“Oh I’m sure Mother never meant anything like that,” said Solly.
“Then why did she make such a will?” said Molly. “You’ve got to consider the generation your mother belonged to. She wasn’t a big friend of sex, you know. She undoubtedly thought it would dry up the organs of increase in you both. Very pretty. Sweetly maternal.”
“I wish you people would get it into your heads that you are talking about my Mother,” said Solly, with some anger.
“Now look, Solly,” said Cobbler, “talk sense. Ever since I first met you your main topic whenever you were depressed was what a hell of a time your mother was giving you. I’ve heard you talk about her in a way which surprised even me — and I specialize in speaking the unspeakable. You can’t make a saint of her now simply because she is dead.”
“Shut up,” said his wife. “Solly needs time to get used to the fact that his mother is dead. You know how you carried on when your mother died. Roared like a bull for days, though you rarely gave her a civil word the last few times you met.”
“Those were quarrels about music,” said Cobbler. “We disagreed on artistic principles. Just showed how really compatible we were that we could talk about them at all. I bet Solly never talked to his mother about such things.”
“The terms of her will showed that she cared a great deal about artistic principles. Or about education, anyhow,” said Solly.
“I have not forgotten that she requested that My Task be sung at her funeral,” said Cobbler. “The bill for that caper is outstanding, by the way. I only got a girl to do it at the last moment.”
“She sang it very nicely,” said Veronica.
“Good voice. A girl called Monica Gall. And it will be ten dollars.”
“Include it in the bill you send to Snelgrove,” said Solly, “along with the charges for the choir, and yourself.”
“I played gratis.”
“Well, don’t. Send Snelgrove a bill. I don’t wish to think that my Mother was obliged to you for anything.”
“Oh, for God’s sake don’t turn nasty, just because I spoke my mind. If you want friends who echo everything you say and defer to all your pinhead notions, count me out.”
“Shut up, both of you,” said Molly. “You’re carrying on like a couple of children. But listen to me, Solly. You and Veronica may have some hard days ahead of you, and you’ve got to make up your minds now to stick together, or this idiotic will can make trouble between you. And the fact that you have no money will make it all the easier.”
“We have just as much money as we ever had,” said Solly. “I still have my job, you know.”
“A junior lecturer, and quite good for your age. A miserable salary, considering that you are expected to live the life of a man of education and some position on it. Still, Humphrey and I are living very happily on less. But if I understand the conditions of the will, you have to live in this house, and keep it up, and keep Ethel and Doris on that money, and go on having children until you have a son. They say that clever men tend to have daughters, Solly, and I suppose you qualify as a clever man, in spite of the way you are behaving at present.” Molly’s affectionate tone took the sting out of her words. “But I think you should recognize that your mother has laid the Dead Hand on you and Veronica in the biggest possible way, and the sooner you see that the better you will be able to deal with it.”
“And you’d better not begin by holding a grudge against me,” said Cobbler. “You are going to want all your friends, now that you have joined the ranks of the struggling poor. You are going to feel some very sharp pangs, you know, when you see all that lovely money, which might have been yours, going to support dear little Miss God-knows-who, while she studies flower arrangement in the Japanese Imperial Greenhouses, at the expense of your Mum’s estate. So stop snapping me up on every word. I had nothing personal against your Mum. It is just that she symbolized all the forces that have been standing on my neck ever since I was old enough to have a mind of my own. And to prove my goodwill, I give you a toast to her memory.”
Amity was restored, and they drank the toast. Perhaps only Molly and Veronica heard Cobbler murmur, as he raised his glass, “Toujours gai, le diable est mort.”
TWO
Mrs Bridgetower’s will would not, under ordinary circumstances, have become a matter of public interest until the probate was completed but, as Cobbler pointed out, there were institutions in Salterton which hoped for a legacy. Chief among these was Waverley University, and the rumour that it was to have nothing aroused some waspishness in the Bursar’s office. Universities are, in a high-minded way, unceasingly avaricious. The thought that the wealthy widow of a former professor — a member of the family, so to speak — had not remembered the Alma Mater in her will (particularly when her son and presumed heir was also of the faculty) was unbearable. The rumour was that a trust had been set up, and moreover a trust with an educational purpose; if this were true, it was a slap in the face for Waverley. But was it true?
It is not a university’s function to pry into private affairs. That is the job of a newspaper. Thus it was that, acting on a discreet tip from the Bursar’s office, the Salterton Evening Bellman sought information from the three executors in turn. From Miss Puss it received the sharpest of rebuffs; the Dean temporized, and said that he was not free to speak until he had consulted the others; it was Solly who said that a trust was to be established, and that details should be sought from Mr Snelgrove. The lawyer, who loved secrecy, called the executors together to urge them to say nothing to anyone; nobody had any right to know anything about Mrs Bridgetower’s estate until after probate. It was Solly who pointed out that this was impossible.
A detailed knowledge of law and ordinary common sense are not always found together, and it was Solly who had to explain the situation to Mr Snelgrove, as tactfully as possible. According to the will, the girl who was to benefit from Mrs Bridgetower’s money must be chosen and launched on her course of study within a year of her benefactress’ death: Mr Snelgrove was also to have the probate completed by that time, or else suffer the humiliation of seeing this juicy plum pass into the hands of another lawyer. Therefore, whether the trust was legally in existence before the probate or not, the girl must be chosen within a year, and that could not be done unless some knowledge of the impending trust were available to at least a few people. It took a surprisingly long time to get this through Mr Snelgrove’s head, though he had drawn Mrs Bridgetower’s will and ought to have foreseen it. His was the perplexity of the man who understands his situation intellectually but has not comprehended it emotionally, and he continued to say “Yes” and “I see” when it was amply clear that he did not see at all.
Though Solly was willing that something should be known of the trust, he was not willing that it should be publicly known that his mother had used him shabbily. His state of mind was by no means an uncommon one: his mother had been the bane of his life, but after her death he was determined that no one should think ill of her. So, after consultation with Veronica, he paid a visit to Mr Gloster Ridley, the editor of The Bellman, explained the situation to him, and asked for his help in putting the best face on the matter. This stroke of diplomacy, undertaken without the knowledge of the other executors or of Snelgrove, had excellent result. The Bellman published a reasonable amount of information about the trust and its purpose, made it clear that nothing would happen for some time, said kind things about the late Mrs Bridgetower’s lifelong enthusiasm for the education of women, and gave no hint that the lady’s son had been left a mere token bequest, or that there were any curious conditions attaching to the trust. Thus an agreeable version of the truth was made public, and the murmurs at Waverley were, for the moment, stilled.
Mr Snelgrove and Miss Puss were displeased, however. They both possessed that type of mind which gets deep satisfaction out of withholding information. If Miss Puss could have bought shoes without confiding her size to the salesman, she would have done it. So another meeting was called, and Solly was raked over the coals for talking to the press. Already he was learning useful lessons from his experience as an executor, and he let Snelgrove and Miss Puss talk until they were tired. Then he covered all his previous arguments once again, and pointed out that the effect of the newspaper article had been good, and that it had substituted a body of carefully chosen fact for spiteful rumour. He received unexpected support from Dean Knapp. It would be too much to say that Miss Puss and the lawyer were mollified, but they were temporarily subdued. Solly had a pleasant feeling that he was becoming the guiding spirit of the executors.