Part 6 (1/2)
”And the youngest life might drop, the day after your own. You can't take it out of G.o.d's hand.”
”I must either let it go by law, or will it--here and there. I know enough whom it would help; but I want to invest, not spend it; to invest it in a life--or lives--that will carry it on from where I leave it. How shall I know?”
”He giveth it a body as it pleaseth Him,” quoted Marmaduke Wharne, thoughtfully. ”I am English, you know, Oldways; I can't help reverencing the claims of next of kin. Unless one is plainly shown otherwise, it seems the appointment. How can we set aside his ways until He clearly points us out his own exception?”
”My 'next' are two women whom I don't know, my niece's children. She died thirty years ago.”
”Perhaps you ought to know them.”
”I know _about_ them; I've kept the run; but I've held clear of family. They didn't need me, and I had no right to put it into their heads they did, unless I fully meant”--
He broke off.
”They're like everybody else, Wharne; neither better nor worse, I dare say; but the world is full of just such women. How do I know this money would be well in their hands--even for themselves?”
”Find out.”
”One of 'em was brought up by an Oferr woman!”
The tone in which he _commonized_ the name to a satiric general term, is not to be written down, and needed not to be interpreted.
”The other is well enough,” he went on, ”and contented enough.
A doctor's widow, with a little property, a farm and two children,--her older ones died very young,--up in New Hamps.h.i.+re. I might spoil _her_; and the other,--well, you see as I said, I _don't know_.”
”Find out,” said Marmaduke Wharne, again.
”People are not found out till they are tried.”
”Try 'em!”
Mr. Oldways had been sitting with his head bent, thoughtfully, his eyes looking down, his hands on the two stiff, old-fas.h.i.+oned arms of his chair. At this last spondaic response from Marmaduke, he lifted his eyes and eyebrows,--not his head,--and raised himself slightly with his two hands pressing on the chair arms; the keen glance and the half-movement were impulsively toward his friend.
”Eh?” said he.
”Try 'em,” repeated Marmaduke Wharne. ”Give G.o.d's way a chance.”
Mr. Oldways, seated back in his chair again, looked at him intently; made a little vibration, as it were, with his body, that moved his head up and down almost imperceptibly, with a kind of gradual a.s.senting apprehension, and kept utterly silent.
So, their talk being palpably over for this time, Marmaduke Wharne got up presently to go. They nodded at each other, friendlily, as he looked back from the door.
Left alone, Mr. t.i.tus Oldways turned in his swivel-chair, around to his desk beside which he was sitting.
”Next of kin?” he repeated to himself. ”G.o.d's way?--Well! Afterwards is a long time. A man must give it up somewhere. Everything escheats to the king at last.”
And he took a pen in his hand and wrote a letter.
V.