“It’s a very long story and doubtless it would bore you since all you want to talk about is how you think you’ve been cheated and how much you hate Cornwall. No, don’t say any more, Bennett. Mr. Brogan is here. Shortly we’ll know what’s in Aunt Ellie’s will. You’re in it, else you wouldn’t have been invited here. Come now and strive for a modicum of manners.”
“Easy for you to say,” he said under his breath, but she still heard him, frowned, but held her peace.
Cousin Bennett was a very handsome man who had the nicest smile, with hair as blond as an angel’s and lovely eyes as blue as the heavens themselves. However, as their acquaintance had deepened the day before—it took only about thirty minutes—he began to show his true feelings, and they were angry and resentful. She looked at him now, his lower lip sullen, and wanted to kick him. For all she knew, Aunt Ellie had left him everything. After all, Caroline was already an heiress and didn’t need Scrilady Hall or any more groats, and Aunt Ellie had known that.
However, it was not to be. Mr. Brogan, pale from spending too many years inside an office, patted his grizzled hair and motioned for the two of them to be seated. “Eleanor Penrose’s will is quite short and to the point, at least at the beginning,” he said, untying the slender ribbon and smoothing out the document. “She had me prepare this will only two years ago. After some bequests to the Penrose servants and several local charities in Trevellas, the remainder of her money goes to you, Miss Derwent-Jones, and it is a sizable amount.”
“No,” Bennett howled, and jumped from his chair. “All her money—my uncle’s money—to Caroline? I won’t accept it. I will fight this, I will—”
“Do sit down, Mr. Penrose. There is much more in Mrs. Penrose’s will, but I will leave this instant if you don’t control yourself.”
Bennett flung himself back into the chair and looked as if he would kill both Mr. Brogan and Caroline.
“Now,” Mr. Brogan said, clearing his throat, “your aunt had me write down this explanation exactly.” He set his glasses on his nose, lifted the paper, and read:
“ ‘My dearest niece:
I look forward to the day when you will come to Cornwall and live with me. When you become nineteen, I will come fetch you from that awful man Mr. Ffalkes. He will have no more hold over you. Together, my love, we will make Scrilady Hall a home again, filled with laughter and fun and parties. Never forget that I’ve loved you through the years and wanted only the best for you.
Your loving aunt
Eleanor Penrose” ’
Caroline couldn’t help it. She lowered her head and let the tears roll down her cheeks and drip on the back of her hands, clasped in her lap.
“Miss Derwent-Jones, naturally your aunt assumed you would be coming here to live with her until you married. As I said, she wrote the will when you were seventeen and she decided to write you the letter as if she would pass away at that time, because doing it that way, she told me, it would sound as if it came from her heart, which it did.”
He looked up then and saw that she was crying. “Oh dear, I’m so very sorry, Miss Derwent-Jones. Forgive me. This is all s
uch a shock for you, such a tragedy—”
“What about me?”
“Huh? Oh, Mr. Penrose. Why don’t we discuss it once Miss Derwent-Jones has composed herself? This is naturally quite upsetting to her.”
“Why? She’s got all the money.”
Caroline rubbed the back of her hand over her eyes, blew her nose on her aunt’s handkerchief, and said, “It’s all right, Mr. Brogan. Forgive me. It’s just hearing her letter, it’s like she’s here, talking to me.”
“I understand. Your aunt was a fine lady. You wish to continue?”
“Yes, certainly.”
“Very well.” Mr. Brogan set his glasses back onto his nose and perused the paper in his hands. “Now, the will becomes complicated and for the both of you, extremely unusual, perhaps startling.
“I suppose the best way to explain it is to tell you that Eleanor Penrose was a strong woman, yet a very compassionate woman, a woman who felt that money carried with it responsibilities toward those less fortunate than herself.”
“I am certainly to be considered less fortunate than my uncle’s blasted widow.”
“Mr. Penrose, you will hold your tongue,” Mr. Brogan said with unaccustomed heat. “Now, Mrs. Penrose was a lady of standing in the area, and beyond that, she had begun working many hours with young girls who had become pregnant out of wedlock. These girls had invariably been seduced or even raped by their employers or their employers’ sons and thus cast out even by their own families and left with nothing. She saved them, brought them here, and put them in a small house in St. Agnes. She and Dr. Treath had become close during the past couple of years. One reason I suppose is that she brought him a steady supply of patients.”
It was an attempt at a jest, and Caroline forced herself to smile. Mr. Brogan had tried. He cleared his throat and continued. “After the young girls gave birth, Eleanor would help them do whatever it was they themselves wished. If they chose to keep the children, she would see that they obtained positions that would make that possible. If not, then the children were adopted.”
“What utter nonsense,” Bennett Penrose said, rising to pace to and fro in front of the desk. “A pack of silly young girls who couldn’t keep their legs together—what the devil does this have to do with me? With us? Seduced by their employers, you say? You mean their betters? What’s wrong with that? It’s their fault for getting pregnant, it’s a witless thing to do. As for the rest of it, why—”
“Be quiet, Bennett,” Caroline said, rising and limping to stare him right in his eyes. “You will shut your damned mouth or I will hit you, I swear it. Maybe I’ll even shoot you. I’m quite a good shot, you know.”
“No, don’t get violent on me. Just listen, none of this has anything to do with us, Caroline.”