The Old Homestead Part 72

"Mother, in this thing, I must judge for myself. My father, I know, intended that I should, else why did he leave me, untrammeled as I am?"

Mrs. Farnham started up--her pale blue eyes gleamed venomously. She stood for a moment, growing paler, and more repulsive; some evil idea evidently possessed her.

"Be careful, be careful," she said, shaking her finger at him, menacingly, "do not provoke me--don't go a step farther, or I will prove how far you are untrammeled. Another word and there will be no medium between my love and my hate."

"Mother, are you mad?"

"Mother, indeed! I have been a mother to you. I've done what few mothers would have the courage to undertake for a child, but what I have done can be taken back--don't provoke me, I tell you, again, Frederick Farnham--don't provoke your mother."

"Oh, be a mother, a true-hearted woman," cried Fred, imploringly; "Isabel will love you; be kind to her."

Mrs. Farnham drew back, and folded her arms in an att.i.tude she had seen Rachel a.s.sume on the stage, and which she deemed very imposing.

"Frederick Farnham, if you marry that girl I will bring you to her level--I will make a pauper of you."

Frederick smiled; the whole thing struck him as a farce badly played.

"I shall certainly marry her, if she will accept me," he said, coldly.

Mrs. Farnham strode from the room, sweeping by her son with a furious display of temper. Directly she returned with a folded paper in her hand.

"Here, sir, is your father's will, made out by his own hand, three days before his death; we shall prove how far it makes you independent of your mother."

"My father's will!" exclaimed Frederick, turning white with surprise; "my father's will in your hands, and produced for the first time!

Madam, explain this."

The stern paleness of his face struck the woman with terror; the pa.s.sion that had made her forget everything but revenge, was quenched beneath his firm glance. She began to tremble, and attempted to hide the paper in the folds of her dress.

"Promise me to give up this girl, and I will burn it," she said, with a frightened look. "It was for your sake I kept it back; he wanted to give your fortune away; I could not stand it, besides no one asked for the will; promise me, and I'll burn it."

"I will make no promise. If that is my father's will give it to me and it shall be acted upon, though every cent I have be swept away. Give me the will, madam."

"No, no, don't ask for it. There is a medium in all things; I was angry, I did not mean what I said."

"Oblige me, madam, I must see that paper--mother, I will see it!"

exclaimed Frederick, impetuously, as she crumpled the doc.u.ment tightly in her hand, retreating backward from the room with her eyes fixed upon his with the expression of a weak child, detected in its wickedness.

"How dare you, Frederick Farnham, how dare you speak to your mother in that tone?" she said, in a voice that was half defiant, half reproachful, still retreating from him.

"It is useless, mother, I demand that paper! It must be placed in the hand of my guardian."

"It never shall!" cried the mother, darting through the door; and rus.h.i.+ng toward the kitchen with angry swiftness, she dashed the paper over Salina's shoulder into a huge fire that blazed in the chimney.

Frederick followed her, pale with excitement.

"You have not, mother, you dare not!"

Mrs. Farnham broke into a hysterical laugh.

"It's burned--it's ashes!" she said. "Oh, Frederick, what a mother I have been to you."

Farnham turned away, muttering gloomily to himself. The old lady followed him.

"Don't be angry, Fred, I did it for your good, for your own good; n.o.body is hurt by it but myself; I lose all authority over you now.

Why, Fred, by that will, if you'd persisted in marrying without my consent, the whole property would have been--yes, would have been mine. See what I have sacrificed to you; but there is a medium in everything but a mother's love. I could have forced you to give up that girl, but see how I have destroyed my own power. You will remember this, dear boy, and not break my heart by this low match."

"Mother, if that paper was my father's will, you have committed a great wrong--a serious legal wrong. I cannot be grateful for it, I can never respect you again."

Mrs. Farnham began to cry.

"There it is," she said. "If I have done any wrong, it's you that urged me to it; as for that will, I always meant to keep the just medium between right and wrong, and let the thing rest in my writing-desk without saying a word about it. I wouldn't have burned it--nor have touched it again on any account, but you made me do both.

First you provoked me to bring it out from where it had rested innocent as a lamb for so many years. Then, as if that wasn't enough, the way you went on was so dreadful. You drove me to it; what else could you expect from a mother's love, especially such a mother as I have been to you, Frederick?"

Farnham was still excited, but sternly thoughtful.

"Mother," he said, "I must know what the will contained. It shall be acted upon to the very letter. You know its contents; tell me on your honor as a lady, on your honesty as a woman, all that you remember of it, word for word."

"No!" said Mrs. Farnham, petulantly, "I won't say a word about it, I won't own that there ever was a will; but if you'll be quiet, to-morrow Mr. Wales, my lawyer will be up. I sent for him to meet your guardian and myself on your birth-day, to help about settling the affairs, he will talk with you."

"Beit so, mother, but remember this testament must be carried out to the letter."

"Very well; I'll consult about it, we shall be able to strike a medium yet. Fred, you may not believe it, but you've got a mother, a true mother, one in ten thousand, Frederick Farnham."

By the way Mrs. Farnham withdrew, one might have fancied she had done a meritorious thing in concealing, and at last destroying her husband's will. Indeed she had convinced herself of this, and went out with an air of great self-complacency.

CHAPTER XLVII.

SALINA BOWLES' MISSION.

With an honest purpose, whatever betide, She stands like a pillar of native stone, Firm and rough, with a cap of pride-- Till her trust is given, her mission done.

With characteristic reverence for ancient usages, Salina Bowles set herself resolutely against all cooking-stoves, modern ranges and inventions of that cla.s.s. That exemplary female was often heard to declare that no decent meal could ever be cooked by any of these new-fangled contrivances. A hickory back log, and good oak-wood answered her purpose quite well enough. Only give her plenty of them and she'd cook a dinner with any woman on this side of sundown. From these prejudices it happened that Salina, in order to prepare the late dinner with which Mrs. Farnham usually taxed all her culinary genius, had built a huge wood-fire, and was planting again even on the hearth before it, when a folded paper flashed over her shoulder, and rus.h.i.+ng through the flames fell behind the back log.

Salina rose promptly upright, gave Mrs. Farnham a sharp look, and stooped to pick up the comb that had been knocked loose from her hair.

When her eyes fell once again on the young man and his mother, she began deliberately twisting up her hair, while the brief dialogue we have recorded pa.s.sed between them.

After they went out, Salina removed her tin oven from before the fire, took up a huge pair of tongs and deliberately fished out Mr. Farnham's will from behind the back-log. It had been a good deal blackened and scorched at the edges in its pa.s.sage through the flames, but the writing was only slightly obliterated. Salina, who had no scruples against reading a doc.u.ment so obtained, recognized the signature, and gathered enough from the contents to be certain that it was an important paper.

She thrust the will into her bosom with great deliberation, replaced her tin oven on the hearth, and went on with her work as usual. Once or twice she paused in her occupation, and seemed pondering over some idea in her mind, but when the other servants came in she said nothing of the subject of her thoughts. The moment dinner was over, which Mrs.

Farnham partook of alone. Salina put on her sun-bonnet and shawl, merely saying that "she was going out a spell," and took a short cut across the fields towards Judge Sharp's house, leaving the Old Homestead on her right, determined not to visit that till after her errand was accomplished.

The judge was a little surprised when Salina appeared before him with a peremptory request that he would leave his women folks and give her a few words with him alone.

He went into the library and closed the door, wondering in his mind what could have brought that interesting female into his presence, with her face so full of mysterious importance.