In her distress and confusion of mind Miss Garth was incapable of reasoning with herself, as she might have reasoned at a happier time.  She hastened to the antechamber of Mrs. Vanstone’s room; and, after explaining Mr. Pendril’s position toward the family, placed his letter in the hands of the medical men.  They both answered, without hesitation, to the same purpose.  Mrs. Vanstone’s condition rendered any such interview as the lawyer desired a total impossibility.  If she rallied from her present prostration, Miss Garth should be at once informed of the improvement.  In the meantime, the answer to Mr. Pendril might be conveyed in one word—­Impossible.

“You see what importance Mr. Pendril attaches to the interview?” said Miss Garth.

Yes:  both the doctors saw it.

“My mind is lost and confused, gentlemen, in this dreadful suspense.  Can you either of you guess why the signature is wanted? or what the object of the interview may be?  I have only seen Mr. Pendril when he has come here on former visits:  I have no claim to justify me in questioning him.  Will you look at the letter again?  Do you think it implies that Mr. Vanstone has never made a will?”

“I think it can hardly imply that,” said one of the doctors.  “But, even supposing Mr. Vanstone to have died intestate, the law takes due care of the interests of his widow and his children—­”

“Would it do so,” interposed the other medical man, “if the property happened to be in land?”

“I am not sure in that case.  Do you happen to know, Miss Garth, whether Mr. Vanstone’s property was in money or in land?”

“In money,” replied Miss Garth.  “I have heard him say so on more than one occasion.”

“Then I can relieve your mind by speaking from my own experience.  The law, if he has died intestate, gives a third of his property to his widow, and divides the rest equally among his children.”

“But if Mrs. Vanstone—­”

“If Mrs. Vanstone should die,” pursued the doctor, completing the question which Miss Garth had not the heart to conclude for herself, “I believe I am right in telling you that the property would, as a matter of legal course, go to the children.  Whatever necessity there may be for the interview which Mr. Pendril requests, I can see no reason for connecting it with the question of Mr. Vanstone’s presumed intestacy.  But, by all means, put the question, for the satisfaction of your own mind, to Mr. Pendril himself.”

Miss Garth withdrew to take the course which the doctor advised.  After communicating to Mr. Pendril the medical decision which, thus far, refused him the interview that he sought, she added a brief statement of the legal question she had put to the doctors; and hinted delicately at her natural anxiety to be informed of the motives which had led the lawyer to make his request.  The answer she received was guarded in the extreme:  it did not impress her