Ellis Peters - George Felse 02 - Death and the Joyful Woman by Ellis Peters Page B

betting myself,” said George, “that he wouldn’t let his pile be divided up. Right?”
    “Right. He was a born amasser, he didn’t want things to disintegrate after he was gone, either. There’s a long list of minor legacies to staff, not one of ’em interesting to us, you wouldn’t consider killing a mouse for the amounts he considered a due reward for service. Mind you, he paid good wages living, I don’t think it’s meanness, it’s just this empire-building tendency of his. But the residue of his property, after payment of these flea-bites, is left to—did I hear you make a guess?”
    “You did not,” said George. “My mind’s a blank. He didn’t, by any chance, think of the possibility of grandchildren, and leave it in trust for them?”
    “Not a hope. The whole dynasty is cancelled, he’s making a new and surprising start. The name is Katherine Norris, George. And what, if anything, do you make of that?”

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CHAPTER IV
    « ^ »
    AND WHAT
DID
George make of it? Just plain spite? A reaction towards Kitty Norris simply because Leslie had veered off from her and married someone else? A way of hitting Leslie as hard as possible by so pointedly deflecting his expectations into the lap of the girl he wouldn’t marry? Not a gesture of consolation to Kitty, Armiger wasn’t quite as clumsy as that, surely, even when he was angry. Or was there more to it than met the eye? Plainly this represented a move to amalgamate Armiger’s Ales and Norris’s Beers and vest the lot in Kitty after his death; but might it not be intended primarily as a move in a game which was to be played with Armiger very much alive and in shrewd command of his forces? Kitty would be welcome to the show after he was dead, provided he ran it while he was alive. His naming her as his heiress might well be an earnest of good faith designed to bring off a deal which had so far eluded him, and the deal could only be the acquisition of Norris’s to add to his own barony here and now. After all, with Leslie out of the picture Armiger was making no sacrifice in declaring his intention of leaving everything he had to Kitty, since he had no other close relatives, and he couldn’t take his fortune with him. He had to dispose of it somehow; how better than by buying a present gain with it, while he was here to enjoy it?
    Supposing there existed a tentative proposition for a merger, thought George, and Miss Norris’s manager was holding off—as he understandably might, for once the two firms were joined there wasn’t much doubt who would turn out to be the boss—wouldn’t such a disposition for the future strengthen Armiger’s hand considerably? What had he to lose, in any case? If he failed to get what he wanted this will was as easily revoked as the previous one. It was at least worth a try. What Armiger wanted he usually got, hence the ferocity and finality of his reaction on the one occasion when he failed in his aims.
    George got out his car and sat behind the wheel, and thought out his next move without haste. A rum set-up, when you came to think of it, old Norris making Armiger’s right-hand man trustee for his daughter, but the three men had been fairly close friends, and nobody had ever questioned Shelley’s integrity; it seemed to work well enough in practice. He didn’t know whether the trust was wound up now that the girl was of age, or not. There were a lot of relevant things he didn’t know, and on the face of it he had very little right so far to inquire into them. There was only one person he had a perfect right to see about Kitty Norris’s movements and affairs, and that was Kitty Norris. She had been at The Jolly Barmaid last night, she had been with Armiger, he had spoken to her, among others, just before he went off happily to display his latest garish toy; and sooner or later George would have to see her. It might as well be sooner, he decided, and started the car.
    Kitty had a flat in Comerbourne, not far from