"Greatlystartled, I drew back from the bed which but a moment before had been the scene of such mingled emotions.
"'All is over here,' said I, and turned to follow the man whom with her latest breath she had bidden me to stop from leaving the house.
"As I could not take the lamp and leave my companions in darkness, I stepped out into a dark hall; but before I had taken a half dozen steps I heard a cautious foot descending the back stairs, and realizing that it would be both foolish and unsafe for me to endeavor to follow him through the unlighted rooms and possibly intricate passages of this upper hall, I bounded down the front stairs, and feeling my way from door to door, at last emerged into a room where there was a lamp burning.
"I had found the kitchen, and in it were Huckins and the man Briggs. Huckins had his hand on the latch of the outside door, and from his look and the bundle he carried, I judged that if I had been a minute later he would have been in full flight from the house.
"'Put out the light!' he shouted to Briggs.
"But I stepped forward, and the man did not dare obey him, and Huckins himself looked cowed and dropped his hand from the door-knob.
"'Where are you going?' I asked, moving rapidly to his side.
"'Isn't she dead?' was his only answer, given with a mixture of mockery and triumph difficult to describe.
"'Yes,' I assented, 'she is dead; but that does not justify you in flying the house.'
"'And who says I am flying?' he protested. 'Cannot I go out on an errand without being told I am running away?'
"'An errand,' I repeated, 'two minutes after your sister has breathed her last! Don't talk to me of errands. Your appearance is that of flight, and that bundle in your arms looks like the cause of it.'
"His eye, burning with a passion very natural under the circumstances, flashed over me with a look of disdain.
"'And what do you know of my appearance, and what is it to you if I carry or do not carry a bundle out of this house? Am I not master of everything here?'
"'No,' I cried boldly; then, thinking it might perhaps be wiser not to undeceive him as to his position till I had fully sounded his purposes, I added somewhat nonchalantly: 'that is, you are not master enough to take anything away that belonged to your sister. If you can prove to me that there is nothing in that bundle savewhat is yours and was yours before your sister died, well and good, you may go away with it and leave your poor dead sister to be cared for in her own house by strangers. But while I have the least suspicion that property of any nature belonging to this estate is hidden away under that roll of old clothes, you stop here if I have to appeal first to the strength of my arms and then to that of the law.'
"'But,' he quavered, 'it is mine—mine. I am but carrying away my own. Did you not draw up the will yourself? Don't you know she gave everything to me?'
"'What I know has nothing to do with it,' I retorted. 'Did you think because you saw a will drawn up in your favor that therefore you had immediate right to what she left, and could run away with her effects before her body was cold? A will has to be proven, my good man, before an heir has any right to touch what it leaves. If you do not know this, why did you try to slink away like a thief, instead of walking out of the front door like a proprietor? Your manner convicts you, man; so down with the bundle, or I shall have to give you in charge of the constable as a thief.'
"'You——!' he began, but stopped. Either his fears were touched or his cunning awakened, for after surveying me for a moment with mingled doubt and hatred, he suddenly altered his manner, till it became almost cringing, and muttering consolingly to himself, 'After all it is only a delay; everything will soon be mine,' he laid the bundle on the one board of the broken table besideus, adding with hypocritical meekness: 'It was only some little keepsakes of my sister, not enough to make such a fuss about.'
"'I will see to thesekeepsakes,' said I, and was about to raise the bundle, when he sprang upon me.
"'You——you——!' he cried. 'What right have you to touch them or to look at them? Because you drew up the will, does that make you an authority here? I don't believe it, and I won't see you put on the airs of it. I will go for the constable myself. I am not afraid of the law. I will see who is master in this house where I have lived in wretched slavery for years, and of which I shall be soon the owner.'
"'Very well,' said I, 'let us go find the constable.'
"The calmness with which I uttered this seemed at once to abash and infuriate him.
"He alternately cringed and ruffled himself, shuffling from one foot to the other till I could scarcely conceal the disgust with which he inspired me. At last he blurted forth with forced bravado:
"'Have I any rights, or haven't I any rights! You think because I don't know the law, that you can make a fool of me, but you can't. I may have lived like a dog, and I may not have a good coat to my back, but I am the man to whom this property has been given, as no one knows better than yourself; and if I chose to lift my foot and kick you out of that door for calling me a thief, who would blame me?—answer me that.'
"'No one,' said I, with a serenity equal to his fury, 'if this property is indeed to be yours, and if I know it as you say.'
"Struck by the suggestion implied in these words, as by a blow in the face for which he was wholly unprepared, he recoiled for a moment, looking at me with mingled doubt and amazement.
"'And do you mean to deny to my face, within an hour of the fact, and with the very witnesses to it still in the house, what you yourself wrote in this paper I now flaunt in your face? If so,youare the fool, and I the cunning one, as you will yet see, Mr. Lawyer.'
"I met his look with great calmness.
"'The hour you speak of contained many minutes, Mr. Huckins; and it takes only a few for a woman to change her mind, and to record that change.'
"'Her mind?' The stare of terror and dismay in his eyes was contradicted by the laugh on his lips. 'What mind had she after I left her? She couldn't even speak. You cannot frighten me.'
"'Mr. Huckins,' I now said, beckoning to the two witnesses whom our loud talking had guided to the spot where we were, 'I have thought best to tell you what some men might have thought it more expedient perhaps to conceal. Mrs. Wakeham, who evidently felt herself unduly influenced by you in the making of that will you hold in your hand, immediately upon your withdrawal testified her desire to make another, and as I had no interestin the case save the desire to fulfil her real wishes, I at once complied with her request, and formally drew up a second will more in consonance with her evident desires.'
"'It is a lie, a lie; you are deceiving me!' shrieked the unhappy man, taken wholly by surprise. 'She couldn't utter a word; her tongue was paralyzed; how could you know her wishes?'
"'Mrs. Wakeham had some of the cunning of her brother,' I observed. 'She knew when to play dumb and when to speak. She talked very well when released from the influence of your presence.'
"Overwhelmed, he cast one glance at the two witnesses, who by this time had stepped to my side, and reading confirmation in the severity of their looks, he fell slowly back against the table where he stood leaning heavily, with his head fallen on his breast.
"'Who has she given the house to?' he asked at last faintly, almost humbly.
"'That I have no right to tell you,' I answered. 'When the will is offered for probate you will know; that is all the comfort I can give you.'
"'She has left nothing to me, that much I see,' he bitterly exclaimed; and his head, lifted with momentary passion, fell again. 'Ten years gone to the dogs,' he murmured; 'ten years, and not a cent in reward! It is enough to make a man mad.' Suddenly he started forward in irrepressible passion. 'You talk about influence,'he cried, 'my influence; what influence didyouhave upon her? Some, or she would never have dared to contradict her dying words in that way. But I'll have it out with you in the courts. I'll never submit to being robbed in this way.'
"'You do not know that you are robbed,' said I, 'wait till you hear the will.'
"'The will? This is her will!' he shrieked, waving before him the paper that he held; 'I will not believe in any other; I will not acknowledge any other.'
"'You may have to,' now spoke up Mr. Dickey in strong and hearty tones; 'and if I might advise you as a neighbor, I would say that the stiller you keep now the better it probably will be for you in the future. You have not earned a good enough reputation among us for disinterestedness to bluster in this way about your rights.'
"'I don't want any talk from you,' was Huckins' quick reply, but these words from one who had the ears of the community in which he lived had nevertheless produced their effect; for his manner changed and it was with quite a softened air that he finally put up the paper in his pocket and said: 'I beg pardon if I have talked too loud and passionately. But the property was given to me and it shall not be taken away if any fight on my part can keep it. So let me see you all go, for I presume you do not intend to take up your abode in this house just yet.'
"'No,' I retorted with some significance, 'though it might be worth our while. It may contain more keepsakes;I presume there are one or two boards yet that have not been ripped up from the floors.' Then ashamed of what was perhaps an unnecessary taunt, I hastened to add: 'My reason for telling you of the existence of a second will is that you might no longer make the one you hold an excuse for rifling these premises and abstracting their contents. Nothing here is yours—yet; and till you inherit, if ever you do inherit, any attempt to hide or carry away one article which is not manifestly your own, will be regarded by the law as a theft and will be punished as such. But,' I went on, seeking to still further mitigate language calculated to arouse any man's rage, whether he was a villain or not, 'you have too much sense, and doubtless too much honesty to carry out such intentions now you know that you have lost whatever rights you considered yourself to possess, so I will say no more about it but at once make my proposition, which is that we give this box into the charge of Mr. Dickey, who will stand surety for it till your sister can be found. If you agree to this——'
"'But I won't agree,' broke in Huckins, furiously. 'Do you think I am a fool? The box is mine, I say, and——'
"'Or perhaps,' I calmly interrupted, 'you would prefer the constable to come and take both it and the house in charge. This would better please me. Shall I send for the constable?'
"'No, no,——you! Do you want to make a prison-bird of me at once?'
"'I do not want to,' said I, 'but the circumstances force me to it. A house which has given up one treasure may give up another, and for this other I am accountable. Now as I cannot stay here myself to watch over the place, it necessarily follows that I must provide some one who can. And as an honest man you ought to desire this also. If you felt as I would under the circumstances, you would ask for the company of some disinterested person till our rival claims as executors had been duly settled and the right heir determined upon.'
"'But the constable? I don't want any constable.'
"'And you don't want Mr. Dickey?'
"'He's better than the constable.'
"'Very well; Mr. Dickey, will you stay?'
"'Yes, I'll stay; that's right, isn't it, Susan?'
"Miss Thompson who had been looking somewhat uneasy, brightened up as he spoke and answered cheerfully:
"'Yes, that's right. But who will see me home?'
"'Can you ask?' I inquired.
"She smiled and the matter was settled.
"In the hall I had the chance to whisper to Mr. Dickey:
"'Keep a sharp lookout on the fellow. I do not trust him, and he may be up to tricks. I will notify the constable of the situation and if you want help throw up a window and whistle. The man may make another attempt to rob the premises.'
"'That is so,' was the whispered reply. 'But he will have to play sharp to get ahead of me.'"
"Duringthe short walk that ensued we talked much of the dead widow and her sinister brother.
"'They belong to an old family,' observed Miss Thompson, 'and I have heard my mother tell how she has danced in their house at many a ball in the olden times. But ever since my day the place has borne evidences of decay, though it is only in the last five years it has looked as if it would fall to pieces. Which of them do you think was the real miser, he or she? Neither of them have had anything to do with their neighbors for ten years at least.'
"'Do not you know?' I asked.
"'No,' said she, 'and yet I have always lived in full view of their house. You see there were years in which no one lived there. Mr. Wakeham, who married this woman about the time father married mother, was a great invalid, and it was not till his death that the widow came back here to live. The father, who was a stern old man, I have heard mother tell, gave his property to her because she was the only one of his children who had not displeasedhim, but when she was a widow this brother came back to live with her, or on her, we have never been able to determine which. I think from what I have seen to-night it must have been on her, but she was very close too, or why did she live like a hermit when she could have had the friendship of the best?'
"'Perhaps because her brother overruled her; he has evidently had an eye on this property for a long time.'
"'Yes, but they have not even had the comforts. For three years at least no one has seen a butcher's cart stop at their door. How they have lived none of us know; yet there was no lack of money or their neighbors would have felt it their duty to look after them. Mrs. Wakeham has owned very valuable stocks, and as for her dividends, we know by what the postmaster says that they came regularly.'
"'This is very interesting,' said I. 'I thought that fellow's eyes showed a great deal of greed for the little he was likely to inherit. Is there no one who is fully acquainted with their affairs, or have they lived so long out of the pale of society that they possess no friends?'
"'I do not know of any one who has ever been honored with their confidence,' quoth the young lady. 'They have shown so plainly that they did not desire attention that gradually we have all ceased to go to their doors.'
"'And did not sickness make any difference? Did no one go near them when it was learned how ill this poor woman was?'
"'We did not know she was ill till this morning. We had missed her face at the window, but no doctor had been called, and no medicine bought, so we never thought her to be in any danger. When we did find it out we were afraid to invade premises which had been so long shut against us; at least I was; others did go, but they were received so coldly they did not remain; it is hard to stand up against the sullen displeasure of a man like Mr. Huckins.'
"'And do you mean to say that this man and his sister have lived there alone and unvisited for years?'
"'They wished it, Mr. Etheridge. They courted loneliness and rejected friendship. Only one person, Mr. H——, the minister, has persisted in keeping up his old habit of calling once a year, but I have heard him say that he always dreaded the visit, first, because they made him see so plainly that they resented the intrusion, and, secondly, because each year showed him barer floors and greater evidences of poverty or determined avarice. What he will say now, when he hears about the two wills and the brother trying to run away with his sister's savings, before her body was cold, I do not know. There will be some indignation felt in town you may be sure, and considerable excitement. I hope you will come back to-morrow to help me answer questions.'
"'I shall come back as soon as I have been to Marston.'
"'So you are going to hunt up the heirs? I pray you may be successful.'
"'Do you know them? Have you ever heard anything about them?' I asked.
"'Oh, no. It must be forty years since Harriet Huckins ran away from home. To many it will be a revelation that such a person lives.'
"'And we do not even know that she does,' said I.
"'True, true, she may be dead, and then that hateful brother will have the whole. I hope he won't. I hope she is alive and will come here and make amends for the disgrace which that unsightly building has put upon the street.'
"'I hope so too,' said I, feeling my old disgust of Huckins renewed at this mention of him.
"We were now at her gate, so bidding her good-by, I turned away through the midnight streets, determined to find the constable. As I went hurrying along in the direction of his home, Miss Thompson's question repeated itself in my own mind. Had Mrs. Wakeham been the sufferer and victim which her appearance, yes and her words to me, had betokened? Or was her brother sincere in his passion and true in his complaints that he had been subject to her whims and had led the life of a dog in order to please her. With the remembrance of their two faces before me, I felt inclined to believe her words rather than his, and yet her last cry had contained something in its tone beside anxiety for the rights of an almost unknown heir; there had been anger in it,—the anger of one whose secret has been surprised and who feels himself personally robbed of something dearer than life.
"However, at this time I could not stop to weigh these possibilities or decide this question. Whatever was true as regarded the balance of right between these two, there was no doubt as to the fact that this man was not to be trusted under temptation. I therefore made what haste I could, and being fortunate enough to find the constable still up, succeeded in interesting him in the matter and obtaining his promise to have the house put under proper surveillance. This done, I took the car for Fulton Ferry, and was so fortunate as to reach home at or near two o'clock in the morning. This was last night, and to-day you see me here. You disappoint me by saying that you know no one by the name of Harriet Smith."
"Yet," exclaimed Edgar, rousing himself from his attitude of listening, "I know all the old inhabitants. Harriet Smith," he continued in a musing tone, "Harriet—What is there in the name that stirs up some faint recollection? Did I once know a person by that name after all?"
"Nothing more likely."
"But there the thing stops. I cannot get any farther," mused Edgar. "The name is not entirely new to me. I have some vague memory in connection with it, but what memory I cannot tell. Let me see if Jerry can help us." And going to the door, he called "Jerry! Jerry!"
The response came slowly; heavy bodies do not soon overcome their inertia. But after the lapse of a few minutes a shuffling footstep was heard. Then the soundof heavy breathing, something between a snore and a snort, and the huge form of the good-natured driver came slowly into view, till it paused and stood in the door opening, which it very nearly filled.
"Did you call, sirs?" asked he, with a rude attempt at a bow.
"Yes," responded Edgar, "I wanted to know if you remembered a woman by the name of Harriet Smith once living about here."
"Har-ri-et Smith," was the long-drawn-out reply; "Har-ri-et Smith! I knows lots of Harriets, and as for Smiths, they be as plenty as squirrels in nut time; but Har-ri-et Smith—I wouldn't like to say I didn't, and I wouldn't like to say I did."
"She is an old woman now, if she is still living," suggested Frank. "Or she may have moved away."
"Yes, sir, yes, of course"; and they perceived another slow Harriet begin to form itself upon his lips.
Seeing that he knew nothing of the person mentioned, Edgar motioned him away, but Frank, with a lawyer's belief in using all means at his command, stopped him as he was heavily turning his back and said:
"I have good news for a woman by that name. If you can find her, and she turns out to be a sister of Cynthia Wakeham, of Flatbush, New York, there will be something good for you too. Do you want to try for it?"
"Do I?" and the grin which appeared on Jerry's face seemed to light up the room. "I'm not quick," he hastilyacknowledged, as if in fear that Frank would observe this fault and make use of it against him; "that is, I'm not spry on my feet, but that leaves me all the more time for gossip, and gossip is what'll dothisbusiness, isn't it, Dr. Sellick?" Edgar nodding, Jerry laughed, and Frank, seeing he had got an interested assistant at last, gave him such instructions as he thought he needed, and dismissed him to his work.
When he was gone, the friends looked for an instant at each other, and then Frank rose.
"I am going out," said he. "If you have friends to see or business to look after, don't think you must come with me. I always take a walk before retiring."
"Very well," replied Edgar, with unusual cheeriness. "Then if you will excuse me I'll not accompany you. Going to walk for pleasure? You'd better take the road north; the walk in that direction is the best in town."
"All right," returned Frank; "I'll not be gone more than an hour. See you again in the morning if not to-night." And with a careless nod he disappeared, leaving Edgar sitting alone in the room.
On the walk in front of the house he paused.
"To the north," he repeated, looking up and down the street, with a curious shake of the head; "good advice, no doubt, and one that I will follow some time, but not to-night. The attractions in an opposite direction are too great." And with an odd smile, which was at oncefull of manly confidence and dreamy anticipation, he turned his face southward and strode away through the warm and perfumed darkness of the summer night.
He took the road by which he had come from the depot, and passing rapidly by the few shops that clustered about the hotel, entered at once upon the street whose picturesque appearance had attracted his attention earlier in the evening.
What is he seeking? Exercise—the exhilaration of motion—the refreshment of change? If so, why does he look behind and before him with an almost guilty air as he advances towards a dimly lighted house, guarded by the dense branches of a double row of poplars? Is it here the attraction lies which has drawn him from the hotel and the companionship of his friend? Yes, for he stops as he reaches it and gazes first along the dim shadowy vista made by those clustered trunks and upright boughs, and then up the side and across the front of the silent house itself, while an expression of strange wistfulness softens the eager brightness of his face, and his smile becomes one of mingled pride and tenderness, for which the peaceful scene, with all its picturesque features, can scarcely account.
Can it be that his imagination has been roused and his affections stirred by the instantaneous vision of an almost unknown woman? that this swelling of the heart and this sudden turning of his whole nature towards what is sweetest, holiest, and most endearing in life means thathis hitherto free spirit has met its mate, and that here in the lonely darkness, before a strange portal and in the midst of new and untried scenes, he has found the fate that comes once to every man, making him a changed being for ever after?
The month is June and the air is full of the scent of roses. He can see their fairy forms shining from amid the vines clambering over the walls and porches before him. They suggest all that is richest and spiciest and most exquisite in nature, as does her face as he remembered it. What if a thorn has rent a petal here and there, in the luxurious flowers before him, are they not roses still? So to him her face is all the lovelier for the blemish which might speak to others of imperfection, but which to him is only a call for profounder tenderness and more ardent devotion. And if in her nature there lies a fault also, is not a man's first love potent enough to overlook even that? He begins to think so, and allows his glances to roam from window to window of the nearly darkened house, as if half expecting her sweet and melancholy head to look forth in quest of the stars—or him.
The living rooms are mainly on the side that overlooks the garden, and scarcely understanding by what impulse he is swayed, he passes around the wall to a second gate, which he perceives opening at right angles to the poplar walk. Here he pauses a moment, looking up at the window which for some reason he has determined to be hers, and while he stands there, the moonlight shows thefigure of another man coming from the highway and making towards the self-same spot. But before this second person reaches Frank he pauses, falters, and finally withdraws. Who is it? The shadow is on his face and we cannot see, but one thing is apparent, Frank Etheridge is not the only man who worships at this especial shrine to-night.
Thenext morning at about nine o'clock Frank burst impetuously into Edgar's presence. They had not met for a good-night the evening before and they had taken breakfast separately.
"Edgar, what is this I hear about Hermione Cavanagh? Is it true she lives alone in that house with her sister, and that they neither of them ever go out, not even for a half-hour's stroll in the streets?"
Edgar, flushed at the other's excitement, turned and busied himself a moment with his books and papers before replying.
"Frank, you have been among the gossips."
"And what if I have! You would tell me nothing, and I knew there was a tragedy in her face; I saw it at the first glance."
"Is it a tragedy, this not going out?"
"It is the result of a tragedy; must be. They say nothing and nobody could draw from her beyond the boundary of that brick wall we rode by so carelessly. And she so young, so beautiful!"
"Frank, you exaggerate," was all the answer he received.
Frank bit his lip; the phrase he had used had been a trifle strong for the occasion. But in another moment he was ready to continue the conversation.
"Perhaps I do speak of an experiment that has never been tried; but you know what I mean. She has received some shock which has terrified her and made her afraid of the streets, and no one can subdue this fear or induce her to step through her own gate. Is not that sad and interesting enough to move a man who recognizes her beauty?"
"It is certainly very sad," quoth the other, "if it is quite true, which I doubt."
"Go talk to your neighbors then; they have not been absent like yourself for a good long year."
"I am not interested enough," the other began.
"But you ought to be," interpolated Frank. "As a physician you ought to recognize the peculiarities of such a prejudice. Why, if I had such a case——"
"But the case is not mine. I am not and never have been Miss Cavanagh's physician."
"Well, well, her friend then."
"Who told you I was her friend?"
"I don't remember; I understood from some one that you used to visit her."
"My neighbors, as you call them, have good memories."
"Didyou use to visit her?"
"Frank, Frank, subdue your curiosity. If I did, I do not now. The old gentleman is dead, and it was he upon whom I was accustomed to call when I went to their house."
"The old gentleman?"
"Miss Cavanagh's father."
"And you called upon him?"
"Sometimes."
"Edgar, how short you are."
"Frank, how impatient you are."
"But I have reason."
"How's that?"
"I want to hear about her, and you mock me with the most evasive replies."
Edgar turned towards his friend; the flush had departed from his features, but his manner certainly was not natural. Yet he did not look unkindly at the ardent young lawyer. On the contrary, there was a gleam of compassion in his eye, as he remarked, with more emphasis than he had before used:
"I am sorry if I seem to be evading any question you choose to put. But the truth is you seem to know more about the young lady than I do myself. I did not know that she was the victim of any such caprice."
"Yet it has lasted a year."
"A year?"
"Just the time you have been away."
"Just——" Edgar paused in the repetition. Evidently his attention had been caught at last. But he soon recovered himself. "A strange coincidence," he laughed. "Happily it is nothing more."
Frank surveyed his friend very seriously.
"I shall believe you," said he.
"You may," was the candid rejoinder. And the young physician did not flinch, though Etheridge continued to look at him steadily and with undoubted intention. "And now what luck with Jerry?" he suddenly inquired, with a cheerful change of tone.
"None; I shall leave town at ten."
"Is there no Harriet Smith here?"
"Not if I can believe him."
"And has been none in the last twenty years?"
"Not that he can find out."
"Then your quest here is at an end?"
"No, it has taken another turn, that is all."
"You mean——"
"That I shall come back here to-morrow. I must be sure that what Jerry says is true. Besides—— But why mince the matter? I—I have become interested in that girl, Edgar, and want to know her—hear her speak. Cannot you help me to make her acquaintance? If you used to go to the house—— Why do you frown? Do you not like Miss Cavanagh? "
Edgar hastily smoothed his forehead.
"Frank, I have never thought very much about her.She was young when I visited her father, and then that scar——"
"Never mind," cried Frank. He felt as if a wound in his own breast had been touched.
Edgar was astonished. He was not accustomed to display his own feelings, and did not know what to make of a man who did. But he did not finish his sentence.
"If she does not go out," he observed instead, "she may be equally unwilling to receive visitors."
"Oh, no," the other eagerly broke in; "people visit there just the same. Only they say she never likes to hear anything about her peculiarity. She wishes it accepted without words."
It was now Edgar's turn to ask a question.
"You say she lives there alone? You mean with servants, doubtless?"
"Oh, yes, she has a servant. But I did not say she lived there alone; I said she and her sister."
Edgar was silent.
"Her sister does not go out, either, they say."
"No? What does it all mean?"
"That is whatIwant to know."
"Not go out? Emma!"
"Do you rememberEmma?"
"Yes, she is younger than Hermione."
"And what kind of a girl isshe?"
"Don't ask me, Frank. I have no talent for describing beautiful women."
"She is beautiful, then?"
"If her sister is, yes."
"You meanshehas no scar." It was softly said, almost reverently.
"No, she has no scar."
Frank shook his head.
"The scar appeals to me, Edgar."
Edgar smiled, but it was not naturally. The constraint in his manner had increased rather than diminished, and he seemed anxious to start upon the round of calls he had purposed to make.
"You must excuse me," said he, "I shall have to be off. You are coming back to-morrow?"
"If business does not detain me."
"You will find me in my new office by that time. I have rented the small brown house you must have noticed on the main street. Come there, and if you do not mind bachelor housekeeping, stay with me while you remain in town. I shall have a good cook, you may be sure, and as for a room, the north chamber has already been set apart for you."
Frank's face softened and he grasped the doctor's hand.
"That's good of you; it looks as if you expected me to need it."
"Have you not a Harriet Smith to find?"
Frank shrugged his shoulders. "I see that you understand lawyers."
Frank rode down to the depot with Jerry. As he passed Miss Cavanagh's house he was startled to perceive a youthful figure bending over the flower-beds on the inner side of the wall. "She is not so pretty by daylight," was his first thought. But at that moment she raised her head, and with a warm thrill he recognized the fact that it was not Hermione, but the sister he was looking at.
It gave him something to think of, for this sister was not without her attractions, though they were less brilliant and also less marred than those of the sad and stately Hermione.
When he arrived at his office his first inquiry was if anything had been heard from Flatbush, and upon being told to the contrary he immediately started for that place. He found the house a scene of some tumult. Notwithstanding the fact that the poor woman still lay unburied, the parlors and lower hall were filled with people, who stared at the walls and rapped with wary but eager knuckles on the various lintels and casements. Whispers of a treasure having been found beneath the boards of the flooring had reached the ear of the public, and the greatest curiosity had been raised in the breasts of those who up to this day had looked upon the house as a worm-eaten structure fit only for the shelter of dogs.
Mr. Dickey was in a room above, and to him Frank immediately hastened.
"Well," said he, "what news?"
"Ah," cried the jovial witness, coming forward, "glad to see you. Have you found the heirs?"
"Not yet," rejoined Frank. "Have you had any trouble? I thought I saw a police-officer below."
"Yes, we had to have some one with authority here. Even Huckins agreed to that; he is afraid the house will be run away with, I think. Did you see what a crowd has assembled in the parlors? We let them in so that Huckins won't seem to be the sole object of suspicion; but he really is, you know. He gave me plenty to do that night."
"He did, did he?"
"Yes; you had scarcely gone before he began his tactics. First he led me very politely to a room where there was a bed; then he brought me a bottle of the vilest rum you ever drank; and then he sat down to be affable. While he talked I was at ease, but when he finally got up and said he would try to get a snatch of sleep I grew suspicious, and stopped drinking the rum and set myself to listening. He went directly to a room not far from me and shut himself in. He had no light, but in a few minutes I heard him strike a match, and then another and another. 'He is searching under the boards for more treasure,' thought I, and creeping into the next room I was fortunate enough to come upon a closet so old and with such big cracks in its partition that I was enabled to look through them into the place where he was. The sight that met my eye was startling. Hewas, as I conjectured, peering under the boards, which he had ripped up early in the evening; and as he had only the light of a match to aid him, I would catch quick glimpses of his eager, peering face and then lose the sight of it in sudden darkness till the gleam of another match came to show it up again. He crouched upon the floor and crept along the whole length of the board, thrusting in his arm to right and left, while the sweat oozed on his forehead and fell in large drops into the long, narrow hollow beneath him. At last he seemed to grow wild with repeated disappointments, and, starting up, stood looking about him at the four surrounding walls, as if demanding them to give up their secrets. Then the match went out, and I heard him stamp his foot with rage before proceeding to put back the boards and shift them into place. Then there came silence, during which I crept on tiptoe to the place I had left, judging that he would soon leave his room and return to see if I had been watching him.
"The box was on the bed, and throwing myself beside it, I grasped it with one arm and hid my face with the other, and as I lay there I soon became conscious of his presence, and I knew he was looking from me to the box, and weighing the question as to whether I was sleeping sound enough for him to risk a blow. But I did not stir, though I almost expected a sudden crash on my head, and in another moment he crept away, awed possibly by my superior strength, for I am a much bigger man thanhe, as you must see. When I thought him gone I dropped my arm and looked up. The room was in total darkness. Bounding to my feet I followed him through the halls and came upon him in the room of death. He had the lamp in his hand, and he was standing over his sister with an awful look on his face.
"'Where have you hidden it?' he hissed to the senseless form before him. 'That box is not all you had. Where are the bonds and the stocks, and the money I helped you to save?'
"He was so absorbed he did not see me. He stooped by the bed and ran his hand along under the mattresses; then he lifted the pillows and looked under the bed. Then he rose and trod gingerly over the floor, as if to see if any of the boards were loose, and peered into the empty closet, and felt with wary hand up and down the mantel sides. At last his eyes fell on the clock, and he was about to lift his hand to it when I said:
"'The clock is all right; you needn't set it; see, it just agrees with my watch!'
"What a face he turned to me! I tell you it is no fun to meet such eyes in an empty house at one o'clock at night; and if you hadn't told me the police would be within call I should have been sick enough of my job, I can tell you. As it was, I drew back a foot or two and hugged the box a little more tightly, while he, with a coward's bravado, stepped after me and whispered below his breath:
"'You are making yourself too much at home here. If I want to stop the clock, now that my sister is dead, what is that to you? You have no respect for a house in mourning, and I am free to tell you so.'
"To this tirade I naturally made no answer, and he turned again to the clock. But just as I was asking myself whether I should stop him or let him go on with his peerings and pokings, the bell rang loudly below. It was a welcome interruption to me, but it made him very angry. However, he went down and welcomed, as decently as he knew how, a woman who had been sent to his assistance by Miss Thompson, evidently thinking that it was time he made some effort to regain my good opinion by avoiding all further cause for suspicion.
"At all events, he gave me no more trouble that night, nor since, though the way he haunts the door of that room and the looks he casts inside at the clock are enough to make one's blood run cold. Do you think there are any papers hidden there?"
"I have no doubt of it," returned Frank. "Do you remember that the old woman's last words were, 'The clock! the clock!' As soon as I can appeal to the Surrogate I shall have that piece of furniture examined."
"I shall be mortally interested in knowing what you find there," commented Mr. Dickey. "If the property comes to much, won't Miss Thompson and I get something out of it for our trouble?"
"No doubt," said Frank.
"Then we will get married," said he, and looked so beaming, that Frank shook him cordially by the hand.
"But where is Huckins?" the lawyer now inquired. "I didn't see him down below."
"He is chewing his nails in the kitchen. He is like a dog with a bone; you cannot get him to leave the house for a moment."
"I must see him," said Frank, and went down the back stairs to the place where he had held his previous interview with this angry and disappointed man.
At first sight of the young lawyer Huckins flushed deeply, but he soon grew pale and obsequious, as if he had held bitter communing with himself through the last thirty-six hours, and had resolved to restrain his temper for the future in the presence of the man who understood him. But he could not help a covert sneer from creeping into his voice.
"Have you found the heirs?" he asked, bowing with ill-mannered grace, and pushing forward the only chair there was in the room.
"I shall find them when I need them," rejoined Frank. "Fortunes, however small, do not usually go begging."
"Then you have not found them?" the other declared, a hard glitter of triumph shining in his sinister eye.
"I have not brought them with me," acknowledged the lawyer, warily.
"Perhaps, then, you won't," suggested Huckins, while he seemed to grow instantly at least two inches in stature."If they are not in Marston where are they? Dead! And that leaves me the undisputed heir to all my sister's savings."
"I do not believe them dead," protested Frank.
"Why?" Huckins half smiled, half snarled.
"Some token of the fact would have come to you. You are not in a strange land or in unknown parts; you are living in the old homestead where this lost sister of yours was reared. You would have heard if she had died, at least so it strikes an unprejudiced mind."
"Then let it strike yours to the contrary," snapped out his angry companion. "When she went away it was in anger and with the curse of her father ringing in her ears. Do you see that porch?" And Huckins pointed through the cracked windows to a decayed pair of steps leading from the side of the house. "It was there she ran down on her way out. I see her now, though forty years have passed, and I, a little fellow of six, neither understood nor appreciated what was happening. My father stood in the window above, and he cried out: 'Don't come back! You have chosen your way, now go in it. Let me never see you nor hear from you again.' And we never did, never! And now you tell me we would have heard if she had died. You don't know the heart of folks if you say that. Harriet cut herself adrift that day, and she knew it."
"Yet you were acquainted with the fact that she went to Marston."
The indignant light in the brother's eye settled into a look of cunning.
"Oh," he acknowledged carelessly, "we heard so at the time, when everything was fresh. But we heard nothing more, nothing."
"Nothing?" Frank repeated. "Not that she had married and had had children?"
"No," was the dogged reply. "My sister up there," and Huckins jerked his hand towards the room where poor Mrs. Wakeham lay, "surmised things, but she didn't know anything for certain. If she had she might have sent for these folks long ago. She had time enough in the last ten years we have been living in this hole together."
"But," Etheridge now ventured, determined not to be outmatched in cunning, "you say she was penurious, too penurious to live comfortably or to let you do so."
Huckins shrugged his shoulders and for a moment looked balked; then he cried: "The closest women have their whims. If she had known any such folks to have been living as you have named, she would have sent for them."
"If you had let her," suggested Frank.
Huckins turned upon him and his eye flashed. But he very soon cringed again and attempted a sickly smile, which completed the disgust the young lawyer felt for him.
"If I had let her," he repeated; "I, who pined for companionship or anything which would have put a goodmeal into my mouth! You do not know me, sir; you are prejudiced against me because I want my earnings, and a little comfort in my old age."
"If I am prejudiced against you, it is yourself who has made me so," returned the other. "Your conduct has not been of a nature to win my regard, since I have had the honor of your acquaintance."
"And what has yours been, worming, as you have, into my sister's confidence——"
But here Frank hushed him. "We will drop this," said he. "You know me, and I think I know you. I came to give you one last chance to play the man by helping me to find your relatives. I see you have no intention of doing so, so I will now proceed to find them without you."
"If they exist," he put in.
"Certainly, if they exist. If they do not——"
"What then?"
"I must have proofs to that effect. I must know that your sister left no heirs but yourself."
"That will take time," he grumbled. "I shall be kept weeks out of my rights."
"The Surrogate will see that you do not suffer."
He shuddered and looked like a fox driven into his hole.
"It is shameful, shameful!" he cried. "It is nothing but a conspiracy to rob me of my own. I suppose I shall not be allowed to live in my own house." And his eyes wandered greedily over the rafters above him.
"Are you sure that it is yours?"
"Yes, yes, damn you!" But the word had been hasty, and he immediately caught Frank's sleeve and cringed in contrition. "I beg your pardon," he cried, "perhaps we had better not talk any longer, for I have been too tried for patience. They will not even leave me alone in my grief," he whined, pointing towards the rooms full, as I have said, of jostling neighbors and gossips.
"It will be quiet enough after the funeral," Frank assured him.
"Oh! oh! the funeral!" he groaned.
"Is it going to be too extravagant?" Frank insinuated artfully.
Huckins gave the lawyer a look, dropped his eyes and mournfully shook his head.
"The poor woman would not have liked it," he muttered; "but one must be decent towards one's own blood."
Franksucceeded in having Mr. Dickey appointed as Custodian of the property, then he went back to Marston.
"Good-evening, Doctor; what a nest of roses you have here for a bachelor," was his jovial cry, as he entered the quaint little house, in which Sellick had now established himself. "I declare, when you told me I should always find a room here, I did not realize what a temptation you were offering me. And in sight——" He paused, changing color as he drew back from the window to which he had stepped,——"of the hills," he somewhat awkwardly added.
Edgar, who had watched the movements of his friend from under half lowered lids, smiled dryly.
"Of the hills," he repeated. Then with a short laugh, added, "I knew that you liked that especial view."
Frank's eye, which was still on a certain distant chimney, lighted up wonderfully as he turned genially towards his friend.
"I did not know you were such a good fellow," he laughed. "I hope you have found yourself made welcome here."
"Oh, yes, welcome enough."
"Any patients yet?"
"All of Dudgeon's, I fear. I have been doing little else but warning one man after another: 'Now, no words against any former practitioner. If you want help from me, tell me your symptoms, but don't talk about any other doctor's mistakes, for I have not time to hear it.'"
"Poor old Dudgeon!" cried Frank. Then, shortly: "I'm a poor one to hide my impatience. Have you seen either ofthemyet?"
"Either—of—them?"
"The girls, the two sweet whimsical girls. You know whom I mean, Edgar."
"You only spoke of one when you were here before, Frank."
"And I only think of one. But I saw the other on my way to the depot, and that made me speak of the two. Have you seen them?"
"No," answered the other, with unnecessary dryness; "I think you told me they did not go out."
"But you have feet, man, and you can go to them, and I trusted that you would, if only to prepare the way for me; for I mean to visit them, as you have every reason to believe, and I should have liked an introducer."
"Frank," asked the other, quietly, but with a certain marked earnestness, "has it gone as deep as that? Are you really serious in your intention of making the acquaintance of Miss Cavanagh?"
"Serious? Have you for a minute thought me otherwise?"
"You are not serious in most things."
"In business I am, and in——"
"Love?" the other smiled.
"Yes, if you can call it love, yet."
"We will not call it anything," said the other. "You want to see her, that is all. I wonder at your decision, but can say nothing against it. Happily, you have seen her defect."
"It is not a defect to me."
"Not if it is in her nature as well?"
"Her nature?"
"A woman who for any reason cuts herself off from her species, as she is said to do, cannot be without her faults. Such idiosyncrasies do not grow out of the charity we are bid to have for our fellow-creatures."
"But she may have suffered. I can readily believe she has suffered from that same want of charity in others. There is nothing like a personal defect to make one sensitive. Think of the averted looks she must have met from many thoughtless persons; and she almost a beauty!"
"Yes, thatalmostis tragic."
"It can excuse much."
Edgar shook his head. "Think what you are doing, Frank, that's all.Ishould hesitate in making the acquaintance of one who foranyreason has shut herself away from the world."
"Is not her whim shared by her sister?"
"They say so."
"Then there are two whose acquaintance you would hesitate to make?"
"Certainly, if I had any ulterior purpose beyond that of mere acquaintanceship."
"Her sister has no scar?"
Edgar, weary, perhaps, of the conversation, did not answer.
"Why should she shut herself up?" mused Frank, too interested in the subject to note the other's silence.
"Women are mysteries," quoth Edgar, shortly.
"But this is more than a mystery," cried Frank. "Whim will not account for it. There must be something in the history of these two girls which the world does not know."
"That is not the fault of the world," retorted Edgar, in his usual vein of sarcasm.
But Frank was reckless. "The world is right to be interested," he avowed. "It would take a very cold heart not to be moved with curiosity by such a fact as two girls secluding themselves in their own house, without any manifest reason. Areyounot moved by it, Edgar? Are you, indeed, as indifferent as you seem?"
"I should like to know why they do this, of course, but I shall not busy myself to find out. I have much else to do."
"Well, I have not. It is the one thing in life for me;so look out for some great piece of audacity on my part, for speak to her I will, and that, too, before I leave the town."
"I do not see how you will manage that, Frank."
"You forget I am a lawyer."
Yet for all the assurance manifested by this speech, it was some time before Frank could see his way clearly to what he desired. A dozen plans were made and dismissed as futile before he finally determined to seek the assistance of a fellow-lawyer whose name he had seen in the window of the one brick building in the principal street. "Through him," thought he, "I may light upon some business which will enable me to request with propriety an interview with Miss Cavanagh." Yet his heart failed him as he went up the steps of Mr. Hamilton's office, and if that gentleman, upon presenting himself, had been a young man, Frank would certainly have made some excuse for his intrusion, and retired. But he was old and white-haired and benignant, and so Frank was lured into introducing himself as a young lawyer from New York, engaged in finding the whereabouts of one Harriet Smith, a former resident of Marston.
Mr. Hamilton, who could not fail to be impressed by Etheridge's sterling appearance, met him with cordiality.
"I have heard of you," said he, "but I fear your errand here is bound to be fruitless. No Harriet Smith, so far as I know, ever came to reside in this town. And I was born and bred in this street. Have you actualknowledge that one by that name ever lived here, and can you give me the date?"
The answers Frank made were profuse but hurried; he had not expected to gain news of Harriet Smith; he had only used the topic as a means of introducing conversation. But when he came to the point in which he was more nearly interested, he found his courage fail him. He could not speak the name of Miss Cavanagh, even in the most casual fashion, and so the interview ended without any further result than the making on his part of a pleasant acquaintance. Subdued by his failure, Frank quitted the office, and walked slowly down the street. If he had not boasted of his intentions to Edgar, he would have left the town without further effort; but now his pride was involved, and he made that an excuse to his love. Should he proceed boldly to her house, use the knocker, and ask to see Miss Cavanagh? Yes, he might do that, but afterwards? With what words should he greet her, or win that confidence which the situation so peculiarly demanded? He was not an acknowledged friend, or the friend of an acknowledged friend, unless Edgar—— But no, Edgar was not their friend; it would be folly to speak his name to them. What then? Must he give up his hopes till time had paved the way to their realization? He feared it must be so, yet he recoiled from the delay. In this mood he re-entered Edgar's office.
A woman in hat and cloak met him.
"Are you the stranger lawyer that has come to town?" she asked.
He bowed, wondering if he was about to hear news of Harriet Smith.
"Then this note is for you," she declared, handing him a little three-cornered billet.
His heart gave a great leap, and he turned towards the window as he opened the note. Who could be writing letters to him of such dainty appearance as this? Not she, of course, and yet—— He tore open the sheet, and read these words:
"If not asking too great a favor, may I request that you will call at my house, in your capacity of lawyer."As I do not leave my own home, you will pardon this informal method of requesting your services. The lawyer here cannot do my work."Yours respectfully,"Hermione Cavanagh."
"If not asking too great a favor, may I request that you will call at my house, in your capacity of lawyer.
"As I do not leave my own home, you will pardon this informal method of requesting your services. The lawyer here cannot do my work.
"Yours respectfully,
"Hermione Cavanagh."
He was too much struck with amazement and delight to answer the messenger at once. When he did so, his voice was very business-like.
"Will Miss Cavanagh be at liberty this morning?" he asked. "I shall be obliged to return to the city after dinner."
"She told me to say that any time would be convenient to her," was the answer.
"Then say to her that I will be at her door in half an hour."
The woman nodded, and turned.
"She lives on the road to the depot, where the two rows of poplars are," she suddenly declared, as she paused at the door.
"I know," he began, and blushed, for the woman had given him a quick glance of surprise. "I noticed the poplars," he explained.
She smiled as she passed out, and that made him crimson still more.
"Do I wear my heart on my sleeve?" he murmured to himself, in secret vexation. "If so, I must wrap it about with a decent cloak of reserve before I go into the presence of one who has such power to move it." And he was glad Edgar was not at home to mark his excitement.
The half hour wore away, and he stood on the rose-embowered porch. Would she come to the door herself, or would it be the sad-eyed sister he should see first? It mattered little. It was Hermione who had sent for him, and it was with Hermione he should talk. Was it his heart that was beating so loudly? He had scarcely answered the question, when the door opened, and the woman who had served as a messenger from Miss Cavanagh stood before him.
"Ah!" said she, "come in." And in another moment he was in the enchanted house.
A door stood open at his left, and into the room thus disclosed he was ceremoniously ushered.
"Miss Cavanagh will be down in a moment," said the woman, as she slowly walked away, with more than one lingering backward look.
He did not note this look, for his eyes were on the quaint old furniture and shadowy recesses of the staid best room, in which he stood an uneasy guest. For somehow he had imagined he would see the woman of his dreams in a place of cheer and sunshine; at a window, perhaps, where the roses looked in, or at least in a spot enlivened by some evidences of womanly handiwork and taste. But here all was stiff as at a funeral. The high black mantel-shelf was without clock or vase, and the only attempt at ornament to be seen within the four grim walls was an uncouth wreath, made of shells, on a background of dismal black, which hung between the windows. It was enough to rob any moment of its romance. And yet, if she should look fair here, what might he not expect of her beauty in more harmonious surroundings.
As he was adjusting his ideas to this thought, there came the sound of a step on the stair, and the next moment Hermione Cavanagh entered his presence.