"The Mystery of O'Connor Death"

Chapter 30

Chapter 30

     Finally, the day of the party arrived. A day that really seemed like an important day. Everything was ready for this party and almost all the guests had accepted the invitation. Among the list of guests, the name of Mrs. Isabella Wharton caught the eye; she was a wealthy woman and had been respected by the people of that area for four years and had to be invited. Anyway, everyone was happy for this party and among them only Georgiana seemed a little anxious as if she was waiting for something bad to happen all day. Night came and it was time for the party.
   When they announced the arrival of Mrs. Elizabeth Buchanan and James went to greet her. Elizabeth said: "Mr. Ellington, I haven't seen you for a long time."
   James said: "Yes; that's right, almost four years."
   "What is the reason for holding this party?"
   James smiled and said: "There is no special reason but for you who have not heard from our family for four years something interesting has happened." Then he called Georgiana who was standing behind them and talking to Karen.
   Georgiana turned red when she saw that woman and did not feel well at all but on the other hand, Elizabeth smiled.
   James who did not know the reason for this change of mood said: "Georgiana, she is Mrs. Elizabeth Buchanan one of our family friends. Mrs. Buchanan, she is Georgiana, my lost sister."
   When Elizabeth heard the phrase "my lost sister" she turned pale and said in shock: "Your sister? Did I hear correctly?"
   James smiled and said: "Yes; you heard correctly."
Elizabeth unbelievably said softly: "This is impossible. I don't believe it."
   James laughed and said: "Why don't you believe it?"
   Georgiana wanted to run away at that moment. She felt that if she did not escape, the same bad thing that she was waiting for would happen. She prayed that something would happen to get her out of that group as soon as possible. She saw Mrs. Ellington calling her and left them happily.
At that moment when the doorman announced the arrival of Mrs. Jane McKenzie along with Mr. Tom Baker Elizabeth who was still shocked looked around to see someone in the crowd but could not find the person she wanted. A few minutes later the doorman announced the arrival of Mr. Raymond Wharton along with Mr. Leonard who was an unknown guest; Mrs. Ellington got a little confused in terms of preparing hospitality items. What was going on here?
   Elizabeth wanted to go to him as soon as she saw Mr. Wharton but since Mr. Wharton went to Jane and Tom Baker to introduce them to Mr. Ellington she preferred to wait a few moments.
It was during the introduction that Mr. Ellington called Raymond Mr. Wharton, while he had introduced himself to Jane and Tom as "Jack Porter"; this was when both of them looked surprised and angry, although they tried to hide their anger, but they could not succeed.
   Tom felt like a ship that was proudly sailing in the calm sea, but suddenly caught in a whirlpool. If there was any secret behind this matter, it was too late for any reaction.
   When Mr. Wharton left the group, Elizabeth quickly went to Raymond and took him to a corner and said in surprise: "I can't believe Emily is James's sister. She doesn't even know me."
   Mr. Wharton said: "I can't believe it either. She treated me like a stranger."
   "I heard something strange about Emily, is this true?"
   "What are you talking about? What do you mean?"
While Elizabeth was talking to Raymond, the doorman announced the arrival of Mrs. Isabella Wharton. Everyone was surprised because she entered the hall with Alice and went straight to Jane. When she reached her, she smiled and said: "Dear Jane, we finally found each other; I'm very happy."
   Jane smiled and said in surprise: "Dear Isabella, I'm very happy to see you too, but I didn't expect to see you and my dear nephew here, but I'm very happy that after all this time I was looking for Alice, I finally see her."
   Isabella smiled as she looked at Alice and said: "Alice really wanted to see you, so when I told her that I finally found you and you're coming to this party tonight, I couldn't stop her from coming here."
Throughout this time, Georgiana was curious why Mrs. Wharton had brought Alice to this party and coincidentally stood in a place where she could see them well and hear their words well.
     Alice said: "Auntie, I'm very happy to see you." The word "auntie" was like a spark for Georgiana in the midst of absolute darkness that lit everything up for her. Although it was painful moments for Georgiana, but these moments passed quickly; Georgiana experienced happiness, worry, anger and sadness together in these minutes. Georgiana had tears in her eyes; she couldn't stop laughing; her hands were shaking a little; she had no control over herself. She turned to the wall so no one would see her condition.
After a few minutes when she regained control of herself, she quickly went to Alice and after hugging her; while squeezing her hands, she grabbed one of Alice's hands firmly and pulled her aside and said in surprise: "Alice, what are you doing here?"
   Alice, who was a little surprised, finally came to herself and after introducing the group to each other, she smiled and said: "Georgiana, I insisted so much on Mrs. Wharton to bring me here so that I could finally see my aunt after four years."
   Georgiana said: "I'm sorry; then I shouldn't have bothered this group for now."
While Georgiana was talking to Alice, Jane and Tom were both shocked and their faces looked a little red. Jane finally came to herself and said with a voice that showed she was shaking a little: "Excuse me, Mrs. Ellington, you?" Georgiana interrupted her and said with a laugh: "You want to ask if I'm sure I'm Mr. Ellington's daughter? I'm used to this question; yes, I've been Mr. Ellington's daughter for thirty-five years now." But she was lying almost. Then she said to Alice: "Alice, my mother said 'take you to the library so that everyone will come later and surprise you.'"
   Alice said in surprise: "Surprise me? Why?"
   Georgiana shrugged and laughed and said: "I don't know until now that I told you it was too much, but promise me you'll be surprised."
   Alice laughed and said: "I'll try." Then she turned to Jane and said: "Auntie, will you wait for me for a few minutes?"
   Jane came forward and caressed her cheek and smiled and said: "Yes Alice; I'll wait for you."
   When the two of them left the hall hand in hand with slow steps. As soon as the doors closed behind them; Georgiana tightened Alice's hand and ran to the library, dragging Alice with her. Alice's hand hurt and she had to follow Georgiana. She wanted to protest but didn't because she liked this pain.
     When they entered the library; they saw that apparently a servant had been cleaning the library. He had stopped working and was looking at them with surprise. Georgiana said: "Mary, what are you doing here at this time?"
   Mary, who looked very surprised, said: "Mr. Ellington ordered me to clean the library quickly because they want to meet with one of their guests here."
   Georgiana said: "Go tell Mr. Ellington not to do this and come here right now. Tell mother, James and Karen to come too."
   When the servant left the library and Alice and Georgiana were alone; Georgiana still held Alice's hand tightly. Georgiana stood in front of Alice and started caressing her; she stared into Alice's eyes in silence. She didn't know what to say to her or where to start, but Alice broke the silence and said softly: "Mother, do you finally recognize me?"
   Georgiana hugged Alice and kept saying: "Alice, forgive me; forgive me." Until her voice cracked and she continued: "Alice, I'm very sorry; you must have suffered a lot. This plan was supposed to last only ten days but it took four years."
   Alice laughed and said: "It's okay; even though it took four years, you spent these years with your real family."
"But I had forgotten you and John."
   "The day I saw you by the sea, I hated Aunt for wanting to find out who killed her father with this ridiculous plan; anyway, I've come to terms with it now; father is waiting for you in the porch."
   Mrs. Ellington said in surprise: "Alice, are you my granddaughter?"
   Georgiana looked behind her and saw that everyone had arrived. She turned to them and said: "Mother, please wait; I'll explain everything to you later. Mother, please take the guests to the garden right now and separate Mrs. Wharton's group, Mrs. Buchanan, Mrs. McKenzie, Mr. Baker and Mr. Wharton with their friend from the rest of the guests."
   Mrs. Ellington said: "I'll do it right now." And left them.
   Georgiana said: "James and Karen, I ask you to stay with Alice and take care of her; don't give her to Tom Baker."
     When the guests were walking in the garden, Tom Baker approached Isabella and said: "Hello, dear sister."
Isabella said: "Hello, dear stepbrother."
Tom looked at Isabella's face and said: "You were always kind to me, but now you are not happy to see me."
   Isabella laughed and said: "Time changes people's thoughts and behaviors; now I have realized how right Raymond was about you."
   "I did a lot of bad things that were all for money." "Money? Why? So it was for this that you got close to the McKenzie family?"
   "Money makes people dirty."
  "If money makes people dirty, then why were you so eager to get rich?"
After a few moments of silence, Tom Baker continued: "You really don't know? I lived with my family in a very dirty room; we were poor. My father didn't have a steady job; he did anything to get some money to get by for the rest of the day."
   "So your situation wasn't that bad."
   Tom sighed and said: "Yes, of course, until he couldn't find a job in that cold and hard winter and we didn't have any money to pay that landlord who was a drunkard. That was for a small and dirty room that I always hated." And he fell silent again, deeply lost in thought. He continued:
   "That was enough for that man to kick us out of the house."
   "So you had to sleep on the street."
   "Yes; when I saw all those poor people sleeping on the street in the winter cold, I didn't think that house was hell anymore."
   Isabella felt sorry for Tom for a moment and said with sadness: "So you suffered a lot?"
   "Everyone was almost sick; even though we were very careful, my mother and sisters got infected with smallpox."
"Smallpox?"
   "Because we didn't have any money, my father left us alone to go somewhere far away to get some money; after all, the doctor wanted money and without money he wouldn't examine anyone."
   "How bad."
   "When my mother and sisters died in front of my eyes, I first waited for my father to come, but he didn't. A few days later, hungry and aimless, I walked on the street until I fainted on the ground in front of your carriage."
   "I remember when they brought you home, you were burning with fever and moaning constantly. My mother's heart burned for you."
   "When your father took care of me, your brother didn't treat me well. To be honest, the first time I fought with your brother, I told him that he shouldn't call me brother and that I only live with this family for his father's money. I was stupid to always bring this up in the fights of childhood; even though your mother always took my side in the fights, but when Raymond left home he wrote in his letter that I said that he is a worthless person who was born in a rich family and that all the Wharton's wealth is mine. Mr. Wharton finally kicked me out of the house because of this letter and my behavior. When I left you; a while later I finally met the McKenzie family and managed to attract Mr. McKenzie's attention. They were also a wealthy family. This time I decided to act smartly. After a while Mr. McKenzie decided to hire me in his shipbuilding company; after a few months when I realized that there were some disagreements between Mr. McKenzie and Mr. David O'Connor, Mr. David O'Connor left there a few days later. The accounting of the company was in my hands. Suddenly it occurred to me to slowly bankrupt the company. Mr. McKenzie trusted me and didn't doubt me. He had many creditors. I told Mr. McKenzie that we didn't have enough money to pay off our debts. And I did a clever thing. It was that because of the disagreements between Mr. David O'Connor and Mr. McKenzie, I did the bankruptcy-related work under Mr. O'Connor's name. Many of the creditors played the role of a bankrupt creditor because of the money they had taken from me. From the money that I got from Mr. McKenzie to pay off his debts and the money that your father had given me, I was able to accumulate wealth for myself."
   After a few minutes of silence, Tom continued: "It was a clever plan, wasn't it sister?"
"Yes, it was a very cunning plan. I'm really sorry for the McKenzie family for trusting someone like you."
   "Mr. McKenzie had to resort to some tricks to pay off his debts, which only dragged him deeper into the swamp. Anyway, the real creditors were increasing day by day and Mr. McKenzie went to the bank as the only hope to get a loan, but the bank did not lend. A few days later, Mr. McKenzie realized that it was Mr. David O'Connor who had prevented the bank from lending to Mr. McKenzie and thus Mr. McKenzie's suspicion was lifted from me." He continued: "I hate John O'Connor. Fate forced me to kill Mr. McKenzie and John O'Connor, maybe it was John O'Connor's fault."
   Isabella said: "Fate forced you?" Then she laughed and said: "What a bad fate; now why are you telling me all this? Don't you want to kill me?"
   "I don't know, maybe."
   "If I'm going to die, I want to know all the ins and outs of this case."
   "A few days later I realized that someone was secretly paying off Mr. McKenzie's debt and most importantly, he was getting closer to me and that person was John O'Connor. That day Mr. McKenzie wanted to commit suicide before meeting his creditors; I was very angry and told him 'that he had to die.' Anyway, when I shot Mr. McKenzie, I wiped the gun and put it in his hand. Then I quickly left the room and went to the next room. After a few minutes I went back there and saw John O'Connor who was shocked and had barely reached over the body. John O'Connor was very stupid to take that gun and most importantly, he had not noticed my presence there until then. When I saw his surprised and horrified face, I told him 'I can't believe he killed Mr. McKenzie.' His tongue was tied; when he came to himself, the first thing he did was throw the gun there." He stopped talking and said: "Sorry if my speech was long." Then he continued: "A few days later we heard that Mr. O'Connor had taken over Jane's guardianship, I decided to start a small business with the money I had earned, but things were not going well at all in those ten years that passed hard I realized that O'Connor's shipbuilding company was booming in a situation where I was losing money every day and hated John O'Connor very much. I decided to get O'Connor's money by telling Jane everything against John and she decided to kill John's wife and child."
   A voice said: "But I didn't do it."
   It was Jane's voice.
   Tom turned to Jane in surprise and said: "Did you hear all my words?"
   "I thought you were confessing now that you know everything is against you?"
   Tom laughed and wanted to say something when Jane said: "John and his family are all alive."
   Tom laughed and said: "I killed John myself."
   At that moment, the man who had come with Raymond came forward and said: "I'm alive; you killed one of your fake creditors."
   Jane said: "I can't believe you proposed to me? Are you crazy?"
   Raymond said: "Tom, you don't know how happy I am to see you in this situation."
A gunshot sounded; Tom committed suicide and because of this the guests fled.
     John O'Connor entered the building and quickly searched every room and hall carefully to find Emily, and in the meantime, the servants who were constantly trying to politely get him out of the building and kept telling him: "Sir, please leave here; The Ellington family is not in a good mood, the party is canceled."
But John O'Connor did not hear them at all until he forcibly opened a hall door and saw Emily's face. The servants pulled him back by force and wanted to take Mr. O'Connor away when he shouted Emily's name loudly.
   Georgiana, as soon as she heard Emily's name, said loudly: "Let him come in."
   John quickly entered and said: "Emily, I've been looking for you all over the country from north to south, from east to west for almost four years. Now I've found you here."
   Georgiana stuttered: "John, I know it's been hard for you. When I heard that Alice was very ill, I wanted to get to her anyway, but …" Karen interrupted her and said: "But her carriage overturned and she hit her head; When I got to her, she had passed out."
   Mrs. Ellington said: "When Karen brought her here, I didn't care who she was. A few days later when she regained consciousness and the doctor wanted to open her headband; She was alive, Georgiana, my lost daughter."
   Mr. Ellington said: "I tried to convince my wife that that woman was not our daughter, but I failed."
   Karen said again: "A few days later, that woman suddenly took me among the trees and took out a wooden box from under the ground. A box that only my sister and I knew about; She was really Georgiana."
   Mrs. Ellington said: "I was scared and wanted to leave here anyway."
   Georgiana said: "I insisted we come back here. I had forgotten everything, I just remembered that I was Georgiana Ellington."
   Alice said: "When I saw my mother on the beach, I was very surprised. I got sick and passed out from a high fever when we got home together."
   Georgiana said: "Margaret saw me and Emily called me. I had a bad feeling and wanted to escape."
   Alice said: "Aunt told me "that she had to explain something to me." Father, the truth is that twenty-some years ago, just when Georgiana Ellington was looking for her sister in the forest, Emily died of measles and grandmother who loved Emily very much became mentally ill and that night Georgiana found her unconscious before everyone else and took care of her as Emily. That's how it happened that Emily apparently survived a deadly disease."
   Mrs. Ellington said: "But this is selfishness."
It took a while for John O'Connor to believe this. It seemed impossible and because of this Georgiana explained the whole story to him again and this time it seemed more reasonable; He was happy anyway that they were together like before and on the other hand, although accepting John O'Connor as a member of the family seemed a bit difficult, but over time this problem was solved and they were even very happy about it.
     Alice had only told her mother that grandmother would go to Margaret's house tomorrow. Georgiana went to Beneet's house in the afternoon and when she saw her grandmother in bed, she realized that she was ill.
Margaret was kind to her and smiled as if she had decided not to hate her anymore.
Georgiana was still kind to her even though she knew she was not Emily and called her mother. A few days later Alice's grandmother died.
After the funeral, Georgiana invited all the members of Beneet's family to their house, which they had left four years ago.
   When all the Beneets got out of the carriage and saw with surprise that everyone was waiting for them in the yard, they immediately went to them. Georgiana said: "My father bought this house for me with the same money that had been inherited to me; John agreed to live here because I liked this house. Mr. Warton has taken good care of this house in these four years. Anyway, now this house belongs to you."
   Margaret said: "I don't accept it, this is still your house."
   "Do you still have a grudge against your mother and father?"
   "No, I don't have a grudge; after all, they were opposed to my marriage with Jarvis."
   "Then please live here. You should be the lady of this house, not the wife of a farmer. Mr. Bent should not be a farmer either, it is true that he lost his money in a stream, but that does not mean that you should not be the lady of this house." Margaret said: "But."
   Georgiana interrupted her and said: "We have decided to leave here, Alice has no good memories of this house. Anyway, we want to leave this house."
Finally, with Georgiana's insistence, the Beneet family agreed to live in this house from now on. Georgiana and her family immediately got into the carriage and moved towards their new house.