Cap'n Dan's Daughter Part 7

"But WHAT foolishness was that about a cousin in California?"

"'Twa'n't foolishness, I tell you. You ask any one of a dozen folks you meet outside the post-office now, and they'll all tell you you had one. They might not agree whether 'twas a cousin or a grandmother or a step-child, or whether it lived in Californy or the Cape of Good Hope, but they all know it's dead now, and we've got anywheres from a postage stamp to a hogshead of diamonds. Serena, if you hear yells for help this afternoon, don't pay any attention. It'll only mean that my patience has run out and I'm tryin' to make this community short one devilish fool at least. There'll be enough left; he'll never be missed."

"Daniel, I never saw you so worked up. You must expect people to be excited. I'm excited myself."

The captain wiped his forehead with his napkin. "_I_ ain't exactly a graven image, now that you mention it," he admitted. "But you and I have got some excuse and they ain't. Haven't they been in to see you; or did you lock the doors?"

"I have had callers, of course. Mrs. Berry was here, and Mrs. Tripp, and the Cahoon girls, and Issachar Eldredge's wife. The first four pretended they came on lodge business, and the Eldredge woman to get my recipe for chocolate doughnuts; but, of course, I knew what they really came for.

Daniel, HOW do you suppose the news got out so soon? I didn't tell a soul and you promised you wouldn't."

"I didn't, neither. Probably that lawyer man dropped a hint down at the Manonquit House, and that set things goin'. Just heave over one seed of a yarn in most any hotel or boardin' house and you'll have a crop of lies next mornin' that would load a three-master. They come up in the night, like toadstools."

"But you didn't tell anyone how much your Aunt Lavinia left us?"

"You bet I didn't. I told 'em I didn't know yet. I was cal'latin' to hire a couple of dozen men and a boy to count it, and soon's the job was finished I'd get out a proclamation. What did you tell your gang?"

"I simply said," Serena unconsciously drew herself up and spoke with a gracious dignity; "I said they might quote me as saying it was NOT a million."

Azuba entered from the kitchen, heaving a steaming platter.

"There!" she exclaimed, setting the dish before her employers; "I don't know as clam fritters are what rich folks ought to eat, but I done the best I could. I'm so shook up and trembly this day it's a mercy I didn't fry the platter."

Yes, something had happened to the Dotts, something vastly more wonderful and surprising than falling heir to three thousand dollars and a silver tea-pot. When Captain Daniel shut up the Metropolitan Store the previous evening and started for the house, the bearer of the great news was on his way from the Manonquit House, where he had had supper. When Serena bewailed her fate and expressed a desire for an opportunity, he was almost at the front gate, and the ring of the bell which interrupted her conversation with her husband was the signal that Opportunity, in the person of Mr. Glenn Farwell, Junior, newest member of the firm of Shepley and Farwell, attorneys, of Boston, was at the door.

Mr. Farwell was spruce and brisk and businesslike; also he was young, a fact which he tried to conceal by a rather feeble beard, and much professional dignity of manner and expression. Occasionally, in the heat of conversation, he forgot the dignity; the beard he never forgot. Shown into the Dott sitting-room by Azuba, who, as usual, had neglected to remove her kitchen ap.r.o.n, he bowed politely and inquired if he had the pleasure of addressing Captain and Mrs. Daniel Abner Dott. The captain a.s.sured him that he had. Serena was too busy glaring at the ap.r.o.n and its wearer to remember etiquette.

"Won't you--won't you sit down, Mr. er--er--" began the captain.

Mr. Farwell introduced himself, and sat down, as requested. After a glance about the room, which took in the upright piano--purchased second-hand when Gertrude first began her music lessons--the what-not, with its array of sh.e.l.ls, corals, miniature ships in bottles, and West Indian curiosities, and the crayon enlargement over the mantel of Captain Solon Dott, Daniel's grandfather, he proceeded directly to business.

"Captain Dott," he said, addressing that gentleman, but bowing politely to Serena to indicate that she was included in the question, "you received a letter from our firm about a week ago, did you not?"

Captain Dan, who had scarcely recovered from his surprise at his caller's ident.i.ty, shook his head. "As a matter of fact," he stammered, "I--I only got it to-day. It came all right, that is, it got as far as the post-office, but the postmaster, he handed it over to Balaam Hamilton, to bring to me. Well, Balaam is--well, his underpinnin's all right; he wears a number eleven shoe--but his top riggin' is kind of lackin' in spots. You'd understand if you knew him. He put the letter in his pocket and--"

"Mercy!" cut in Serena, impatiently, "what do you suppose Mr. Farwell cares about Balaam Hamilton? He forgot the letter, Mr. Farwell, and we only got it this morning. That is why it hasn't been answered. What about the letter?"

The visitor did not answer directly. "I see," he said. "That letter informed you that Mrs. Lavinia Dott--your aunt, Captain,--was dead, and that we, her legal representatives, having, as we supposed, her will in our possession, and being in charge of her affairs--"

Mrs. Dott interrupted. Her excitement had been growing ever since she learned the visitor's name and, although her husband did not notice the peculiar phrasing of the lawyer's sentence, she did.

"As you supposed?" she repeated. "You did have the will, didn't you?"

"We had a will, one which Mrs. Dott drew some eight or nine years ago.

But we received word from Italy only yesterday that there was another, a much more recent one, which superseded the one in our possession. Of course, that being the case, the bequests in the former were not binding upon the estate. That is to say, our will was not a will at all."

Serena gasped. She looked at her husband, and he at her.

"Then we--then she didn't leave us the three thousand dollars?" she cried.

"Or--or the tea-pot?" faltered Captain Dan.

Mr. Farwell smiled. He was having considerable fun out of the situation.

However, it would not do to keep possibly profitable clients in suspense too long, so he broke the news he had journeyed from Boston to impart.

"She left you a great deal more than that," he said. "In the former will, her cousin, Mr. Percy Hungerford of Scarford, was the princ.i.p.al legatee. He was a favorite of hers, I believe, and she left the bulk of her property--some hundred and twenty thousand dollars in securities, and her estate at Scarford--to him. But last February it appears that he and she had a falling out. He--Mr. Hungerford--is, so I am told, a good deal of a sport--ahem! that is, he is a young gentleman of fashionable and expensive tastes, and he wrote his aunt, asking for money, rather frequently. The February letter reached her when she was grouchy--er--not well, I mean, and she changed her will, practically disinheriting him. Under the new will he receives twenty thousand dollars in cash. The balance--" Mr. Farwell, who, during this long statement, had interspersed legal dignity of term with an occasional lapse into youthful idiom, now spoke with impressive solemnity,--"the balance," he said, "one hundred thousand in money and securities, and the house at Scarford, which is valued, I believe, at thirty-five thousand more, she leaves to you, as her only other relative, Captain Dott. I am here to congratulate you and to offer you my services and those of the firm, should you desire legal advice."

Having sprung his surprise, Mr. Farwell leaned back in his chair to enjoy the effect of the explosion. The first effect appeared to be the complete stupefaction of his hearers. Those which followed were characteristic.

"My soul and body!" gasped Captain Dan. "I--I--my land of love! And only this mornin' I was scared I couldn't pay my store bills!"

"A hundred thousand dollars!" cried Serena. "And that beautiful house at Scarford! OURS! Oh! oh! oh!"

Mr. Farwell crossed his knees. "A very handsome little windfall," he observed, with condescension.

"We get a hundred thousand!" murmured the captain. "My! I wish Father was alive to know about it. But, say, it's kind of rough on that young Hungerford, after expectin' so much, ain't it now!"

"A hundred thousand!" breathed his wife, her hands clasped. "And that lovely house! Why, we could move to Scarford to-morrow if we wanted to!

Yes, and live there! Oh--oh, Daniel! I--I don't know why I'm doing it, but I--I believe I'm going to cry."

Her husband rushed over to the couch and threw his arm about her shoulder.

"Go ahead, old lady," he commanded. "Cry, if you want to. I--I'm goin'

to do SOMETHIN' darn ridiculous, myself!"

Thus it was that Fortune and Opportunity came to the Dott door, and it was the news of the visitation, distorted and exaggerated, which set all Trumet by the ears next day.

Azuba's clam fritters were neglected that noon, just as breakfast had been. Neither Captain Dan nor his wife had slept, and they could not eat. They pretended to, they even tried to, but one or the other was certain to break out with an exclamation or a wondering surmise, and the meal was, as the captain said, "all talk and no substantials." They had scarcely risen from the table when the doorbell rang.

Azuba heard it and made her entrance from the kitchen. She had remembered this time to shed the offending ap.r.o.n, but she carried it in her hand.

"I'm a-goin'," she declared; "I'm a-goin', soon's ever I can."

She started for the sitting-room, but the captain stepped in front of her.

"You stay right where you are," he ordered. "I'll answer that bell myself this time."

"Daniel," cried his wife, "what are you going to do?"

"Do? I'm goin' to head off some more fools, that's what I'm goin' to do.

They shan't get in here to pester you to death with questions, not if I can help it."

"But, Daniel, you mustn't. You don't know who it may be."

"I don't care."

"Oh, dear me! What are you going to say? You mustn't insult people."

"I shan't insult 'em. I'll tell 'em--I'll tell 'em you're sick and can't see anybody."