took me entirely by surprise.

After providing for the education of Miss Yelverton under the
direction of her guardians, and for her residence, under ordinary
circumstances, with the major's sister, Lady Westwick, the clause
concluded by saddling the child's future inheritance with this
curious condition:

From the period of her leaving school to the period of her
reaching the age of twenty-one years, Miss Yelverton was to pass
not less than six consecutive weeks out of every year under the
roof of one of her two guardians. During the lives of both of
them, it was left to her own choice to say which of the two she
would prefer to live with. In all other respects the condition
was imperative. If she forfeited it, excepting, of course, the
case of the deaths of both her guardians, she was only to have a
life-interest in the property; if she obeyed it, the money itself
was to become her own possession on the day when she completed
her twenty-first year.

This clause in the will, as I have said, took me at first by
surprise. I remembered how devotedly Lady Westwick had soothed
her sister-in-law's death-bed sufferings, and how tenderly she
had afterward watched over the welfare of the little motherless
child--I remembered the innumerable claims she had established in
this way on her brother's confidence in her affection for his
orphan daughter, and I was, therefore, naturally amazed at the
appearance of a condition in his will which seemed to show a
positive distrust of Lady Westwick's undivided influence over the
character and conduct of her niece.