“Look here, then. Call the young chap. Call Fred Vincy.”
Mary’s heart began to beat more quickly. Various ideas rushed through her mind as to what the burning of a second will might imply. She had to make a difficult decision in a hurry.
“I will call him, if you will let me call Mr. Jonah and others with him.”
“Nobody else, I say. The young chap. I shall do as I like.”
“Wait till broad daylight, sir, when everyone is stirring. Or let me call Simmons now, to go and fetch the lawyer? He can be here in less than two hours.”
“Lawyer? What do I want with the lawyer? Nobody shall know—I say, nobody shall know. I shall do as I like.”
“Let me call someone else, sir,” said Mary, persuasively. She did not like her position—alone with the old man, who seemed to show a strange flaring of nervous energy which enabled him to speak again and again without falling into his usual cough; yet she desired not to push unnecessarily the contradiction which agitated him. “Let me, pray, call someone else.”
“You let me alone, I say. Look here, missy. Take the money. You’ll never have the chance again. It’s pretty nigh two hundred—there’s more in the box, and nobody knows how much there was. Take it and do as I tell you.”
Mary, standing by the fire, saw its red light falling on the old man, propped up on his pillows and bed-rest, with his bony hand holding out the key, and the money lying on the quilt before him. She never forgot that vision of a man wanting to do as he liked at the last. But the way in which he had put the offer of the money urged her to speak with harder resolution than ever.