The Anna Katharine Green Mystery Megapack by Anna Katharine Green

Author:Anna Katharine Green
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Tags: agatha christie, miss marple, amelia butterworth, violet strange, cozy
ISBN: 9781434446299
Publisher: Wildside Press
Published: 2013-05-19T16:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER VI

THE LAWYER

The answer was an unexpectedly sensible one.

“Hunt up her man of business and see what he can do for you. She cannot get along without money; nor could that statement of hers have got into the papers without somebody’s assistance. Since she did not get it from the fellow we have just left, she must have had it from the only other person she would dare confide in.”

Ransom answered by immediately hailing a down-town car.

The interview which followed was certainly a remarkable one. At first Mr. Harper would say nothing, declaring that his relations with Mrs. Ransom were of a purely business and confidential nature. But by degrees, moved by the persuasive influence of Mr. Ransom’s candor and his indubitable right to consideration, he allowed himself to admit that he had seen Mrs. Ransom during the last three days and that he had every reason to believe that there was a twin sister in the case and that all Mrs. Ransom’s eccentric conduct was attributable to this fact and the overpowering sense of responsibility which it seemed to have brought to her—a result which would not appear strange to those who knew the sensitiveness of her nature and the delicate balance of her mind.

Mr. Ransom recalled the tenor of her strange letter on this subject, but was not convinced. He inquired of Mr. Harper if he had heard her say anything about the equally astounding fact of a returned brother, and when he found that this was mere jargon to Mr. Harper, he related what he knew of Hazen and left the lawyer to draw his own inferences.

The result was some show of embarrassment on the part of Mr. Harper. It was evident that in her consultations with him she had entirely left out all allusion to this brother. Either the man had advanced a false claim or else she was in an irresponsible condition of mind which made her see a sister where there was a brother.

Ransom made some remark indicative of his appreciation of the dilemma in which they found themselves, but was quickly silenced by the other’s emphatic assertion:

“I have seen the girl; she was with Mrs. Ransom the day she came here. She sat in the adjoining room while we talked over her case in this one.”

“You saw her—saw her face?”

“No, not her face; she was too heavily veiled for that. Mrs. Ransom explained why. They were too absurdly alike, she said. It awoke comment and it gave her the creeps. But their figures were identical though their dresses were different.”

“So! there is someone then; the girl is not absolutely a myth.”

“Far from it. Nor is the will which Mrs. Ransom has asked me to draw up for her a myth.”

“Her will! she has asked you to draw up her will!”

“Yes. That was the object of her visit. She had entered the married state, she said, and wished to make a legal disposition of her property before she returned to you. She was very nervous when she said this; very nervous through all the interview.

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