“My wife gives a reception today,” ventured one gentleman to his neighbor.
“And I have an engagement at five that won’t bear postponement.”
“Sylvester has always been on hand before.”
“We can’t proceed without him,” was the reply.
Mr. Wheelock looked thoughtful.
With a nod of his head towards such gentlemen as met his eye, Bertram hastened to a little cupboard devoted to the use of himself and uncle. Opening it, he looked within, took down a coat he saw hanging before him, and unconsciously uttered an exclamation. It was a dress-coat such as had been worn by Mr. Sylvester the evening before.
“What does this mean! My uncle has been here!” were the words that sprang to his lips; but he subdued his impulse to speak, and hastily hanging up the coat, relocked the door. Proceeding at once to the outer room, he asked two or three of the clerks if they were sure Mr. Sylvester had not been in during the day. But they all returned an unequivocal “no,” and that too with a certain stare of surprise that at once convinced him he was betraying his agitation too plainly.
“I will telegraph whether Wheelock considers it necessary or not,” thought he, and was moving to summon a messenger boy when he caught sight of Hopgood slowly making his way in from the street. He was very pale and walked with his eyes fixed on the ground, ominously shaking his great head in a way that bespoke an inner struggle of no ordinary nature. Bertram at once sauntered out to meet him.
“Hopgood,” said he, “your evident anxiety is infectious. What has happened to make my uncle’s detention a matter of such apparent import? If you do not wish to confide in me, his nephew almost his son, speak to Mr. Wheelock or to one of the directors, but don’t keep anything to yourself which concerns his welfare or—What are you looking at?”
The man was gazing as if fascinated at the keys in Bertram’s hand.
“Nothing sir, nothing. You must not detain me; I have nothing to say. I will wait ten minutes,” he muttered to himself, glancing again at the clock. Suddenly he saw the various directors come filing out of the inner room, and darted for the second time from Bertram’s detaining hand.
“I hope nothing has happened to Mr. Sylvester,” exclaimed one gentleman to another as they filed by.
“If he were given to a loose ends’ sort of business it would be another thing.”
“He looked exceedingly well at the reception last night,” exclaimed another; “but in these days—”
Suddenly there was a hush. A telegraph boy had just entered the door and was asking for Mr. Bertram Sylvester.
“Here I am,” said Bertram, hastily taking the envelope presented him. Slightly turning his back, he opened it. Instantly his face grew white as chalk.
“Gentlemen,” said he, “you will have to excuse my uncle today; a great misfortune has occurred to him.” Then with a slow and horror-stricken movement, he looked about him and exclaimed, “Mrs. Sylvester is dead.”
A confused murmur at once arose, followed by a hurried rush; but of all the faces that flocked out of the bank, none wore such a look of blank and helpless astonishment as that of Hopgood the janitor, as with bulging eyes and nervously working hands, he slowly wended his way to the foot of the stairs and there sat down gazing into vacancy.
XX
The Dregs in the Cup
“O eloquent, just and mightie death! whom none could advise, thou hast persuaded; what none hath dared, thou hast done; and whom all the world hath flattered, thou only hast cast out of the world and despised: thou hast drawn together all the farre stretched greatnesses; all the pride, crueltie and ambition of man and covered it all over with these two narrow words, ‘Hic jacet’ ”
Sir Walter Raleigh
Bertram’s hurried ring at his uncle’s door was answered by Samuel the butler.
“What is this I hear?” cried the young man, entering with considerable agitation, “Mrs. Sylvester dead?”
“Yes sir,” returned the old and trusty servant, with something like a sob in his voice. “She went out riding this morning behind a pair of borrowed horses—and being unused to Michael’s way of driving, they ran away and she was thrown from the carriage and instantly killed.”
“And Miss Fairchild?”
“She didn’t go with her. Mrs. Sylvester was alone.”
“Horrible, horrible! Where is my uncle, can I see him?”
“I don’t know, sir,” the man returned with a strange look of anxiety. “Mr. Sylvester is feeling very bad, sir. He has shut himself up in his room and none of his servants dare disturb him, sir.”
“I should, however, like him to know I am here. In what room shall I find him?”
“In the little one, sir, at the top of the house. It has a curious lock on the door; you will know it by that.”
“Very well. Please be in the hall when I come down; I may want to give you some orders.”
The old servant bowed and Bertram hastened with hushed steps to ascend the stairs. At the first platform he paused. What is there in a house of death, of sudden death especially, that draws a veil of spectral unreality over each familiar object! Behind that door now inexorably closed before him, lay without doubt the shrouded form of her who but a few short hours before, had dazzled the eyes of men and made envious the hearts of women with her imposing beauty! No such quiet then reigned over the spot filled by her presence. As the vision of a dream returns, he saw her again in all her splendor. Never a brow in all the great hall shone more brightly beneath
