"By God, you are a good feller, sir," was all Mr. Osborne said. It had
never struck him that the widow would feel any pain at parting from the
boy, or that his having a fine fortune could grieve her. A
reconciliation was announced as speedy and inevitable, and Amelia's
heart already began to beat at the notion of the awful meeting with
George's father.
It was never, however, destined to take place. Old Sedley's lingering
illness and death supervened, after which a meeting was for some time
impossible. That catastrophe and other events may have worked upon Mr.
Osborne. He was much shaken of late, and aged, and his mind was
working inwardly. He had sent for his lawyers, and probably changed
something in his will. The medical man who looked in pronounced him
shaky, agitated, and talked of a little blood and the seaside; but he
took neither of these remedies.
One day when he should have come down to breakfast, his servant missing
him, went into his dressing-room and found him lying at the foot of the
dressing-table in a fit. Miss Osborne was apprised; the doctors were
sent for; Georgy stopped away from school; the bleeders and cuppers
came. Osborne partially regained cognizance, but never could speak
again, though he tried dreadfully once or twice, and in four days he
died. The doctors went down, and the undertaker's men went up the
stairs, and all the shutters were shut towards the garden in Russell
Square. Bullock rushed from the City in a hurry. "How much money had
he left to that boy? Not half, surely? Surely share and share alike
between the three?" It was an agitating moment.
What was it that poor old man tried once or twice in vain to say? I
hope it was that he wanted to see Amelia and be reconciled before he
left the world to one dear and faithful wife of his son: it was most
likely that, for his will showed that the hatred which he had so long
cherished had gone out of his heart.
They found in the pocket of his dressing-gown the letter with the great
red seal which George had written him from Waterloo. He had looked at
the other papers too, relative to his son, for the key of the box in
which he kept them was also in his pocket, and it was found the seals
and envelopes had been broken--very likely on the night before the
seizure--when the butler had taken him tea into his study, and found
him reading in the great red family Bible.
When the will was opened, it was found that half the property was left
to George, and the remainder between the two sisters. Mr. Bullock to
continue, for their joint benefit, the affairs of the commercial house,
or to go out, as he thought fit. An annuity of five hundred pounds,
chargeable on George's property, was left to his mother, "the widow of
my beloved son, George Osborne," who was to resume the guardianship of
the boy.