“I need not read it word for word,” said Geoff; “I will give it afterwards to my cousin Grace. The lawyers think, after close consideration, that there is--no case----.” (Here there was a movement on the part of Miss Anna and a quick “I told you so.”) “Wait a little,” said Geoffrey, “They say there is scarcely any case to go to a jury; but they say also that if it did go to a jury the strong moral probability and the touching character of all the circumstances might lead to a verdict for the claimants notwithstanding the weakness of the evidence. Law would be against it; but the jury might be for it.”
“I understand that reasoning,” said Miss Anna: “most men are fools, and jurymen are men--therefore it is likely that fools being the judges, the verdict would be preposterous. Is that all your wiseacres have got to say?”
“Not quite,” said Geoff; “the lawyers advise a compromise.”
“A compromise? I object--I object at once. I will not hear of it. Let it go into court. If I am compelled to yield to the sentiment of a dozen British idiots, I must do so; but consent to rob myself, for no reason? oh no, no! I will never do that.”
“Aunt Anna, you are not the only person concerned.”
“I am,” she said; “I have the largest share. I am the eldest. Your mother has never gone against me in her life, and she will not now.”
“Anna,” said Mrs Underwood tremulously, “I always have followed your advice--oh, always, it is quite true; but Geoff, you know--Geoff is a man now; and he has been bred up to the law, and he ought to know better, far better than we do.”
“Should he? but he doesn’t; he’s a poor weak sentimental creature not strong enough to be either one thing or another, a swindler or an honest man. He naturally takes refuge in compromises. I haven’t known him so long without knowing that. I believe the lawyer’s opinion is his own, it is so like him. A compromise? no! I will have no compromise,” cried Miss Anna, striking her stick upon the floor.
“And we reject it too,” cried Grace--“we will have nothing, nothing! we settled upon all that before we came here. If we had not decided so, we should never have come.”
“Let it go to a jury if you like,” said Miss Anna, paying no attention to this. “I am not afraid. I take the risk of sentiment. Yes, of course, they are a pack of sentimental fools: two pretty girls in deep mourning will get anything out of a British jury. Still I’ll risk it. But nothing, nothing in the world will make me consent to a compromise.”