"There never was such a thing heard of as the refusing of a fortune legally bequeathed," cried the lawyer.
"I daresay there has been, many a time. If not, this will be a precedent."
"You'll be so laughed at," persisted Mr. Wedderburn. "You'll be set down--I'm afraid people will be for setting you down as a lunatic."
"Let them," said the doctor. "They shan't confine me as one without my own certificate. Mr. Wedderburn," he continued in a graver tone, "I am serious in this refusal. I feel that I have no right whatever to this money of Lady Oswald's. She has paid me liberally for my services----"
"If you only knew how many thousands inherit money daily who have no right to it," interrupted Mr. Wedderburn.
"Doubtless they do. I was going to observe that it is not so much my having no right to it, that would cause me to decline, as the fact that others exist who have a right. I----"
"But the will gives you a right," interposed the lawyer, unable to get over his surprise.
"A legal right, I am aware it does. But not a just one. No, I will not accept this legacy."
The doctor was silent for a minute. "I should wish the money to be appropriated just as though there had been no Dr. Davenal in existence. You say this will was made but about six months ago. It must have superseded another will, I presume?"
"It may be said that it superseded several," was the reply. "Lady Oswald was constantly making wills. She had made some half-dozen before this last one."
"And each one disposing of her property differently?" quickly asked the doctor.
"Yea, or nearly so. Twice she bequeathed it to her nephews, the Stephensons. Once it was left to Mr. Oswald Cray; once to charities; once to Sir Philip Oswald. She has been exceedingly capricious."
"All the more reason why I should not take it now," warmly cried Dr. Davenal. "She must have left it to me in a moment of caprice; and had she lived a few months longer this will would have been revoked as the rest have been. Mr. Wedderburn, were I capable of acting upon it, of taking the money, I should lose all self-respect for ever. I could not, as a responsible being, responsible to One who sees and judges all I do, be guilty of so crying an injustice."
Mr. Wedderburn suppressed a shrug of the shoulders. He could only look at these affairs with a lawyer's eye and a lawyer's reasoning. Dr. Davenal resumed--