The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Bequest, by W.W. Jacobs

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Title: The Bequest
Ship's Company, Part 6.

Author: W.W. Jacobs

Release Date: January 1, 2004 [EBook #10566]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ASCII

*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE BEQUEST ***

Produced by David Widger

SHIP'S COMPANY

By W.W. Jacobs

THE BEQUEST

R. Robert Clarkson sat by his fire, smoking thoughtfully. His lifelong
neighbour and successful rival in love had passed away a few days before,
and Mr. Clarkson, fresh from the obsequies, sat musing on the fragility
of man and the inconvenience that sometimes attended his departure.

His meditations were disturbed by a low knocking on the front door, which
opened on to the street. In response to his invitation it opened slowly,
and a small middle-aged man of doleful aspect entered softly and closed
it behind him.

"Evening, Bob," he said, in stricken accents. "I thought I'd just step
round to see how you was bearing up. Fancy pore old Phipps! Why, I'd
a'most as soon it had been me. A'most."

Mr. Clarkson nodded.

"Here to-day and gone to-morrow," continued Mr. Smithson, taking a seat.
"Well, well! So you'll have her at last-pore thing."

"That was his wish," said Mr. Clarkson, in a dull voice.

"And very generous of him too," said Mr. Smithson. "Everybody is saying
so. Certainly he couldn't take her away with him. How long is it since
you was both of you courting her?"

"Thirty years come June," replied the other.

"Shows what waiting does, and patience," commented Mr. Smithson. "If
you'd been like some chaps and gone abroad, where would you have been
now? Where would have been the reward of your faithful heart?"

Mr. Clarkson, whose pipe had gone out, took a coal from the fire and lit
it again.

"I can't understand him dying at his age," he said, darkly. "He ought to
have lived to ninety if he'd been taken care of."

"Well, he's gone, pore chap," said his friend. "What a blessing it must
ha' been to him in his last moments to think that he had made provision
for his wife."

"Provision!" exclaimed Mr. Clarkson. "Why he's left her nothing but the
furniture a