THE MISSING WILL.
Mr. Franklin was a solicitor in good practice at the West End of London,having offices at ---- Chambers, Regent Street, and a private residencenear Fulham. He was a man of somewhat peculiar habits, although veryshrewd, able in his profession, and generous towards his friends--whowere not a few. His domestic life had been far from comfortable. He hadbeen separated from his wife, through incompatibility of temper; andthat lady, with one of her children, lived in a distant part of themetropolis, upon a liberal allowance from his purse.
This description will cover the life and pursuits of Mr. Franklin duringa series of about fifteen years. All this while, and probably muchearlier than the beginning of this epoch, he saved a considerableportion of his earnings, and invested it with that success a prudentlawyer was able to command. He was not, it is true, what is called aspeculative or "enterprising" man. He was rather a plodding orhard-working man. He had a notion that lawyers ought not to engage inrisks, lest they should be tempted, in the frenzy of greed, or to coversome unusual loss, to use the money which clients might by necessity orchoice leave in their hands. He never made "lumps of money," but grewrich by slow degrees, as the accumulated instalments of his frugalitywere piled on each other, and as the usufruct thereof, year by year,swelled the total of his husbanded gains.
At the head of his staff or firm was a managing clerk; and at the top ofhis rather small establishment in the country was a housekeeper. In boththese persons Mr. Franklin had the utmost confidence. That comfortablefeeling, I suppose, grew out of long experience; but it was not one Ifound it possible to share on my first introduction to these worthypersons. The clerk exhibited all the salient features of his calling. Hewas cunning, reticent, and conceited. I dare say he was faithful to hismaster. Fidelity is a peculiar merit of the attorney's clerk. I haveknown many in my time, but never knew one treacherous to his master; andnever heard, on reliable authority, of one who betrayed a client'ssecret. I have often had occasion to know that bribes have been offeredto the wretched copyist, whose earnings have probably not averaged apound per week; and to office-lads, whose wages were but a fewshillings--bribes equal to at least a quarter's honest income--but not asecret could be extracted in this mode. I have often mused on thisphenomenon, but never could fully understand the exact relation betweenthe cause and the effect. The reader is perhaps a better psychologistthan I am, and can explain it. I leave the fact in his hands, orhead--merely vouching for it as a fact. As I have said, there was thisfaithful clerk at the head of the staff in Mr. Franklin's office.
The housekeeper who presided over the domestic economy of the lawyer'sdwelling was a very ordinary sort of person. She was somewhere aboutforty-eight or fifty years of age. She was rather tall, and somewhatbulky in form. Her features were a little harsh, her voice was not onethat could be described as musical, and her manners were not of thatorder denominated ladylike. She also was a faithful servant--or at leastshe very often told me so, and I have no evidence to the contrary. Shedeclared to me, soon after my introduction to her, that she had neverrobbed the good man (that is, her then late master) of a penny. She hadalways laid out his money to the best advantage, never got a commissionfrom the tradesmen who supplied butter, cheese, eggs, or othercomestibles; and, in fact, never plundered him after the manner of hersisterhood. She was in fact--I take it for granted, and ask the readerto assume--a model housekeeper.
This is a censorious and scandalmongering age. I cannot, I fear, relyupon it that my pages may not fall into the hands of some one or twopersons always ready to suspect and say ill of their neighbours. Let me,therefore, at once clearly and emphatically state, that no relationshipwhatever subsisted between Mr. Franklin and this lady but the ostensibleone of master and servant. On this head there ought to be no doubt.
Mr. Franklin one day, after a short illness, died.
The fact of his death was almost immediately communicated to hisrelatives and friends, who mingled a few natural and conventional tearsover his dead body, which, in due course, was interred, withoutneedless pomp or ceremony, in a churchyard not far off.
After and before the funeral much surprise was expressed at thenon-discovery of a will.
Had he made a will, or had he died intestate? On that head there wasmuch speculation, and many decided opinions formed. Some folks arguedthat it was very foolish for a lawyer, above all men in the world, toleave his intentions undisclosed, and bequeath a negative legacy oftrouble, distrust, suspicion, heart-burning, and social war among hisacquaintances and kindred. They didn't think he could do it. Otherscontended that there was nothing remarkable in a solicitor's not makinga will. These persons may be divided into two classes. One lot cynicallyremarked that shoemakers' children were usually worse shod than otherbrats; that the offspring of tailors were to be usually known by theseediness of their costume; that publicans never drank the liquors theyvended; that parsons rarely illustrated, by their practice the virtuesthey taught in their pulpits; and that a lawyer should betray a crowningwant of prudence was not, therefore, wonderful. This was the reasoningby which some were led up to the belief that Mr. Franklin had certainlynot made a will. Another lot sneered at this circumlocutory andunsatisfactory process of argument. They said that the thing was plainenough. The deceased was a lawyer. He well knew, and was satisfied with,the arrangements made by the wisdom of the legislature for thedistribution of the personal estate of intestates. Against all thisspeculation there was, however, the unswerving and oft-repeateddeclarations of the managing clerk, who said that his late master did,about two years before his death, make a will. The draft thereof was inthe handwriting of Mr. Franklin. He had also engrossed or copied it forthe executors with his own right hand. The attestation had, however,been made by that faithful clerk and by "that rascal Edwards," a juniorclerk, whose skill in the imitation of autographs had secured himgratuitous and comfortable board and lodging at Portland.
If the deceased made a will, where could it be? That was a knotty andinteresting question. In its solution nobody took a deeper interest thanthe housekeeper. If it could be found, it would. She was as sure as ofthe fact of her existence (and of this, as she had never heard theBerkleyian theory propounded, she had not the slightest shadow of adoubt), that it would secure her the reward of long and meritoriousservitude. The relatives and friends, who desired to find a will, andthought she might aid in its discovery, promised to reward her if herfaith were not justified by the document when it turned up. The clerkwas also zealous in searching for it every where that his sagacitypointed out as its probable lurking-place. Neither will nor draft of awill could, however, be found. The office and the house were ransacked.The safe, all the tin cases, drawers, and bundles of papers, werecritically examined without success. Suspicion, it is needless to say,was rife. It must have been destroyed, was the conclusion almostuniformly arrived at; and the delinquent was marked out by theimagination of several.
The lawyer's only son, who had been a riotous youth, and a sore troubleto his father, was the suspected criminal. It was notorious that thisyoung man had drawn heavily upon his parent from time to time. He didnot like the honourable profession of the law, and, in order toaccommodate his taste, Mr. Franklin had paid considerable premiums tomen of repute in other professions; but the student, or apprentice,forfeited the money thus paid at different times for his benefit. He hadtwice robbed his father of large amounts. The lawyer's patience andaffection had apparently been exhausted some time before his death. Theson, deprived of all allowance by which to sustain an idle life, wasultimately compelled to gain his living in a comparatively humbleposition, and when the father died he was earning a pound a week in amerchant's counting-house. Mr. Franklin, junior, who lodged with hismother, heard of his loss as soon as that lady did. He at once threw uphis engagement, under the vague belief that a fortune had been droppedinto his lap. He practically took possession of the offices and thehouse of the deceased, and had abundant opportunities of getting rid ofany document obnoxious to his interests.
Uncharitable rumour, therefore,set down as fact that this young man, had ascertained that an indignantparent had cut him off with or without the proverbial shilling; that themissing will was the instrument by which his just punishment had beeneffected; that he had discovered the will, and in it his fate; andthat, in order to get the benefit of the statutable distribution of theestate, he had destroyed both the document and the draft thereof.
About a fortnight after Mr. Franklin's death I was instructed to probethe mystery of this lost will. It was chiefly desired that I should findthe will itself; but that was thought a hopeless task. The next thingdesired was, that I should get clear evidence of its former existence,its provisions, and bequests. It was also desired that I should getevidence enough to sustain a prosecution against the young man.
My task, which appeared almost hopeless, and not likely to beprofitable, turned out short, easy, and satisfactory.
A brief investigation of overlooked circumstances informed me that Mr.Franklin had "protected" a young woman, who, in consequence thereof,bore him two children. This attachment he had managed to conceal fromall his friends and acquaintances; and some of them were greatlyscandalised at the discovery of such an offence against social morals. Icalled on this lady, and in my first interview went right through themystery of the will's concealment. The poor creature was awfullyembarrassed by my inquiries, and immediately I thought it wise to lether know the real object of my visit, she fancied herself a delinquent."Upon my word, sir," she said, "I didn't take it. He gave it me. He toldme to keep it until he died, that it would be my only protection afterhis death, and that I was only to give it up to Mr. Thistlethwayte." Isaw the whole design of the late Mr. Franklin. I asked her to let mesee it. She replied by an entreaty that I would not take it from her,for she asked, "What will become of me and my dear children if I loseit?" It was plain that the unsophisticated woman knew nothing of legalformalities, and hugged the paper as though its mere possession wouldobtain the money it set apart for her. I promised her that I would notdeprive her of it; that I would certainly aid, rather than frustrate,the intentions of the father of her children. Of its contents she couldknow nothing beyond the general statement of the deceased--that all herfuture protection was bound up in its provisions. The will had beenhanded to her in a closed envelope. The wax was unbroken when she laidthe packet before me.
How to act did not require a moment's consideration on my part. It wasnot my duty, and it was repugnant to my feelings, to place this youngwoman at a disadvantage. In finding the will I had done more than washoped for, and all that could be expected from me. I advised her at onceto consult a respectable solicitor; and she went with me to the officeof a gentleman in the neighbourhood--a total stranger to me, except byreputation.
The erring son of the deceased was cleared from suspicion; the will wasproved at Doctor's Commons, and the intentions of the testator werefaithfully carried out.
One of the persons largely interested in the residuary estate of thedeceased, which formed its bulk, was much grieved because of thedepositary chosen by Mr. Franklin for the safe custody of his will. "Itis not," said this person, "as if he had left the creature a large sumof money. I don't complain of the provision he has made for theunfortunate children, but he might have spared us the humiliation ofasking her for the will. Why could he not have left that in the custodyof some one of the respectable people to whom he has given the principalpart of his fortune?"
The explanation was, "Why, don't you see, my dear madam, that althoughthe creature had but a small interest in the estate, that interestdepended entirely upon the preservation of the document. As the bulk ofthe property was distributed by the testator nearly the same as the lawwould of itself have distributed it, he had small occasion to make awill at all, except to provide for the creature and her offspring. Hechose the safest of all places in which he could deposit it, as ofcourse he did not wish it destroyed by any of those respectable people,who would not have been much concerned if the mother and her little oneshad been left absolute paupers."
"Do you mean to suggest that either of us would have destroyed thedocument?"
"Certainly not; but I apprehend that the deceased thought it quite aswell to preserve you all from temptation."