Chapter 5: The People’s Stock Exchange

Although we were not paupers, for ever so long after mother’s death we lived pretty much as if we were. We hated the idea of living in a town; especially London, and we could not get a servant to stop at The Chase. Considering that the family consisted of Dick and me, and the four children, who all of them insisted on doing exactly as they pleased, it really was no wonder. The consequence was, that we generally had to do everything for ourselves, and the way in which things were done was beyond description. A stranger dropping in suddenly would have supposed himself to have wandered into something between a lunatic asylum and a workhouse.

Of course, as the head of the family, this state of things occasioned me much concern. I knew that it was not what mother would have wished. But when I spoke to the others about it, they all started laying the blame upon each other, and even upon me. The fact is, when we were servantless, the boys expected Nora and me to do everything. We did not see it. Especially as it was almost invariably their fault that we were without a creature to do a thing. Their habits were so erratic. You could not expect a properly trained servant--or indeed anyone--to take them up their breakfasts in bed at intervals of half an hour or so. Or--if they had made up their minds to fly off to the other side of the county--to have a regular meal ready at perhaps five o’clock in the morning. As for lunch, they expected that to be on all day. And always something hot and really nice. As for tea, as a rule, Nora and I had ours together; but no one ever knew when the boys would insist on having theirs. It was the same with dinner. We always had had a proper dinner, and I felt, strongly, that because mother was dead we ought not all at once to behave as if we were barbarians, and leave off everything she had accustomed us to. And Dick said that he agreed with me. So I fixed it first for seven; then half-past; then eight; then for all sorts of times. But it was no use. Either one of the boys would come in half an hour before the proper time, starving, because--through his own fault--he had had nothing to eat all day, and, before anyone could stop him, would seize whatever was cooking, and make a meal off it there and then. Or else some of them would be ever so late, and make a tremendous fuss because we had not waited--even to the extent of expecting another dinner to be served there and then. In that respect Dick was as bad as anyone. No cook would stand that sort of thing--and no cook did.

If we could only have found mother’s will it might all have been so different. Because it was not at all unlikely that she had appointed someone as guardian, and to take proper control of everything until the children had grown up. As it was, so far as we knew, no one had a right to even send the boys to school. And as they refused, point-blank, to go of their own accord, educationally they bade fair to shine. At Mr Sanford’s suggestion we tried a tutor. The tricks they played him were beyond conception. Nothing would induce him to stop. He actually threatened us with an action for damages. I do not quite know what for, but Mr Sanford had to pay him something extra before he would be satisfied.

I do not wish it to be supposed that the boys were bad boys. They were not. They had loved mother dearly, and I do not believe they had ever given her any trouble. But I fancy they had never been very fond of school. And the sudden chance of liberty had turned their heads. Besides, they had all made up their minds to be things for which much book-learning was not required. And if Jack was going to be an engine-driver, and Jim either a fireman or an aeronaut, and Con a naturalist, it did seem a pity to spend a lot of money on unnecessary schooling.

Unfortunately we could not find a will. The presumption was that mother had made one, but that it had been stolen, because one day I came upon a box of papers which was locked up in one of the drawers in her wardrobe.

Oh dear, how strange I felt as I looked through them. Almost as if I were prying into mother’s secrets. Although I know perfectly well that there was nothing which now she would have wished to have kept hidden from me. There were all father’s letters--even the love-letters which he had written to her before they were married. If I had only known that they were there, I would have had them placed with her in the coffin, so that they might have been hers only, even in the grave. I think she would have liked it. By the beautiful way in which they had been kept bound about with ribbons tied in true lovers’ knots, you could see how sacred she had held them. There were all sorts of things besides. In particular, quantities of ball programmes. She must have seen a great deal of Society at one time. What a strange change must have taken place in her life, because I did not remember her once going anywhere. Some of the things were beyond my comprehension. I wondered what history was attached to a tiny Maltese cross wrapped in silver paper. There were lots of things which suggested us children. Actually, there were the first letters we had each of us written to mother! Such scrawls! Locks of hair, tiny shoes, a baby’s cap, a beautiful christening gown, and I do not know what else besides. Fancy her keeping them all those years! I wondered if, when Nora and I were grown-up, and were married, and had children of our own, we should have a treasure-box like mother’s, containing mementoes of our dear ones. I think if I ever do, I should like to have it with me in my grave. If I had known of its existence mother should have had hers.

All except one thing which was in it. And it is that to which I have been coming all this time. It was a sheet of foolscap paper, folded in three. On one side was written, in mother’s writing: “Contents of Brown Despatch-Box.” When I opened it I perceived that it was a sort of inventory. It began, --

“In the brown despatch-box are--

“My husband’s will, My own will, My husband’s jewels,”

--and then it went on to give quite a long list. Now I knew the brown despatch-box. We all did. It had been father’s. There were his initials--R. B.--in gold letters on the lid. It was unlocked by a tiny little key. I had always understood from mother that she had kept all sorts of wonderful things inside of it. Yet, after she had been buried, and we had got rid of the Ogre, and had found her keys, it was empty. It contained not a vestige of anything. I thought it curious at the time. We all had done. But I thought it still more curious by the time I had reached the bottom of that list.

Next time Mr Sanford came to see us--which was a day or two afterwards--I handed it to him. He made inquiries at Somerset House, where, it appears, they keep such things, and there, sure enough, was a copy of father’s will. It was simplicity itself, just two lines--

“I give and bequeath everything of which I die possessed to my dear wife, for her sole and absolute use.”

So that, so far as we were concerned, everything depended upon what was in mother’s will. Mr Sanford explained to us that at Somerset House they only keep a copy when the original will has been what they call “proved.” And the whereabouts of the original will was just the question. Was it in existence? and, if so, where?

Dick expressed all our sentiments in language of his own.

“The Ogre collared it; that’s what’s come to the thing. What asses we were, not to have suspected him of it at the time!”

“If,” observed Mr Sanford, “he collared that, then the probability is that he collared a good deal else besides. For instance, your father’s jewels. Do any of you know anything about them?”

“It’s a most extraordinary thing,” I explained, “that I should ever have forgotten them. Mother’s death was so sudden, and everything was in such confusion, that, except the one fact that she was dead, all the rest passed clean out of my mind. But I remember them perfectly. Why, it was only during the last holidays before she died that she showed some of them to me. I went into the morning-room one day, and she had the brown despatch-box on the table, and it was full of things. She had a leather case open in her hand. In it were a number of rings. ‘See, Molly,’ she said, ‘there are some of your father’s rings. Your father had some beautiful jewels. I am keeping it for Dick and the boys!”