift from these enemies of ours; and by this act not only should we, as it were, pledge ourselves to make no further efforts to find the will, we should not only sell our birthright to our enemies, but we should be bound to desert Sophy, and so leave her in hopeless poverty, for without our assistance she has not the slightest chance of ever finding the will. All this would be a miserable degradation—a degradation so deep that nothing could satisfy our own consciences to it; even my marriage to Percy could not reconcile it to myself, and he himself would blame me for it. No, no, dears, this would be a shameful action. Let us refuse it at once. You, I know, would do it for my sake; but I would not do it for myself, much less allow you to do so. We have really, at present, strong hopes of finding the will; let us trust to that; let us believe that in the end we shall be righted. If not, God's will be done. The evil may seem to prosper at present, but at any rate let us make no terms with it."
Polly and Harry were both silent. Polly was crying fast now—crying, that her little scheme for my happiness had failed; but yet they both felt as I did, and she could urge nothing further.
"There, dears, I know you both agree with me in your hearts, so let us say no more about it."
And so it was settled; and when papa came in soon after, I told him that we were unanimously of opinion that the money could not be accepted. Papa then said, that although he had not wished to bias us in our decision, yet that he quite agreed with us, and was very glad we had so decided. So the next day he wrote to Miss Harmer, acknowledging the receipt of her letter, and stating that, for various reasons into which it was not necessary to enter, we felt ourselves obliged to decline the offer. This affair had one consequence among us, and that was, that Polly henceforth occupied a very different position amongst us from what she had heretofore done. Harry looked up to her as a prodigy of intellect and acuteness; and I myself felt deeply not only her intelligence, but the thoughtful, loving kindness she had evinced towards me. From that time Polly became quite one of ourselves; and, indeed, I think that insensibly she fell into her natural position as the clever one of the family.
Chapter VI.
The Priest's Chamber.
I was very glad that Polly had left school and come home for good. It was far more cheerful and pleasant than it had been at all since I left school. Polly made the place so cheerful with her bright happy smile, and was so full of life and fun, that I never found time to sit and muse, and wonder and fret over the future, as I had done before she came home. She never left me long alone for any time, but every day would make me go out for long walks with her, and indeed devoted herself entirely to cheering and amusing me. Papa too very much recovered his spirits under her genial influence; and altogether she made our home much brighter and more cheerful than before.
So our life went on for nearly three months, and then one Friday evening I was told that Sarah was below waiting to speak to me. I was rather surprised, for she had been to the house very seldom before, and then always on Sunday evenings.
However, the moment she came in, I saw that she had something very important to tell. Her bright face was quite pale with excitement, and her whole figure was in a nervous tremble.
"Oh, miss," she burst out directly the door was closed behind her, "Oh, miss, I have found the secret door!"
Although I had tried all along to hope that she would some day do so, that hope had been so long deferred that it had almost died away; and now at the sudden news, I felt all the blood rush to my heart, the room swam round with me, and I sat on a chair quite overwhelmed by the sudden shock.
"Shall I get you some water, miss?"
"No, no, Sarah, I shall be myself in a minute or two."
I had to sit quiet a little time, before I could steady myself sufficiently to listen to the account of the wonderful discovery, which was to lead to fortune and happiness. Then I said,—
"I am not very strong, Sarah, and the surprise has been almost too much for me, for I own I hardly expected that you ever would find it. Now tell me all about it, or stay, let me ask papa and my sister to come in to share in this wonderful news of yours." So saying, I ran down to the study where papa was busy writing.
"Papa," I said, "I want you to come up stairs directly."
"What for my dear? I am really very busy at present."
"Never mind, papa; but put by your writing at once and come up. Sarah is here, and oh, papa, she has found the secret door."
"That is news, indeed!" papa said, pushing back his chair at once; "I am sure I never expected it."
So saying, he followed me upstairs. I called Polly as we went up, and she came running up after us, and as she went into the drawing-room with me, I whispered to her that the secret door was found. She gave me a little squeeze of congratulation, and I saw that even in that first flush of pleasure at the news, it was only the consequences to me that she thought of, and that her own personal interest in the matter never entered into her mind.
"Well, Sarah," papa began, "so I hear you have discovered the secret entrance at last."
"Yes sir, I have. From the time I found the first spring at Christmas, I have never ceased looking for another one. I had felt every knob on the fireplace and chimneypiece, and every stone up the chimney as far as I could reach. You know, sir, it is only in the half hour I get of a morning by being up before the other servants that I can try; indeed I only have half that time, for I must get some of the shutters open and appear to have began to do something to account for my time. Well, sir, at last I really seemed to have tried everywhere, and I almost gave up all hope of finding it, although I had quite made up my mind to go on searching as long as I stayed there, even if it was for ten years. Well, sir, yesterday morning I quite got out of temper with the thing, and I sat down on the ground in the great fireplace quite out of heart; my face was quite close to the great iron dogs, so I said, "Drat you, you look for all the world as if you were putting out your long tongues at me;" and I took hold of the tongue nearest to me, and gave it a twist, and do you know, sir, it quite gave me a turn to find that the tongue twisted round in my hand. I twisted