The Experiences of a Barrister, and Confessions of an Attorney Part 11

"Capital!--glorious!" rejoined Ferret; and I thought he was about to perform a salutatory movement, that must have brought his cranium into damaging contact with the chandelier under which he was standing. "Is it not delightful? How every one--especially an attorney--loves a generous giver!"

Mr. Richards appeared to be rendered somewhat uneasy by these strange demonstrations. He knew Ferret well, and evidently suspected that something was wrong somewhere. "Perhaps, Mr. Quillet," said he, "you had better read the will at once."

This was done: the instrument devised in legal and minute form all the property, real and personal, to Giulletta Corelli--a natural-born subject of his majesty, it appeared, though of foreign parentage, and of partially foreign education.

"Allow me to say," broke in Mr. Ferret, interrupting me as I was about to speak--"allow me to say, Mr. Richards, that that will does you credit: it is, I should say, a first-rate affair, for a country pract.i.tioner especially. But of course you submitted the draught to counsel?"

"Certainly I did," said Richards tartly.

"No doubt--no doubt. Clearness and precision like that could only have proceeded from a master's hand. I shall take a copy of that will, Richards, for future guidance, you may depend, the instant it is registered in Doctors' Commons."

"Come, come, Mr. Ferret," said I; "this jesting is all very well; but it is quite time the farce should end."

"Farce!" exclaimed Mr. Richards.

"Farce!" growled doubtful Mr. Quillet.

"Farce!" murmured the beautiful Giulletta.

"Farce!" cried Mr. Ferret. "My dear sir, it is about one of the most charming and genteel comedies ever enacted on any stage, and the princ.i.p.al part, too, by one of the most charming of prima donnas. Allow me, sir--don't interrupt me! it is too delicious to be shared; it is, indeed. Mr. Richards, and you, Mr. Quillet, will you permit me to observe that this admirable will has _one_ slight defect?"

"A defect!--where--how?"

"It is really heart-breaking that so much skill and ingenuity should be thrown away; but the fact is, gentlemen, that the excellent person who signed it had no property to bequeath!"

"How?"

"Not a shilling's worth. Allow me, sir, if you please. This piece of parchment, gentlemen, is, I have the pleasure to inform you, a marriage settlement."

"A marriage settlement!" exclaimed both the men of law in a breath.

"A marriage settlement, by which, in the event of Mr. Harlowe's decease, his entire property pa.s.ses to his wife, in trust for the children, if any; and if not, absolutely to herself." Ferret threw the deed on the table, and then giving way to convulsive mirth, threw himself upon the sofa, and fairly shouted with glee.

Mr. Quillet seized the doc.u.ment, and, with Richards, eagerly perused it.

The proctor then rose, and bowing gravely to his astonished client, said, "The will, madam, is waste paper. You have been deceived." He then left the apartment.

The consternation of the lady and her attorney may be conceived. Madam Corelli, giving way to her fiery pa.s.sions, vented her disappointment in pa.s.sionate reproaches of the deceased; the only effect of which was to lay bare still more clearly than before her own cupidity and folly, and to increase Edith's painful agitation. I led her down stairs to my wife, who, I omitted to mention, had accompanied us from town, and remained in the library with the children during our conference. In a very short time afterwards Mr. Ferret had cleared the house of its intrusive guests, and we had leisure to offer our condolences and congratulations to our grateful and interesting client. It was long before Edith recovered her former gaiety and health; and I doubt if she would ever have thoroughly regained her old cheerfulness and elasticity of mind, had it not been for her labor of love in superintending and directing the education of her daughter Helen, a charming girl, who fortunately inherited nothing from her father but his wealth. The last time I remember to have danced was at Helen's wedding. She married a distinguished Irish gentleman, with whom, and her mother, I perceive by the newspapers, she appeared at Queen Victoria's court in Dublin, one, I am sure, of the brightest stars which glittered in that galaxy of beauty and fashion.

THE SECOND MARRIAGE.

A busy day in the a.s.size court at Chester, chequered, as usual, by alternate victory and defeat, had just terminated, and I was walking briskly forth, when an attorney of rather low _caste_ in his profession--being princ.i.p.ally employed as an intermediary between needy felons and the counsel practising in the Crown Court--accosted me, and presented a brief; at the same time tendering the fee of two guineas marked upon it.

"I am engaged to-morrow, Mr. Barnes," I exclaimed a little testily, "on the civil side: besides, you know I very seldom take briefs in the Crown Court, even if proffered in due time; and to-morrow will be the last day of the a.s.size in Chester! There are plenty of unemployed counsel who will be glad of your brief."

"It is a brief in an action of ejectment," replied the attorney--"Woodley _versus_ Thornd.y.k.e; and is brought to recover possession of a freehold estate now held and farmed by the defendant."

"An action of ejectment to recover possession of a freehold estate!

defended, too, I know, by a powerful bar; for I was offered a brief, but declined it. Mr. P ---- leads; and you bring me this for the plaintiff, and at the last moment too! You must be crazed."

"I told the plaintiff and her grandfather," rejoined Mr. Barnes, "that it was too late to bespeak counsel's attention to the case; and that the fee, all they have, with much difficulty, been able to raise, was ridiculously small; but they insisted on my applying to you--Oh, here they are!"

We had by this time reached the street, and the attorney pointed towards two figures standing in att.i.tudes of anxious suspense near the gateway.

It was dusk, but there was quite sufficient light to distinguish the pale and interesting features of a young female, dressed in faded and scanty mourning, and accompanied by a respectable-looking old man with white hair, and a countenance deeply furrowed by age and grief.

"I told you, Miss Woodley," said the attorney, "that this gentleman would decline the brief, especially with such a fee"--

"It is not the fee, man!" I observed, for I was somewhat moved by the appealing dejection exhibited by the white-haired man and his timid grand-daughter; "but what chance can I have of establishing this person's right--if right she have--to the estate she claims, thus suddenly called upon to act without previous consultation; and utterly ignorant, except as far as this I perceive hastily-scrawled brief will instruct me, both of the nature of the plaintiff's claim and of the defence intended to be set up against it?"

"If you would undertake it, sir," said the young woman with a tremulous, hesitating voice and glistening eyes, "for _his_ sake"--and she glanced at her aged companion--"who will else be helpless, homeless."

"The blessing of those who are ready to perish will be yours, sir," said the grandfather with meek solemnity, "if you will lend your aid in this work of justice and mercy. We have no hope of withstanding the masterful violence and wrong of wicked and powerful men except by the aid of the law, which we have been taught will ever prove a strong tower of defence to those who walk in the paths of peace and right."

The earnestness of the old man's language and manner, and the pleading gentleness of the young woman, forcibly impressed me; and, albeit, it was a somewhat unprofessional mode of business, I determined to hear their story from their own lips, rather than take it from the scrawled brief, or through the verbal medium of their attorney.

"You have been truly taught," I answered; "and if really ent.i.tled to the property you claim, I know of no masterful men that in this land of England can hinder you from obtaining possession of it. Come to my hotel in about an hour and a-half from hence: I shall then have leisure to hear what you have to say. This fee," I added, taking the two guineas from the hand of the attorney, who still held the money ready for my acceptance, "you must permit me to return. It is too much for you to pay for losing your cause; and if I gain it--but mind I do not promise to take it into court unless I am thoroughly satisfied you have right and equity on your side--I shall expect a much heavier one. Mr. Barnes, I will see you, if you please, early in the morning." I then bowed, and hastened on.

Dinner was not ready when I arrived at the hotel; and during the short time I had to wait, I more than half repented of having had anything to do with this unfortunate suit. However, the pleadings of charity, the suggestions of human kindness, rea.s.serted their influence; and by the time my new clients arrived, which they did very punctually at the hour I had indicated, I had quite regained the equanimity I had momentarily lost, and, thanks to mine host's excellent viands and generous wine, was, for a lawyer, in a very amiable and benevolent humor indeed.

Our conference was long, anxious, and unsatisfactory. I was obliged to send for Barnes before it concluded, in order to thoroughly ascertain the precise nature of the case intended to be set up for the defendant, and the evidence likely to be adduced in support of it. No ray of consolation or of hope came from that quarter. Still, the narrative I had just listened to, bearing as it did the impress of truth and sincerity in every sentence, strongly disposed me to believe that foul play has been practised by the other side; and I determined, at all hazards, to go into court, though with but faint hope indeed of a _present_ successful issue.

"It appears more than probable," I remarked on dismissing my clients, "that this will is a fabrication; but before such a question had been put in issue before a jury, some producible evidence of its being so should have been sought for and obtained. As it is, I can only watch the defendant's proof of the genuineness of the instrument upon which he has obtained probate: one or more of the attesting witnesses _may_, if fraud has been practised, break down under a searching cross-examination, or incidentally perhaps disclose matter for further investigation."

"One of the attesting witnesses is, as I have already told you, dead,"

observed Barnes; "and another, Elizabeth Wareing, has, I hear, to-day left the country. An affidavit to that effect will no doubt be made to-morrow, in order to enable them to give secondary evidence of her attestation, though, swear as they may, I have not the slightest doubt I could find her if time were allowed, and her presence would at all avail us."

"Indeed! This is very important. Would you, Mr. Barnes, have any objection," I added, after a few moments' reflection, "to make oath, should the turn of affairs to-morrow render your doing so desirable, of your belief that you could, reasonable time being allowed, procure the attendance of this woman--this Elizabeth Wareing?"

"Not the slightest: though how that would help us to invalidate the will Thornd.y.k.e claims under I do not understand."

"Perhaps not. At all events do not fail to be early in court. The cause is the first in to-morrow's list, remember."

The story confided to me was a very sad, and, unfortunately in many of its features, a very common one. Ellen, the only child of the old gentleman, Thomas Ward, had early in life married Mr. James Woodley, a wealthy yeoman, prosperously settled upon his paternal acres, which he cultivated with great diligence and success. The issue of this marriage--a very happy one, I was informed--was Mary Woodley, the plaintiff in the present action. Mr. Woodley, who had now been dead something more than two years, bequeathed the whole of his property, real and personal, to his wife, in full confidence, as he expressed himself but a few hours before he expired, that she would amply provide for his and her child. The value of the property inherited by Mrs. Woodley under this will amounted, according to a valuation made a few weeks after the testator's decease, to between eight and nine thousand pounds.

Respected as a widow, comfortable in circ.u.mstances, and with a daughter to engage her affections, Mrs. Woodley might have pa.s.sed the remainder of her existence in happiness. But how frequently do women peril and lose all by a second marriage! Such was the case with Mrs. Woodley: to the astonishment of everybody, she threw herself away on a man almost unknown in the district--a person of no fortune, of mean habits, and altogether unworthy of accepting as a husband. Silas Thornd.y.k.e, to whom she thus committed her happiness, had for a short time acted as bailiff on the farm; and no sooner did he feel himself master, than his subserviency was changed to selfish indifference, and that gradually a.s.sumed a coa.r.s.er character. He discovered that the property, by the will of Mr. Woodley, was no secured against every chance or casualty to the use and enjoyment of his wife, that it not only did not pa.s.s by marriage to the new bridegroom, but she was unable to alienate or divest herself of any portion of it during life. She could, however, dispose of it by will; but in the event of her dying intestate, the whole descended to her daughter, Mary Woodley.

Incredibly savage was Thornd.y.k.e when he made that discovery; and bitter and incessant were the indignities to which he subjected his unfortunate wife, for the avowed purpose of forcing her to make a will entirely in his favor, and of course disinheriting her daughter. These persecutions failed of their object. An unexpected, quiet, pa.s.sive, but unconquerable resistance, was opposed by the, in all other things, cowed and submissive woman, to this demand of her domineering husband. Her failing health--for gently nurtured and tenderly cherished as she had ever been, the callous brutality of her husband soon told upon the unhappy creature--warned her that Mary would soon be an orphan, and that upon her firmness it depended whether the child of him to whose memory she had been, so fatally for herself, unfaithful, should be cast homeless and penniless upon the world, or inherit the wealth to which, by every principle of right and equity, she was ent.i.tled. Come what may, this trust at least should not, she mentally resolved, be betrayed or paltered with. Every imaginable expedient to vanquish her resolution was resorted to. Thornd.y.k.e picked a quarrel with Ward her father, who had lived at Dale Farm since the morrow of her marriage with Woodley, and the old gentleman was compelled to leave, and take up his abode with a distant and somewhat needy relative. Next Edward Wilford, the only son of a neighboring and prosperous farmer, who had been betrothed to Mary Woodley several months before her father's death, was brutally insulted, and forbidden the house. All, however, failed to shake the mother's resolution; and at length, finding all his efforts fruitless, Thornd.y.k.e appeared to yield the point, and upon this subject at least ceased to hara.s.s his unfortunate victim.

Frequent private conferences were now held between Thornd.y.k.e, his two daughters, and Elizabeth Wareing--a woman approaching middle-age, whom, under the specious pretence that Mrs. Thornd.y.k.e's increasing ailments rendered the services of an experienced matron indispensable, he had lately installed at the farm. It was quite evident to both the mother and daughter that a much greater degree of intimacy subsisted between the master and housekeeper than their relative positions warranted; and from some expressions heedlessly dropped by the woman, they suspected them to have been once on terms of confidential intimacy. Thornd.y.k.e, I should have mentioned, was not a native of these parts: he had answered Mr.

Woodley's advertis.e.m.e.nt for a bailiff, and his testimonials appearing satisfactory, he had been somewhat precipitately engaged. A young man, calling himself Edward Wareing, the son of Elizabeth Wareing, and said to be engaged in an attorney's office in Liverpool, was also a not unfrequent visitor at Dale Farm; and once he had the insolent presumption to address a note to Mary Woodley, formally tendering his hand and fortune! This, however, did not suit Mr. Thornd.y.k.e's views, and Mr.

Edward Wareing was very effectually rebuked and silenced by his proposed father-in-law.

Mrs. Thornd.y.k.e's health rapidly declined. The woman Wareing, touched possibly by sympathy or remorse, exhibited considerable tenderness and compa.s.sion towards the invalid; made her nourishing drinks, and administered the medicine prescribed by the village pract.i.tioner--who, after much delay and _pooh, poohing_ by Thornd.y.k.e, had been called in--with her own hands. About three weeks previous to Mrs. Thornd.y.k.e's death, a sort of reconciliation was patched up through her instrumentality between the husband and wife; and an unwonted expression of kindness and compa.s.sion, real or simulated, sat upon Thornd.y.k.e's features every time he approached the dying woman.

The sands of life ebbed swiftly with Mrs. Thornd.y.k.e. Infolded in the gentle but deadly embrace with which consumption seizes its victims, she wasted rapidly away; and, most perplexing symptoms of all, violent retchings and nausea, especially after taking her medicine--which, according to Davis, the village surgeon, was invariable of a sedative character--aggravated and confirmed the fatal disease which was hurrying her to the tomb.