Page:All the Year Round - Series 2 - Volume 1.djvu/465

 died on the 20th of April. Chadborn arrived just in time, on that very day.

Then, indeed, curiosity and speculation were at their height. The town was on the tiptoe of expectation. But soon it was known that he had died leaving about a million in the stocks. An old bureau stood in the lobby, facing his room door, and from this was brought down a sealed envelope, which was solemnly opened in presence of the London alderman, Mr. Chadborn, and the two clerks. It was found to contain a will bequeathing all his property to these four gentlemen as executors, subject to debts and legacies. The former were little, and of the latter there were none. It gave them nearly a quarter of a million apiece. The fortunate alderman returned to London, and not an hour was lost in taking out probate. In fact, the proctor received instructions almost on the day of the decease. A kind of feeble caveat was entered, which was supported with such indecision that the probate was all but granted. It seemed to be put forward in the hope of something turning up. Long after, the judge stated that probate must have been granted, but for a mysterious occurrence.

One of the disappointed had been a Mr. Helps of Cheapside; and one morning in June the threepenny post brought him a letter and an enclosure. The letter was in pencil.

"The enclosed is a paper saved out of many burned by parties I could hang: they pretend it is not Wood's hand; many swear to it: they want to swindle me: let the rest know."

The enclosure was a piece of paper scorched at one corner, and torn right across the name signed to it. It ran:

"In a codicil to my will I give the corporation of Gloucester one hundred and forty thousand pounds. In this I wish my executors would give sixty thousand pounds to them for the same purpose as I have before named. I would also give to my friend Mr. Phillpotts fifty thousand pounds, to Mr. George Connell ten thousand pounds, to Mr. John Thomas Helps, Cheapside, London, thirty thousand pounds, to Mrs. Goodlake, mother of Mr. Surman, and to Thomas Wood, Smith-street, Chelsea, each twenty thousand pounds, and Samuel Wood fourteen thousand pounds, and the latter gentleman's family six thousand pounds; and I confirm all other bequests, and rive the rest of my property to the executors for their own interest.

".

The recipient of this strange communication, which seemed thus to drop from the clouds, was a connexion of the deceased. It seemed almost too apropos—too much after the pattern of the finding of a lost paper in a melodrama. But it was at once placed in proper hands, and then business really began. The Court of Probate stayed its hand; real substantial claimants rushed to the front, and the decks wore cleared for the fray. The fund would most probably have to furnish costs; so the best lawyers were engaged, and what was to be a five years' battle began.

Even with regard to the old will, some local rumours were beginning to get abroad. This instrument, when produced to the court, appeared to be a sort of compound document, consisting of two papers carefully wafered together. The first was instructions for a will, named the four executors, was in Chadborn's handwriting, and was duly signed by "Jemmy Wood." But there were no signatures of witnesses, so taken by itself it was worth nothing. The other paper was duly signed and attested, and gave all his property to his executors, subject to certain legacies and dispositions he should hereafter make. But the executors were not named. Thus each paper was deficient; the first wanted legal force, the second was "uncertain," as it named no one. Still each supplied the other's imperfection, and taken together they seemed to make a good will. The wafering together showed that such was the testator's intention.

But now it was said in Gloucester that only one paper had been put away in the bureau, and that when the will was produced, after the old man's death, there had been only a single sheet taken out of the bureau. To the amazement of the court the executors now admitted that such was the case, and Mr. Chadborn owned that he had gone home for the first paper, the "instructions," had wafered the two together, and placing them in the envelope, had sealed it up with Mr. Wood's own seal, which happened to be lying there "accidentally," he said. The envelope was then placed in the bureau.

Of this questionable transaction the four executors seemed to have all more or less knowledge. In their statement they declared what was the perfect truth, though not the whole truth—that the two papers when taken out of the envelope were together, which indeed they were, on the last occasion. In the two being attached together consisted the whole force of the will. Separate, even in two distinct drawers of the same bureau, and the executors lost their prize. It was too tempting.

Still it might be said this was a mere technical device; and as the intentions of the testator were manifest, it would be hard that they should be frustrated by an accident of this nature. Flesh and blood could hardly stand being defrauded of a million sterling, when a couple of wafers was all that was wanting to secure it, and when it was conceded that they, and no others, were the executors meant.

But the newly-found codicil pointed at some other matters. It spoke of a regular will, in which the Gloucester corporation received one hundred and forty thousand pounds, and which, taken with the second paper, made everything clear. But where was this will?

The fatuous corporation, who had made game of the testator during his life, and played their stupid jests on him, now became keenly alive to their own interests. A notice appeared