T he offices of Egerton, Forbes & Wilborough were in Bloomsbury, in one of those imposing1 and dignified2 squareswhich have as yet not felt the wind of change. Their brass3 plate was suitably worn down to illegibility4. The firm hadbeen going for over a hundred years and a good proportion of the landed gentry5 of England were their clients. Therewas no Forbes in the firm anymore and no Wilboroughs. Instead there were Atkinsons, father and son, and a WelshLloyd and a Scottish McAllister. There was, however, still an Egerton, descendant of the original Egerton. Thisparticular Egerton was a man of fifty-two and he was adviser7 to several families which had in their day been advisedby his grandfather, his uncle, and his father.
At this moment he was sitting behind a large mahogany desk in his handsome room on the first floor, speakingkindly but firmly to a dejected looking client. Richard Egerton was a handsome man, tall, dark with a touch of grey atthe temples and very shrewd grey eyes. His advice was always good advice, but he seldom minced8 his words.
“Quite frankly9 you haven’t got a leg to stand upon, Freddie,” he was saying. “Not with those letters you’vewritten.”
“You don’t think—” Freddie murmured dejectedly.
“No, I don’t,” said Egerton. “The only hope is to settle out of court. It might even be held that you’ve renderedyourself liable to criminal prosecution11.”
“Oh, look here, Richard, that’s carrying things a bit far.”
There was a small discreet12 buzz on Egerton’s desk. He picked up the telephone receiver with a frown.
“I thought I said I wasn’t to be disturbed.”
There was a murmur10 at the other end. Egerton said, “Oh. Yes—Yes, I see. Ask her to wait, will you.”
He replaced the receiver and turned once more to his unhappy looking client.
“Look here, Freddie,” he said, “I know the law and you don’t. You’re in a nasty jam. I’ll do my best to get you outof it, but it’s going to cost you a bit. I doubt if they’d settle for less than twelve thousand.”
“Twelve thousand!” The unfortunate Freddie was aghast. “Oh, I say! I haven’t got it, Richard.”
“Well, you’ll have to raise it then. There are always ways and means. If she’ll settle for twelve thousand, you’ll belucky, and if you fight the case it’ll cost you a lot more.”
“You lawyers!” said Freddie. “Sharks, all of you!”
He rose to his feet. “Well,” he said, “do your bloody13 best for me, Richard old boy.”
He took his departure, shaking his head sadly. Richard Egerton put Freddie and his affairs out of his mind, andthought about his next client. He said softly to himself, “The Honourable14 Elvira Blake. I wonder what she’s like…”
He lifted his receiver. “Lord Frederick’s gone. Send up Miss Blake, will you.”
As he waited he made little calculations on his desk pad. How many years since—? She must be fifteen—seventeen—perhaps even more than that. Time went so fast. “Coniston’s daughter,” he thought, “and Bess’s daughter. I wonderwhich of them she takes after?”
The door opened, the clerk announced Miss Elvira Blake and the girl walked into the room. Egerton rose from hischair and came towards her. In appearance, he thought, she did not resemble either of her parents. Tall, slim, very fair,Bess’s colouring but none of Bess’s vitality17, with an old-fashioned air about her; though that was difficult to be sureof, since the fashion in dress happened at the moment to be ruffles18 and baby bodices.
“Well, well,” he said, as he shook hands with her. “This is a surprise. Last time I saw you, you were eleven yearsold. Come and sit here.” He pulled forward a chair and she sat down.
“I suppose,” said Elvira, a little uncertainly, “that I ought to have written first. Written and made an appointment.
Something like that, but I really made up my mind very suddenly and it seemed an opportunity, since I was inLondon.”
“And what are you doing in London?”
“Having my teeth seen to.”
“Beastly things, teeth,” said Egerton. “Give us trouble from the cradle to the grave. But I am grateful for the teeth,if it gives me an opportunity of seeing you. Let me see now; you’ve been in Italy, haven’t you, finishing youreducation there at one of these places all girls go to nowadays?”
“Yes,” said Elvira, “the Contessa Martinelli. But I’ve left there now for good. I’m living with the Melfords in Kentuntil I make up my mind if there’s anything I’d like to do.”
“Well, I hope you’ll find something satisfactory. You’re not thinking of a university or anything like that?”
“No,” said Elvira, “I don’t think I’d be clever enough for that.” She paused before saying, “I suppose you’d have toagree to anything if I did want to do it?”
Egerton’s keen eyes focused sharply.
“I am one of your guardians19, and a trustee under your father’s will, yes,” he said. “Therefore, you have a perfectright to approach me at anytime.”
Elvira said, “Thank you,” politely. Egerton asked:
“Is there anything worrying you?”
“No. Not really. But you see, I don’t know anything. Nobody’s ever told me things. One doesn’t always like toask.”
He looked at her attentively20.
“You mean things about yourself?”
“Yes,” said Elvira. “It’s kind of you to understand. Uncle Derek—” she hesitated.
“Derek Luscombe, you mean?”
“Yes. I’ve always called him uncle.”
“I see.”
“He’s very kind,” said Elvira, “but he’s not the sort of person who ever tells you anything. He just arranges things,and looks a little worried in case they mightn’t be what I’d like. Of course he listens to a lot of people—women, Imean—who tell him things. Like Contessa Martinelli. He arranges for me to go to schools or to finishing places.”
“And they haven’t been where you wanted to go?”
“No, I didn’t mean that. They’ve been quite all right. I mean they’ve been more or less where everyone else goes.”
“I see.”
“But I don’t know anything about myself, I mean what money I’ve got, and how much, and what I could do with itif I wanted.”
“In fact,” said Egerton, with his attractive smile, “you want to talk business. Is that it? Well, I think you’re quiteright. Let’s see. How old are you? Sixteen—seventeen?”
“I’m nearly twenty.”
“Oh dear. I’d no idea.”
“You see,” explained Elvira, “I feel all the time that I’m being shielded and sheltered. It’s nice in a way, but it canget very irritating.”
“It’s an attitude that’s gone out of date,” agreed Egerton, “but I can quite see that it would appeal to DerekLuscombe.”
“He’s a dear,” said Elvira, “but very difficult, somehow, to talk to seriously.”
“Yes, I can see that that might be so. Well, how much do you know about yourself, Elvira? About your familycircumstances?”
“I know that my father died when I was five and that my mother had run away from him with someone when I wasabout two, I don’t remember her at all. I barely remember my father. He was very old and had his leg up on a chair.
He used to swear. I was rather scared of him. After he died I lived first with an aunt or a cousin or something of myfather’s, until she died, and then I lived with Uncle Derek and his sister. But then she died and I went to Italy. UncleDerek has arranged for me, now, to live with the Melfords who are his cousins and very kind and nice and have twodaughters about my age.”
“You’re happy there?”
“I don’t know yet. I’ve barely got there. They’re all very dull. I really wanted to know how much money I’ve got.”
“So it’s financial information you really want?”
“Yes,” said Elvira. “I’ve got some money. Is it a lot?”
Egerton was serious now.
“Yes,” he said. “You’ve got a lot of money. Your father was a very rich man. You were his only child. When hedied, the title and the estate went to a cousin. He didn’t like the cousin, so he left all his personal property, which wasconsiderable, to his daughter—to you, Elvira. You’re a very rich woman, or will be, when you are twenty-one.”
“You mean I am not rich now?”
“Yes,” said Egerton, “you’re rich now, but the money is not yours to dispose of until you are twenty-one or marry.
Until that time it is in the hands of your Trustees. Luscombe, myself and another.” He smiled at her. “We haven’tembezzled it or anything like that. It’s still there. In fact, we’ve increased your capital considerably21 by investments.”
“How much will I have?”
“At the age of twenty-one or upon your marriage, you will come into a sum which at a rough estimate wouldamount to six or seven hundred thousand pounds.”
“That is a lot,” said Elvira, impressed.
“Yes, it is a lot. Probably it is because it is such a lot that nobody has ever talked to you about it much.”
He watched her as she reflected upon this. Quite an interesting girl, he thought. Looked an unbelievably milk-and-water Miss, but she was more than that. A good deal more. He said, with a faintly ironic22 smile:
“Does that satisfy you?”
She gave him a sudden smile.
“It ought to, oughtn’t it?”
“Rather better than winning the pools,” he suggested.
She nodded, but her mind was elsewhere. Then she came out abruptly23 with a question.
“Who gets it if I die?”
“As things stand now, it would go to your next of kin6.”
“I mean—I couldn’t make a will now, could I? Not until I was twenty-one. That’s what someone told me.”
“They were quite right.”
“That’s really rather annoying. If I was married and died I suppose my husband would get the money?”
“Yes.”
“And if I wasn’t married my mother would be my next of kin and get it. I really seem to have very few relations—Idon’t even know my mother. What is she like?”
“She’s a very remarkable24 woman,” said Egerton shortly. “Everybody would agree to that.”
“Didn’t she ever want to see me?”
“She may have done…I think it’s very possible that she did. But having made in—certain ways—rather a mess ofher own life, she may have thought that it was better for you that you should be brought up quite apart from her.”
“Do you actually know that she thinks that?”
“No. I don’t really know anything about it.”
Elvira got up.
“Thank you,” she said. “It’s very kind of you to tell me all this.”
“I think perhaps you ought to have been told more about things before,” said Egerton.
“It’s humiliating not to know things,” said Elvira. “Uncle Derek, of course, thinks I’m just a child.”
“Well, he’s not a very young man himself. He and I, you know, are well advanced in years. You must makeallowances for us when we look at things from the point of view of our advanced age.”
Elvira stood looking at him for a moment or two.
“But you don’t think I’m really a child, do you?” she said shrewdly, and added, “I expect you know rather moreabout girls than Uncle Derek does. He just lived with his sister.” Then she stretched out her hand and said, veryprettily, “Thank you so much. I hope I haven’t interrupted some important work you had to do,” and went out.
Egerton stood looking at the door that had closed behind her. He pursed up his lips, whistled a moment, shook hishead and sat down again, picked up a pen and tapped thoughtfully on his desk. He drew some papers towards him,then thrust them back and picked up his telephone.
“Miss Cordell, get me Colonel Luscombe, will you? Try his club first. And then the Shropshire address.”
He put back the receiver. Again he drew his papers towards him and started reading them but his mind was not onwhat he was doing. Presently his buzzer25 went.
“Colonel Luscombe is on the wire now, Mr. Egerton.”
“Right. Put him through. Hallo, Derek. Richard Egerton here. How are you? I’ve just been having a visit fromsomeone you know. A visit from your ward16.”
“From Elvira?” Derek Luscombe sounded very surprised.
“Yes.”
“But why—what on earth—what did she come to you for? Not in any trouble?”
“No, I wouldn’t say so. On the contrary, she seemed rather—well, pleased with herself. She wanted to know allabout her financial position.”
“You didn’t tell her, I hope?” said Colonel Luscombe, in alarm.
“Why not? What’s the point of secrecy26?”
“Well, I can’t help feeling it’s a little unwise for a girl to know that she is going to come into such a large amountof money.”
“Somebody else will tell her that, if we don’t. She’s got to be prepared, you know. Money is a responsibility.”
“Yes, but she’s so much of a child still.”
“Are you sure of that?”
“What do you mean? Of course she’s a child.”
“I wouldn’t describe her as such. Who’s the boyfriend?”
“I beg your pardon.”
“I said who’s the boyfriend? There is a boyfriend in the offing, isn’t there?”
“No, indeed. Nothing of the sort. What on earth makes you think that?”
“Nothing that she actually said. But I’ve got some experience, you know. I think you’ll find there is a boyfriend.”
“Well, I can assure you you’re quite wrong. I mean, she’s been most carefully brought up, she’s been at very strictschools, she’s been in a very select finishing establishment in Italy. I should know if there was anything of that kindgoing on. I dare say she’s met one or two pleasant young fellows and all that, but I’m sure there’s been nothing of thekind you suggest.”
“Well, my diagnosis27 is a boyfriend—and probably an undesirable28 one.”
“But why, Richard, why? What do you know about young girls?”
“Quite a lot,” said Egerton dryly. “I’ve had three clients in the last year, two of whom were made wards15 of courtand the third one managed to bully29 her parents into agreeing to an almost certainly disastrous30 marriage. Girls don’t getlooked after the way they used to be. Conditions are such that it’s very difficult to look after them at all—”
“But I assure you Elvira has been most carefully looked after.”
“The ingenuity31 of the young female of the species is beyond anything you could conjecture32! You keep an eye onher, Derek. Make a few inquiries33 as to what she’s been up to.”
“Nonsense. She’s just a sweet simple girl.”
“What you don’t know about sweet simple girls would fill an album! Her mother ran away and caused a scandal—remember?—when she was younger than Elvira is today. As for old Coniston, he was one of the worst rips inEngland.”
“You upset me, Richard. You upset me very much.”
“You might as well be warned. What I didn’t quite like was one of her other questions. Why is she so anxious toknow who’d inherit her money if she dies?”
“It’s queer your saying that, because she asked me that same question.”
“Did she now? Why should her mind run on early death? She asked me about her mother, by the way.”
Colonel Luscombe’s voice sounded worried as he said: “I wish Bess would get in touch with the girl.”
“Have you been talking to her on the subject—to Bess, I mean?”
“Well, yes…Yes I did. I ran across her by chance. We were staying in the same hotel, as a matter of fact. I urgedBess to make some arrangements to see the girl.”
“What did she say?” asked Egerton curiously34.
“Refused point-blank. She more or less said that she wasn’t a safe person for the girl to know.”
“Looked at from one point of view I don’t suppose she is,” said Egerton. “She’s mixed-up with that racing35 fellow,isn’t she?”
“I’ve heard rumours36.”
“Yes, I’ve heard them too. I don’t know if there’s much in it really. There might be, I suppose. That could be whyshe feels as she does. Bess’s friends are strong meat from time to time! But what a woman she is, eh Derek? What awoman.”
“Always been her own worst enemy,” said Derek Luscombe, gruffly.
“A really nice conventional remark,” said Egerton. “Well, sorry I bothered you, Derek, but keep a look out forundesirables in the background. Don’t say you haven’t been warned.”
He replaced the receiver and drew the pages on his desk towards him once more. This time he was able to put hiswhole attention on what he was doing.
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1
imposing
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| adj.使人难忘的，壮丽的，堂皇的，雄伟的 | |
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dignified
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| a.可敬的，高贵的 | |
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brass
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| n.黄铜；黄铜器，铜管乐器 | |
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illegibility
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| n.不清不楚，不可辨认，模糊 | |
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gentry
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| n.绅士阶级，上层阶级 | |
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6
kin
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| n.家族，亲属，血缘关系；adj.亲属关系的，同类的 | |
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7
adviser
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| n.劝告者，顾问 | |
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8
minced
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| v.切碎( mince的过去式和过去分词 )；剁碎；绞碎；用绞肉机绞（食物，尤指肉） | |
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9
frankly
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| adv.坦白地，直率地；坦率地说 | |
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10
murmur
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| n.低语，低声的怨言；v.低语，低声而言 | |
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prosecution
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| n.起诉，告发，检举，执行，经营 | |
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discreet
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| adj.(言行)谨慎的；慎重的；有判断力的 | |
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13
bloody
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| adj.非常的的；流血的；残忍的；adv.很；vt.血染 | |
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honourable
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| adj.可敬的；荣誉的，光荣的 | |
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15
wards
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| 区( ward的名词复数 )； 病房； 受监护的未成年者； 被人照顾或控制的状态 | |
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16
ward
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| n.守卫，监护，病房，行政区，由监护人或法院保护的人（尤指儿童）；vt.守护，躲开 | |
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vitality
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| n.活力，生命力，效力 | |
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18
ruffles
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| 褶裥花边( ruffle的名词复数 ) | |
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guardians
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| 监护人( guardian的名词复数 )； 保护者，维护者 | |
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attentively
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| adv.聚精会神地；周到地；谛；凝神 | |
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considerably
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| adv.极大地；相当大地；在很大程度上 | |
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ironic
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| adj.讽刺的，有讽刺意味的，出乎意料的 | |
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abruptly
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| adv.突然地，出其不意地 | |
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remarkable
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| adj.显著的，异常的，非凡的，值得注意的 | |
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buzzer
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| n.蜂鸣器；汽笛 | |
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secrecy
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| n.秘密，保密，隐蔽 | |
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diagnosis
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| n.诊断，诊断结果，调查分析，判断 | |
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undesirable
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| adj.不受欢迎的，不良的，不合意的，讨厌的；n.不受欢迎的人，不良分子 | |
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bully
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| n.恃强欺弱者，小流氓；vt.威胁，欺侮 | |
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disastrous
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| adj.灾难性的，造成灾害的；极坏的，很糟的 | |
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ingenuity
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| n.别出心裁；善于发明创造 | |
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32
conjecture
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| n./v.推测，猜测 | |
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33
inquiries
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| n.调查( inquiry的名词复数 )；疑问；探究；打听 | |
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curiously
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| adv.有求知欲地；好问地；奇特地 | |
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racing
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| n.竞赛，赛马；adj.竞赛用的，赛马用的 | |
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rumours
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| n.传闻( rumour的名词复数 )；风闻；谣言；谣传 | |
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