Clara Vaughan, Volume 1 (of 3)

and luxury, and a prospective income of ￡15,000 a-year (so much had the land increased in value) to

appeal to the honour of Mr. Edgar Vaughan. Mr. Vaughan he must henceforth be called. I cannot well understand, still less can I explain, small and threadb

o his sons successively in tail male, failing these to his right heirs in general. This will was said to have been prepared in haste: it was, in fact, drawn by a country attorney, when the testator

my father, as his heiress, in the ordinary course. But it is the chief fault of smatterers in the law (and country attorneys at that time were no better) that they will attempt to be too definite. The country lawyer in this c

ll of Hubert Vaughan; and at the time it was believed that these were quite effectual, and

d but recently been relieved of incumbrances. More than this--she had even insisted upon expressly abandoning, by her marriage settlement, all claim to dower. This unusual course she had adopted, because of some discontent expressed

e had no power to charge the real estate for her benefit, in the manner his will imported; that he had never been more than a tenant in tail, and that entail such that I could not inherit. Neither, of course, could I take under his will, as he possessed no power of disposition

y") which was to have had that effect, being null and void through some absurd informality. They told me something about a tenant to a precipice, but t

maintained a profuse hospitality, and his charity was most lavish. The lawyers told us that, under the circumstances (a favourite expression of theirs when they mean some big robbery), a court of equity would perhaps consider our application to be "recupped," as they called it, out of the estate, for the money laid out in improvements unde

ather's life, and partly, perhaps, from a feeling of hatred towards our supplanter. That he knew not till now the flaw in our title, and his own superior claim, was more than I could believe. I felt sure th

or feigned to wish, that we should remain there, and even showed some reluctance to urge his unrighteous rights. But neither my mother (who bore the shock with

xcept upon some trivial points. More than two months had been thus consumed, and it was now once more the anniversary of my father's death.

d burn the hand or bosom, to wave it, with a triumph wilfully prolonged, before the eyes of justice's dull-visioned ministers; and then to see, without a shudder or a thrill of joy, but with the whole soul gazing, the slow, struggling, ghastly expiation. As this thought came crawling through my heart, lighting up its depth as would a snake of fire, the buhl before me grew streaks of blood, and the heavy crossbars a gallows. I lifted my hand to open the outer lock. Already the old cruciform key was trembling in the silver scutcheon. I raised the lamp in my left hand to show the lunette guard which curved above the hole, when a heavy mass all cold and dark fell across my eyes. I started, and thought for the moment, in m

"I knew you couldn't do it, because I se

mine. What drove me to such a wild deed I can scarcely tell. Shame, perhaps, for the furtive nature of my last attem

room where he died. All the relics I possessed, both of his love and of his death, I brought thither; and spread them out, and wept upon the one, and prayed upon the other. I also b

im, and set it upon a chest by the door, and fixed it so as to ring five minutes before the hour at which the murder befell. A cold presentiment crawled through me that, at the fatal time, I should see the assassin. After all these arrangements I took my volume again, and sat in the shade of the curtain, with a strong light on the page. I was deep i

the sound of the lock he leaped up, and pointed a pistol, then hid it.

d. Do you know this dagger?" He started back, as if I had

th a triumph chill all over me.

; when he looked at me by some wonderful effort, calmly, steadily, even coldly

oice so low and deep, or only fierce self-c

t?" I asked, with my

many years ago. And I know not in

ain were parting one from the other, and a grey void spreading between them. I tried to think, but could not. I strove to say anything, but failed. Fainter and fainter grew the room, the lamp, the ceiling, the face at which I tried to look. Things went to and fro with a quicker quiver, like

aylight was around us, and the faint sunshine on her face. She had been with me ever since. In my weakness, I looked up at her with a

illness after it, changed me no