Mary Garth and Peter Featherstone

Mary Garth and Peter Featherstone are bound by Mary’s work in his household, but not by affection or deference. As his dependable attendant, she sees the avarice and suspicion that shape his final days; when he asks her to help destroy one of his wills and offers her money in exchange, she refuses. Their relationship places Mary at the center of the struggle over Featherstone’s estate while showing how her loyalty to her own principles survives the pressure of his wealth and approaching death.

Household Service and Estrangement

During Featherstone’s final illness, Mary manages the household and bears the uncomfortable responsibility of carrying his refusals to visiting relatives. He will see none of them, while the family keeps arriving to watch for signs of what he may do with his property. Mary invites visitors to stay and eat as custom requires, even as the steady traffic and their attention to the estate expose how thoroughly inheritance has overtaken the household.

Mary’s position is useful but not cherished. She has always seen Featherstone’s most disagreeable side; he is not proud of her, and she understands that she matters to him chiefly because she can serve him. She nevertheless waits on him faithfully and does not answer his snapping with harshness. Her service is a matter of conduct, not sentimental idealization: she does not pretend that his character inspires the reverence or solicitude she might feel for someone else.

The Watch and the Family’s Suspicion

The prospect of an inheritance turns Featherstone’s relatives into anxious observers. Solomon and Mrs. Waule spend long hours at Stone Court, watching Mary and lamenting that they cannot enter Featherstone’s room. His dislike of his family intensifies as he grows too weak to entertain himself by provoking them. Mary, meanwhile, observes their vigilance and recognizes how readily people imagine that other people’s motives are less honest than their own.

After midnight, Mary takes her turn watching beside Featherstone. The quiet hours give her room to reflect on the day’s absurdities and on Fred’s uncertain prospects. She suspects that the Vincys, despite Featherstone’s apparent fondness for them, may be disappointed in the inheritance; she worries about what that would mean for Fred, even while she can laugh at his follies when he is present. Her private concern distinguishes her from the relatives who watch the sickroom chiefly for what the old man’s death may bring them.

The Will and Mary’s Refusal

At about three in the morning, Featherstone calls Mary over and retrieves the tin box he keeps beside him. He asks how many of his relations are in the house, then insists that his faculties are intact and that he has prepared everything necessary to change his mind. He says he has made two wills and intends to burn one. His instructions are precise: Mary is to use a key to open the iron chest, retrieve the topmost paper, and bring him the will.

Mary refuses. She will not touch the chest or the document because doing so could expose her to suspicion. When Featherstone presses her, she makes her reason explicit: “I will not let the close of your life soil the beginning of mine.” Her refusal is not simply resistance to an unpleasant task; it protects the independence and reputation on which her future depends. The old man’s command cannot turn her into an accomplice, and the prospect of his property cannot make her accept that risk.

Featherstone next tries to persuade her with the money in his tin box, urging her to take the notes and gold and do as he says. Mary refuses those too. She warns him not to ask again, adding that otherwise she will call his brother. The offer exposes the transaction Featherstone hopes to make: access to his wealth in exchange for her participation. Mary will accept neither the money nor the key. After he begins to cry, she returns to her chair by the fire, trying to end the pressure without escalating the encounter.

Fred, Death, and the Unresolved Estate

Featherstone then asks Mary to call Fred. She agrees only on condition that she may also call Jonah and others, unwilling to arrange a private encounter whose purpose and consequences she cannot know. Featherstone insists on seeing Fred alone. Mary recognizes that the proposed burning of a second will could have serious implications, but the decision has to be made in the moment; she does not simply comply with the old man’s demand.

After Featherstone throws his stick and falls quiet, Mary waits by the fire. When she sees that he may be motionless, she approaches, checks for signs of breathing, and then lets daylight fall on the bed to see more clearly. She rings the bell; Featherstone is dead, his right hand holding the keys and his left resting on the notes and gold. The objects with which he tried to draw Mary into changing his estate remain with him, while she has touched neither chest nor money.

The subsequent reading establishes the tangled documentary stakes of the household’s vigilance: Featherstone’s solicitor announces an earlier will dated August 9, 1825, a later instrument dated July 20, 1826, and a codicil dated March 1, 1828. Mary alone knows what Featherstone asked of her on his final night. Her refusal has kept her outside the act he wanted her to perform, but the competing documents leave the family’s expectations unsettled.

The Relationship’s Moral Significance

The relationship is defined by a contrast between Featherstone’s control of property and Mary’s control of her own actions. He tries to use both command and payment to secure her cooperation; she answers with a boundary grounded in the danger of suspicion and the value of her future reputation. Her faithful care does not erase her judgment of him, and her judgment does not make her cruel: she stays with him, refuses his demands, and responds to his distress without surrendering her principles.

The episode also shows why Mary’s position is consequential despite her limited formal power in the household. She is a servant and observer in a family consumed by inheritance, yet Featherstone’s final attempt depends on her willingness to act. By refusing, she prevents his private scheme from making her a participant in the destruction of a will. Their relationship therefore reveals the difference between proximity to wealth and authority over it: Featherstone can offer money and issue orders, but Mary retains the decisive choice.