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“Wal, Lady Lothrop she wrote to Lady Maxwell all that hed happened; and Lady Maxwell, she sent over for Ruth to come over and be a companion for her, and said she’d adopt her, and be as a mother to her.

“Wal, then Ruth she went over with some gentlefolks that was goin’ back to England, and offered to see her safe and sound; and so she was set down at Lady Maxwell’s manor. It was a grand place, she said, and such as she never see before,–like them old gentry places in England. And Lady Maxwell she made much of her, and cosseted her up for the sake of what the old Gineral had said about her. And Ruth she told her all her story, and how she believed that the will was to be found somewhere, and that she should be led to see it yet.

“She told her, too, that she felt it in her that Cap’n Oliver wasn’t dead, and that he’d come back yet. And Lady Maxwell she took up for her with might and main, and said she’d stand by her. But then, ye see, so long as there warn’t no will to be found, there warn’t nothin’ to be done. Jeff was the next heir; and he’d got every thing, stock, and lot, and the estate in England into the bargain. And folks was beginnin’ to think putty well of him, as folks allers does when a body is up in the world, and hes houses and lands. Lordy massy! riches allers covers a multitude o’ sins.

“Finally, when Ruth hed ben six months with her, one day Lady Maxwell got to tellin’ her all about her history, and what hed ben atween her and her cousin, when they was young, and how they hed a quarrel and he flung off to Ameriky, and all them things that it don’t do folks no good to remember when it’s all over and can’t be helped. But she was a lone body, and it seemed to do her good to talk about it.

“Finally, she says to Ruth, says she, ‘I’ll show you a room in this house you han’t seen before. It was the room where we hed that quarrel,’ says she; ‘and the last I saw of him was there, till he come back to die,’ says she.

“So she took a gret key out of her bunch; and she led Ruth along a long passage-way to the other end of the house, and opened on a great library. And the minute Ruth came in, she threw up her hands and gin a great cry. ‘Oh!’ says she, ‘this is the room! and there is the window! and there is the cabinet! and there in that middle drawer at the back end in a bundle of papers is the will!

“And Lady Maxwell she said, quite dazed, ‘Go look,’ says she. And Ruth went, jest as she seed herself do, and opened the drawer, and drew forth from the back part a yellow pile of old letters. And in the middle of those was the will, sure enough. Ruth drew it out, and opened it, and showed it to her.

“Wal, you see that will give Ruth the whole of the Gineral’s property in America, tho’ it did leave the English estate to Jeff.

“Wal, the end on’t was like a story-book.

“Jeff he made believe be mighty glad. And he said it must a ben that the Gineral hed got flustered with the sperit and water, and put that ‘ere will in among his letters that he was a doin’ up to take back to England. For it was in among Lady Maxwell’s letters that she writ him when they was young, and that he’d a kep’ all these years and was a takin’ back to her.

“Wal, Lawyer Dean said he was sure that Jeff made himself quite busy and useful that night, a tyin’ up the papers with red tape, and a packin’ the Gineral’s trunk; and that, when Jeff gin him his bundle to lock up in his box, he never mistrusted but what he’d got it all right.

“Wal, you see it was jest one of them things that can’t be known to the jedgment-day. It might a ben an accident, and then agin it might not; and folks settled it one way or t’other, ‘cordin’ to their ‘pinion o’ Jeff; but ye see how ‘mazin’ handy for him it happened! Why, ef it hadn’t ben for the providence I’ve ben a tellin’ about, there it might a lain in them old letters, that Lady Maxwell said she never hed the heart to look over! it never would a turned up in the world.”

“Well,” said I, “what became of Ruth?” “Oh! Cap’n Oliver he came back all alive, and escaped from the Algerines; and they was married in King’s Chapel, and lived in the old Sullivan House, in peace and prosperity. That’s jest how the story was; and now Aunt Lois can make what she’s a mind ter out on’t.”

“And what became of Jeff?” “Oh! he started to go over to England, and the ship was wrecked off the Irish coast, and that was the last of him. He never got to his property.”

“Good enough for him,” said both of us.’ “Wal, I don’t know: ’twas pretty hard on Jeff. Mebbe he did, and mebbe he didn’t. I’m glad I warn’t in his shoes, tho’. I’d rather never hed nothin’. This ‘ere hastin’ to be rich is sich a drefful temptation.

“Wal, now, boys, ye’ve done a nice lot o’ flax, and I guess we’ll go up to yer grand’ther’s cellar and git a mug o’ cyder. Talkin’ always gits me dry.”