Chapter V: Part 5

“I cannot say. The last time I saw that bottle it was at the very back of the shelf where I had pushed it after you had said he was to have no more of it at present. It was in the same place when we went up just now to see if it had been taken from the cabinet. It did not look as though it had been moved.”

“Holding the same amount as when you saw it last?”

“To all _appearance_, yes, sir.”

What was there in her tone or in the little choke which followed these few words which made the doctor stare a moment, then open his lips to speak and then desist with a hasty glance at Edgar? I had myself felt the shiver of some new fear at her manner and the unconscious emphasis she had given to that word _appearance_. But was it the same fear which held him back from pursuing his inquiries, and led him to say instead:

“I should like to see that bottle. No,” he remonstrated, as Orpha started to accompany him. “You are a brave girl, but it is not for your physician to abuse that bravery. Wealthy will go up with me. Meantime, let Edgar take you away to some spot where you can rest till I come back.”

It was kindly meant but oh, how hard I felt it to see these two draw off like accepted lovers; and with what joy I beheld them stop, evidently at a word from her, and seat themselves on one of the leather-covered lounges drawn up against the wall well within the sight of every one there.

I could rest, with these two sitting thus in full view--rest in the present; the future must take care of itself.

The result of the doctor’s visit to the room above was evident in the increased gravity he showed on his return. He had little to say beyond enjoining upon Edgar and Orpha the necessity for a delay in the funeral services and a suggestion that we separate at once for the night and get what sleep we could. He would send a man to sit by the dead and if we would control ourselves sufficiently not to discuss this unhappy event all might yet be well.

The picture he made with Orpha as he took his leave of her at the door remains warm in my memory. She had begun to droop and he saw it. To comfort her he took her two hands in his and drew them to his breast while he talked to her, softly but firmly. As I saw the confidence with which she finally received his admonitions, I blessed him in my heart; though with a man’s knowledge of men I perceived that his endeavor to give comfort sprang from sympathy rather than conviction. Tragedy was in the house, veiled and partially hidden, but waiting--waiting for the full recognition which the morrow must bring. A shadow with a monstrous substance behind it we would be called upon to face!

For one wild instant I wished that I had never left my native land; never seen the great Bartholomew; never felt the welcoming touch of Orpha’s little hand on mine. As I knelt again in my open window a half hour later, the star which had shone in upon me two hours before had vanished in clouds.

Darkness was in the sky, darkness was in the house, darkness was in my own soul, and saddest of all, darkness was in that of our lovely and innocent Orpha.

XXIV

The next day was one of almost unendurable apprehension. Edgar, Orpha and myself could not face each other. The servants could not face us. If we moved from our rooms and by chance met in any of the halls we gazed at each other like specters and like specters flitted by without a word.

Orpha had a friend with her or I could not have stood it. For a long time I did not know who this friend was; then from some whisper I heard echoing up my convenient little stairway I learned that it was Lucy Colfax, Edgar’s real love and Dr. Hunter’s fiancée.

I did not like it. Such companionship was incongruous and unnatural; an insult to Orpha, though the dear child did not know it; but if she found relief in the presence of the one woman who, next to herself, stood in the closest relation to him who was gone, why should I complain so long as I myself could do nothing to comfort her or assuage her intolerable grief and the suspense of this terrible day.

I did not fear that Edgar would make a third. Neither he nor Orpha were ready for talk. None of us were till the doctor’s report was known and the fearful question settled. I heard afterwards that Edgar had spent most of the time in the great room upstairs staring into the corners and seeming to ask from the walls the secret they refused to give.

I did the same in mine, only I paced the floor counting the slow hours as they went by. I am always restless under suspense and movement was my only solace.

What if the report should be one of which I dared not think--dared not mention to myself. What then? What if the roof of the house in which I stood should thunder in and the great stones of the walls fall to the ground and desolation ravish the spot where life, light and beauty reigned in such triumph. I would go down with it, that I knew; but would others? Would that one other whom to save--

Was it coming? The whole house had been so still that the least sound shook me. And it was a _least_ sound. A low but persistent knocking at my door.

I was at the other end of the room and the distance from where I stood to the door looked interminable. I must know--know instantly; I could not wait another moment. Raising my voice, or endeavoring to, I called out:

“Come in.”

It was a mere whisper; ghostly hands were about my throat. But that whisper was heard. I saw the door open and a quiet appearing man,--a complete stranger to me--stepped softly in.

I knew him for what he was before he spoke a word.

The police were in the house. There was no need to ask what the doctor’s report had been.

XXV

It is not my intention, and I am sure it is not your wish, that I should give all the details leading up to the inevitable inquest which followed the discoveries of the physicians and the action of the police.

In the first place my pride, possibly my self-respect held me back from any open attempt to acquaint myself with them. My interview with the Inspector of which I have just made mention, added much to his knowledge but very little to mine. To his questions I gave replies as truthful as they were terse. When I could, I confined myself to facts and never obtruded sentiment unless pressed as it were to the wall. He was calm, reasonable and not without consideration; but he got everything from me that he really wanted and at times forced me to lay my soul bare. In return, I caught, as I thought, faint glimmers now and then of how the mind of the police was working, only to find myself very soon in a fog where I could see nothing distinctly. When he left, the strongest impression which remained with me was that in the terrible hours I saw before me my greatest need would be courage and my best weapon under attack the truth as I knew it. In this conclusion I rested.

But not without a feeling which was as new to me as it was disturbing. I could not leave my room without sensing that somewhere, unseen and unheard, there lingered a presence from whose watchfulness I could not hope to escape. If in passing towards the main hall, I paused at the little circular staircase outside my door for one look down at the marble-floored pavement beneath, it was with the consciousness that an ear was somewhere near which recognized the cessation of my steps and waited to hear them recommence.

So in the big halls. Every door was closed, so slight the movement, so unfrequent any passing to and fro in the great house during the two days which elapsed before the funeral. But to heave a sigh or show in any way the character or trend of my emotions was just as impossible to me as though the walls were lined with spectators and every blank panel I passed was a sounding-board to some listener beyond.

Once only did I allow myself the freedom natural to a mourner in the house of the dead. Undeterred by an imaginary or even an actual encounter with unsympathetic servant or interested police operative, I left my room on the second day and went below; my goal, the court, my purpose, to stand once more by the remains of all that was left to me of my great-hearted uncle.

If I met any one on the way I have no memory of it. Had Orpha flitted by, or Edgar stumbled upon me at the turn of a corner, I might have stayed my step for an instant in outward deference to a grief which I recognized though I was not supposed to share it. But of others I took no account nor do I think I so much as lifted my eyes or glanced to right or left, when having crossed the tessellated pavement of the court, I paused by the huge mound of flowers beneath which lay what I sought, and thrusting my hand among these tokens of love and respect till I touched the wood beneath, swore that whatever the future held for me of shame or its reverse, I would act according to what I believed to be the will of him now dead but who for me was still a living entity.

This done I returned as I had come, only with a lighter step, for some portion of the peace for which I longed had fallen upon me with the utterance of that solemn promise.

I shall give but one incident in connection with the funeral. To my amazement I was allotted a seat in the carriage with Edgar. Orpha rode with some relatives of her mother--people I had never seen.

Though there was every chance for Edgar and myself to talk, nothing more than a nod passed between us. It was better so; I was glad to be left to my own thoughts. In the church I noted no one; but at the grave I became aware of an influence which caused me to turn my head a trifle aside and meet the steady look of a middle-aged man who was contemplating me very gravely.

Taking in his lineaments with a steady look of my own, I waited till I had the opportunity to point him out to one of the undertaker’s men when I learned that he was a well-known lawyer by the name of Jackson, and instantly became assured that he was no other than the man who had drawn up the second will--the will which I had been led to believe was strongly in my favor.

As his interest in me was to all appearance of a kindly sort untinged by suspicion, I felt that perhaps the odds after all, were not so greatly against me. Here was a man ready to help me, and should I need a friend, Providence had certainly shown me in what direction to look.

That night I slept the best of any night since the shock which had unhinged the nerves of every one in the house. I had ascertained that the full name of the lawyer who had been instrumental in drawing up the second will was Frederick W. Jackson, and while uttering this name more than once to myself, I fell into a dreamless slumber.

XXVI

You may recall that my first thought in contemplating the coil in which we had all been caught by the alleged disappearance of the will supposed to contain my uncle’s final instructions, was that an inquiry including every person then in the house, should be made by some one in authority--Edgar, for instance--for the purpose of determining who was responsible for the same by a close investigation into the circumstances which made this crime possible. Little did I foresee at the time that such an inquiry, though shirked when it might have resulted in good, lay before us backed by the law and presided over by a public official.

But this fact was the first one to strike me, as convened in one of the large rooms in the City Hall, we faced the Coroner, in ignorance, most of us, of what such an inquiry portended and how much or how little of the truth it would bring to light.

I knew what I had to fear from my own story. I had told it once before and witnessed its effect. But how about Orpha’s? And Edgar’s? and that of the long row of servants, uneasy in body and perplexed in mind, from whose unwitting, if not unwilling lips some statement might fall which would fix suspicion or so shift it as to lead us into new lines of thought.

I had never been in a court-room before and though I knew that the formality as well as the seriousness of a trial would be lacking in a coroner’s inquest, I shivered at the prospect, for some one of the witnesses soon to be heard had something to hide and whether the discovery of the same or its successful suppression was most to be desired who could tell.

The testimony of the doctors, as well as much of general interest in connection with the case, fell on deaf ears so far as I was concerned. Orpha, clad in her mourning garments and heavily veiled, held all my thoughts. Even the elaborate questioning of the two lawyers who drew up the wills, the similarity and dissimilarity of which undoubtedly lay at the bottom of the dreadful crime we were assembled to inquire into, left me cold. In a way I heard what had passed between each of these men and the testator on the day of the signing. How Mr. Dunn, who had attended to my uncle’s law business for years, had recognized the desirability of his client making a new will under the changed conditions brought about by the reception into his family of a second nephew of whose claims upon a certain portion of his property he must wish to make some acknowledgment, received the detailed instructions sent him, with no surprise and followed them out to the letter, bringing the document with him for signature on the day and at the hour designated in the notes he had received from his client. The result was so satisfactory that no delay was made in calling in the witnesses to his signature and the signing of all three. What delay there was was caused by a little controversy in regard to his former will whose provisions differed in many respects from this one. Mr. Bartholomew wished to retain it,--the lawyer advised its destruction, the lawyer finally gaining the day. It being in Mr. Bartholomew’s possession at the time, the witness expected it to be brought out and burned before his eyes; but it was not, Mr. Bartholomew merely promising that this should be done before the day ended. Whether or not he kept his word, the lawyer could not say from any personal knowledge.

Mr. Jackson had much the same story to tell. He too had received a letter from Mr. Bartholomew, asking his assistance in the making of a new will, together with instructions for the same, scrupulously written out in full detail by the testator’s own hand on bits of paper carefully numbered. Asked to show these instructions, they were handed over and laid side by side with those already passed up by Mr. Dunn. I think they were both read; I hardly noticed; I only know that they were found to be exactly similar, with the one notable exception I need not mention. Of course the names of the witnesses differed.

What did reach my ear was a sentence uttered by Mr. Jackson as coming from my uncle when the will brought for his signature was unfolded before him. “You may be surprised,” Uncle had said, “at the tenor of my bequests and the man I have chosen to bear the heavy burden of a complicated heritage. I know what I am doing and all I ask of you and the two witnesses you have been kind enough to bring here from your office is silence till the hour comes when it will be your business to speak.”

This created a small hubbub among the people assembled, to many of whom it was probably the first word they had ever heard in my favor. During it and the sounding of the gavel calling them to order, my attention naturally was drawn in the direction of these men and women to whom my affairs seemed to be of so much importance. Alas! egotist that I was! They were not interested in me but in the case; and especially in anything which suggested an undue influence on my part over an enfeebled old man. Their antagonism to me was very evident, being heightened rather than lessened by the words just heard.

But there was one face I encountered which told a different story. Mr. Jackson had his own ideas and they were favorable to me. With a sigh of relief I turned my attention back to the heavily veiled figure of Orpha.

What was she thinking? How was she feeling? What interpretation might I reasonably put upon her movements, seeing that I lacked the key to her inmost mind. Witnesses came and went; but only as she swayed forward in her interest, or sank back in disappointment, did I take heed of their testimony or weigh in the scales of my own judgment the value or non-value of what they said.

For truth to say, I had heard nothing so far that was really new to me; nothing to solve certain points raised in my own mind; nothing that vied in interest with the slightest gesture or the least turn of the head of her who bore so patiently this marshalling before her in heavy phalanx facts so hideous as to bar out all sweeter memories.

But when in the midst of a sudden silence I heard my own name called, I started in dismay, all unprepared as I was to face this hostile throng. But it was not I whom they wanted, but Edgar. No one had glanced my way. To the people of C---- there was but one Edgar Quenton Bartholomew now that their chief citizen was gone.

The moment was a bitter one to me and I fear I showed it. But my good sense soon reasserted itself. Edgar was answering questions and I as well as others was there to learn; and to learn, I must listen.

“Your father and mother?”

“Both dead before I was five years old. Uncle Edgar then took me into his home.”

“Adopted you?”

“Not legally. But in every other respect he was a father to me, and I hope I was a son to him. But no papers were ever drawn up.”

“Did he ever call you _Son_?”

“I have no remembrance of his ever having done so. His favorite way of addressing me was Boy.”

A slight tremulousness in speaking this endearing name added to its effect. I gripped at my heart beneath my coat. Our uncle had used the same word in speaking to me--once.

“Did he ever talk to you of his intentions in regard to his property, and if so when?”

“Often, before I became of age.”

“And not since?”

“Oh, yes, since. But not so often. It did not seem necessary, we understood each other.”

“Mr. Bartholomew, did it never strike you as peculiar that your uncle, having a daughter, should have chosen his brother’s son as his heir?”

“No, sir. You see, as I said before, we understood each other.”

“Understood? How?”

“We never meant, he nor I, that his daughter should lose anything by my inheritance of his money.”

It was modestly, almost delicately said and had he loved her I could not but have admired him at that moment. But he did not love her, and to save my soul I could not help sending a glance her way. Would her head rise in proud acknowledgment of his worth or would it fall in shame at his hypocrisy? It fell, but then, I was honest enough to realize that the shame this bespoke might be that of a loving woman troubled at hearing her soul’s most sacred secrets thus bared before the public.

Anxious for her as well as for myself, I turned my eyes upon the crowd confronting us, and wondered at the softened looks I saw there. He had touched a chord of fine emotion in the breasts of these curiosity-mongers. It was no new story to them. It had been common gossip for years that he was to marry Orpha and so make her and himself equal heirs of this great fortune. But his bearing as he spoke,--the magnetism which carried home his lightest word--gave to the well-known romance a present charm which melted every heart.

I felt how impotent any words of mine would be to stem the tide of sympathy that was bearing him on and soon would sweep me out of sight.

But as, overwhelmed by this prospect, I cowered low in my seat, the thought came that these men and women whose dictum I feared were not the arbiters of my destiny. And I took a look at the jury and straightened in my seat. Surely I saw more than one honest face among the twelve and two or three that were more than ordinarily intelligent. I should stand some chance with _them_.

Meanwhile another question had been put.

“Did your uncle at any time ever suggest to you that under a change of circumstances he might change his mind?”

“Never, till the day before he died.”

“There was no break between you? No quarrel?”

“We did not always agree. I am not perfect--” With a smile he said this--“and it was only natural that he should express himself as not always satisfied with my conduct. But _break_? No. He loved me better than I deserved.”

“You have a cousin, a gentleman of the same name, now a resident in your house. Did the difference of opinion between yourself and uncle to which you acknowledge occur since or prior to this cousin’s entrance into the family?”

“Oh, I have memories of childish escapades not always approved of by my uncle. Nor have I always pleased him since I became a man. But the differences of opinion to which you probably allude became more frequent after the introduction amongst us of this second nephew; why, I hardly know. I do not blame my cousin for them.”

The subtle inflection with which this last was said was worthy of a master of innuendo. It may have been unconscious; it likely was, for Edgar is naturally open in his attacks rather than subtle. But conscious or unconscious it caused heads to wag and sly looks to pass from one to another with many a knowing wink. The interloper was to blame of course though young Mr. Bartholomew was too good to say so!

The Coroner probably had his own private opinions on this subject, for taking no notice of these wordless suggestions he proceeded to ask:

“Was your cousin ever present when these not altogether agreeable discussions occurred between yourself and uncle?”

“He was not. Uncle was not the kind of man to upbraid me in the presence of a relative. He thought I showed a growing love of money without much recognition of what it was really good for.”

“Ah! I see. Then that was the topic of these unfortunate conversations between you, and not the virtues or vices of your cousin.”

“We had one, perhaps two conversations on that subject; but many, many others on matters far from personal in which there was nothing but what was agreeable and delightful to us both.”

“Doubtless; what I want to bring out is whether from anything your uncle ever said to you, you had any reason to fear that you had been or might be supplanted in your uncle’s regard by this other man of his and your name. In other words whether your uncle ever intimated that he and not you might be made the chief beneficiary in a new will.”

“He never said it previous to the time I have mentioned.” There was a fiery look in Edgar’s eye as he emphasized this statement by a sharpness of tone strangely in contrast to the one he had hitherto used. “What he may have thought, I have no means of knowing. It was for him to judge between us.”

“Then, there has always existed the possibility of such a change? You must have known this even if you failed to talk on the subject.”

“Yes, I sometimes thought my uncle was moved by a passing impulse to make such a change; but I never believed it to be more than a passing impulse. He showed me too much affection. He spoke too frequently of days when I studied under his eye and took my pleasure in his company.”

“You acknowledge, then, that lately you yourself began to doubt his constancy to the old idea. Will you say what first led you to think that what you had regarded as a momentary impulse was strengthening into a positive determination?”

“Mr. Coroner, if you will pardon me I must take exception to that word _positive_. He could never have been positive at any time as to what he would finally do. Else why _two_ wills? It was what I heard the servants say on my return from one of my absences which first made me question whether I had given sufficient weight to the possibility of my cousin’s influence over Uncle being strong and persistent enough to drive him into active measures. I allude of course to the visit paid him by his lawyer and the witnessing on the part of his man Clarke and his nurse Wealthy to a document they felt sure was a will. As it was well known throughout the house that one had already been drawn up in full accordance with the promises so often made me, they showed considerable feeling, and it was only natural that this should arouse mine, especially as that whole day’s proceedings, the coming of a second lawyer with two men whom nobody knew, was never explained or even alluded to in any conversation I afterwards held with my uncle. I thought it all slightly alarming but still I held to my faith in him. He was a sick man and might have crotchets.”

“At what time and from whom did you definitely hear the truth about that day’s proceedings--that two wills had been drawn up, alike in all respects save that in one you were named as the chief beneficiary and in the other your cousin from England?”

At this question, which evidently had power to trouble him, Edgar lost for the first time his air of easy confidence. Did he fear that he was about to incur some diminution of the good feeling which had hitherto upheld him in any statement he chose to make? I watched him very closely to see. But his answer hardly enlightened me.

The question, if you will remember, was when and where he received definite confirmation of what had been told him concerning two wills.

“In my uncle’s room the night before he died,” was his reply, uttered with a gloom wholly unnatural to him even in a time of trouble. “He had wished to see me and we were talking pleasantly enough, when he suddenly changed his tone and I heard what he had done and how my future hung on the whim of a moment.”

“Can you repeat his words?”

“I cannot. The impression they made is all that is left me. I was too agitated--too much taken aback--for my brain to work clearly or my memory to take in more than the great fact. You see it was not only my position as heir to an immense fortune I saw threatened; but the dearer hope it involved and what was as precious as all the rest, the loss of my past as I had conceived it, for I had truly believed that I stood next to his daughter in my uncle’s affections; too close indeed for any such tampering with my future prospects.”

He was himself again; shaken with feeling but winsome in voice, manner and speech. And it was the sincerity of his feeling which made him so. He had truly loved his uncle. No one could doubt that, not even myself who had truly loved him also.

“On what terms did you leave him? Surely you can remember that?”

Edgar’s eye flashed. As I noted it and the resolution which was fast overcoming the sadness which had distinguished his features up till now, I held my breath in apprehension, for here was something to fear.

“When I left him it was with a mind much more at ease than when he first showed me these two wills. For my faith in him had come back. He would burn one of those wills before he died, but it would not be the one which would put to shame by its destruction, him who had been as a child to him from the day of his early orphanage.”

The Coroner himself was startled by the effect made by these words upon the crowd, and probably blamed his own leniency in allowing this engaging witness to express himself so fully.

In a tone which sounded sharp enough in contrast to the mellow one which had preceded it, he said:

“That is what you _thought_. We had rather listen to facts.”

Edgar bowed, still gracious, still the darling of the men and women ranged before him, many of whom remembered his boyhood; while I sat rigid, realizing how fully I was at the mercy of his attractions and would continue to be till I had an opportunity to speak, and possibly afterwards, for prejudice raises a wall which nothing but time can batter down.

And Orpha? What of her? How was she taking all this? In my anxiety, I cast one look in her direction. To my astonishment she sat unveiled and was gazing at Edgar with an intentness which slowly but surely forced his head to turn and his eye to seek hers. An instant thus, then she pulled down her veil, and the flush just rising to his cheek was lost again in pallor.

Unconsciously the muscles of my hands relaxed; for some reason life had lost some of the poignant terror it had held for me a moment before. A drowning man will catch at straws; so will a lover; and I was both.

In the absorption which followed this glimpse of Orpha’s face so many days denied me, I lost the trend of the next few questions, and only realized that we were approaching the crux of the situation when I heard:

“You did not visit him again?”

“No.”

“Where did you go?”

“To my room.”

“Will you state to the jury just where your room is located?”

“On the same floor as Uncle’s, only further front and on the opposite side of the hall.”

“We have here a chart of that floor. Will you be good enough to step to it and indicate the two rooms you mention?”

Here, at a gesture from the Coroner, an official drew a string attached to a roll suspended on one of the walls and a rudely drawn diagram, large enough to be seen from all parts of the court-room, fell into view.[A]

[A] A reduced copy of the plan will be found facing the title page of this book.

Edgar was handed a stick with which he pointed out the two doors of his uncle’s room and those of his own.

What was coming?

“Mr. Bartholomew, will you now tell the jury what you did on returning to your room?”

“Nothing. I threw myself into a chair and just waited.”

“Waited for what?”

“To hear my cousin enter my uncle’s room.”

The bitterness with which he said this was so deftly hidden under an assumption of casual rejoinder, as only to be detected by one who was acquainted with every modulation of his fine voice.

“And did you hear this?”

“Very soon; as soon as he could come up from the lower hall where Clarke, my uncle’s man, had been sent to summon him.”

“If you heard this, you must also have heard when he left your uncle’s room.”

“I did.”

“Was the interview a long one?”

“I was sitting in front of the clock on my mantel-piece. He was in there just twenty minutes.”

I felt my breast heave, and straightening myself instinctively I met the concentrated gaze of a hundred pair of eyes leveled like one against me.

Did I smile? I felt like it; but if I did it must have expressed the irony with which I felt the meshes of the net in which I was caught tighten with every word which this man spoke.

The Coroner, who was the only person in the room who had not looked my way, went undeviatingly on.

“In what part of the house does this gentleman of whom we are speaking have his room?”

“On the same floor as mine; but further back at the end of a short hall.”

“Will you take the pointer from the officer and show the location of the second Mr. Bartholomew’s room?”

The witness did so.

“Did you hear in which direction your cousin went on leaving your uncle? Did he go immediately to his room?”

“He may have done so, but if he did, he did not stay long, for very soon I heard him return and proceed directly down stairs.”

“How long was he below?”

“A long time. I had moved from my seat and my eye was no longer on the clock so I cannot say how long.”

“Did you hear him when he came up for a second time?”

“Yes; he is not a light stepper.”

“Where did he go? Directly to his room?”

“No, he stopped on the way.”

“How, stopped on the way?”

“When he reached the top of the stairs he paused like one hesitating. But not for long. Soon I heard him coming in the direction of my room, pass it by and proceed to our uncle’s door--the one in front so little-used as to be negligible--where he lingered so long that I finally got up and peered from my own doorway to see what he was doing?”

“Was the hall dark?”

“Very.”

“Darker than usual?”

“Yes, much.”

“How was that? What had happened?”

“The electric light usually kept burning at my end of the hall had been switched off.”

“When? Before your cousin came up or after?”

“I do not know. It simply was not burning when I opened my door.”

“Will you say from which of the doors in your suite you were looking?”

“From the one marked C on the chart.”

“That, as the jury can see if they will look, is diagonally opposite the one at which the witness had heard his cousin pause. Will the witness now state if the hall was too dark at the time he looked out for him to see whether or not any one stood at his uncle’s door?”

“No, it was not too dark for that, owing to the light which shone in from the street through the large window you see there.”

“Enough, you say, to make your uncle’s door visible?”

“Quite enough.”

“And what did you see there? Your cousin standing?”

“No; he was gone.”

“How gone? Could he not have been in your uncle’s room?”

“Not then.”

“Why do you say ‘not then’?”

“Because while I looked I could hear his footsteps at the other end of the house rounding the corner where the main hall meets the little one in which his room is situated.”

My God! I had forgotten all this. I had been very anxious to know how Uncle had fared since I left him in such a state of excitement; whether he were sleeping or awake, and hoped by listening I should hear Wealthy’s step and so judge how matters were within. But a meaning sinister if not definite had been given to this natural impulse by the way Edgar’s voice fell as he uttered that word _stopped_; and from that moment I recognized him for my enemy, either believing in my guilt or wishing others to; in which latter case, it was for me to fight my battle with every weapon my need called for. But the conflict was not yet and “Patience” must still be my watch-word. But I held my breath as I waited for the next question.

“You say that you heard him moving down the hall. You did not see him at your uncle’s door?”

“No, I did not.”

“But you are confident he was there, previous to your looking out?”

“I am very sure that he was; my ear seldom deceives me.”

“Mr. Bartholomew, will you think carefully before you answer the following question. Was there any circumstance connected with this matter which will enable you to locate the hour at which you heard your cousin pass down the hall?”

He hesitated; he did not want to answer. Why? I would have given all that I possessed to know; but he only said:

“I did not look at my watch; I did not need to. The clock was striking three.”

“Three! The jury will note the hour.”

Why did he say that?--_the jury will note the hour?_ My action was harmless. Everything I did that night was harmless. What did he mean then by _the hour_? The mystery of it troubled me--a mystery he was careful to leave for the present just where it was.

Returning to his direct investigation, the coroner led the witness back to the time preceding his entrance into the hall. “You were listening from your room; that room was dark, you were no longer watching the clock which had not yet struck; yet perhaps you can give us some idea of how long your cousin lingered at your uncle’s door before starting down the hall.”

“No, I should not like to do that.”

“Five minutes?”

“I cannot say.”

“Long enough to have entered that room and come out again?”

“You ask too much. I am not ready to swear to that.”

“Very good; I will not press you!” But the suggestion had been made. And for a purpose--a purpose linked with the mystery of which I have just spoken. Glancing at Mr. Jackson, I saw him writing in his little book. He had noted this too. I was not alone in my apprehension which, like a giant shadow thrown from some unknown quarter, was reaching slowly over to envelop me. When I was ready to listen again, it was to hear:

“What did you do then?”

“I went to bed.”

“Did you see or hear anything more of your cousin that night?”

“No, not till the early morning when we were all roused by the news which Wealthy brought to every door, that Uncle was very much worse and that the doctor should be sent for.”

“Tell us where it was you met him then.”

“In the hall near Uncle’s door--the one marked 2 on the chart.”

“How did he look? Was there anything peculiar in his appearance or manner?”

“He was fully dressed.”

“And you?”

“I had had no time to do more than wrap a dressing-gown about me.”

“At what time was this? You remember the hour no doubt?”

“Half past four in the morning; any one can tell you that.”

“And he was fully dressed. In morning clothes or evening?”

“In the ones he wore to dinner the night before.”

It was true; I had not gone to bed that night. There was too much on my mind. But to them it would look as if I had sat up ready for the expected alarm.

“Was he in these same clothes when you finally entered your uncle’s room?”

“Certainly; there was no time then for changing.”

These questions might have been addressed to me instead of to him. They would have been answered with as much truth; but the suggestiveness would have been lacking and in this I recognized my second enemy. I now knew that the Coroner was against me.

A few persons there may have recognized this fact also. But they were all too much in sympathy with Edgar to resent it. I made no show of doing so nor did I glance again at Orpha to see the effect on her of these attacks leveled at me with so much subtlety. I felt, in the humiliation of the moment, that unless I stood cleared of every suspicion, I could never look her again in the face.

Meanwhile the inquiry had reached the event for which all were waiting--the destruction of the one will and the acknowledgment by the dying man that the envelope which held the other was empty.

“Were you near enough to see the red mark on the one he had ordered burned?”

“Yes; I took note of it.”

“Had you seen it before?”

“Yes; when, in the interview of which I have spoken, my uncle showed me the two envelopes and informed me of their several contents.”

“Did he tell you or did you learn in any way which will was in the one marked with red?”

“No. I did not ask him and he did not say.”

“So when you saw it burning you did not know with certainty whether it was the will making you or your cousin his chief heir?”

“I did not.”

He said it firmly, but he said it with effort. Again, why?

The time to consider this was not now, for at this reply, expected though it was, a universal sigh swept through the house, carrying my thoughts with it. Emotion must have its outlet. The echo in my own breast was a silent one, springing from sources beyond the ken of the simple onlooker. We were approaching a critical part of the inquiry. The whereabouts of the missing document must soon come up. Should I be obliged to listen to further insinuations such as had just been made? Was it his plan to show that I was party to a fraud and knew where the missing will lay secreted,--where it would always lie secreted because it was in his favor and not in mine? It was possible; anything was possible. If I were really wise I would prepare myself for the unexpected; for the unexpected was what I probably should be called upon to face.

Yet it was not so, or I did not think it so, in the beginning.

Asked to describe his uncle’s last moments he did so shortly, simply, feelingly.

Then came the question for which I waited.

“Your uncle died, then, without a sign as to where the remaining will was to be found?”

“He did not have time. Death came instantly, leaving the words unsaid. It was a great misfortune.”

With a gesture of reproof, for he would not have it seem that he liked these comments, the Coroner pressed eagerly on:

“What of his looks? Did his features betray any emotion when he found that he could no longer speak?”

Edgar hesitated. It was the first time we had seen him do so and my heart beat in anticipation of a lie.

But again I did him an injustice. He did not want to answer--that we could all see--but when he did, he spoke the truth.

“He looked frightened, or so I interpreted his expression; and his head moved a little. Then all was over.”

In the silence which followed, a stifled sob was heard. We all knew from whom it came and every eye turned to the patient little figure in black who up till now had kept such strong control over her feelings.

“If Miss Bartholomew would like to retire into the adjoining room she is at liberty to do so,” came from the Coroner’s seat.

But she shook her head, murmuring quietly:

“Thank you, I will stay.”

I blessed her in my heart. Still neutral. Still resolute to hear and know all.

The inquiry went on.

“Mr. Bartholomew, did you search for that will?”

“Thoroughly. In a haphazard way at first, expecting to find it in some of the many drawers in his room. But when I did not, I went more carefully to work, I and my two faithful servants, who having been in personal attendance upon him all through his illness, knew his habits and knew the room. But even then we found nothing in any way suggestive of the document we were looking for.”

“And since?”

“The room has been in the hands of the police. I have not heard that they have been any more successful.”

There were more questions and more answers but I paid little attention to them. I was thinking of what had passed between the Inspector and myself at the time he visited me in my room. I have said little about it because a man is not proud of such an experience; but in the quiet way in which this especial official worked, he had made himself very sure before he left me that this document was neither on my person nor within the four walls of the room itself. This had been a part of the search. I tingled yet whenever I recalled the humiliation of that hour. I tingled at this moment; but rebuked myself as the mystery of the whole proceeding got a stronger hold upon my mind. Not with me, not with him, but _somewhere_! When would they reach the point where perhaps the solution lay? Five hours had elapsed between the time I left uncle and the rousing of the house at Wealthy’s hurried call. What had happened during those hours? Who could tell the tale--the whole tale, since manifestly that had never been fully related. Clarke? Wealthy? I knew what they had told the police, what they had confided to each other concerning their experience in the sick-room; but under oath, and with the shadow of crime falling across the lesser mystery what might not come to light under the probe of this prejudiced but undoubtedly honest Coroner?

XXVII

My impatience grew with every passing moment, but fortunately it was not to be tried much longer, for I soon had the satisfaction of seeing Edgar leave the witness chair and Clarke, as we called him, take his seat there.

This old and tried servant of a man exacting as he was friendly and generous as he was just, had always inspired me with admiration, far as I was from being in his good books. Had he liked me I would have felt myself strong in what was now a doubtful position. But devoted as he was to Edgar, I could not hope for any help from him save of the most grudging kind. I therefore sat unmoved and unexpectant while he took his oath and answered the few opening questions. They pertained mostly to the signing of the first will to which he had added his signature as witness. As nothing new was elicited this matter was soon dropped.

Other points of interest shared the same fate. He could substantiate the testimony of others, but he had nothing of his own to impart. Would it be the same when we got to his final attendance on his master--the last words uttered between them--the final good-night?

The Coroner himself seemed to be awake to the full importance of what this witness might have to disclose, for he scrutinized him earnestly before saying:

“We will now hear, as nearly as you can recall, what passed between you and your sick master on the night which proved to be his last? Begin at the beginning--that is, when you were sent to summon one or other of his two nephews to Mr. Bartholomew’s room.”

“Pardon, sir, but that was not the beginning. The beginning was when Mr. Bartholomew, who to our astonishment had eaten his supper in his chair by the fireside, drew a small key from the pocket in his dressing-gown and, handing it to me, bade me unlock the drawer let into the back of his bedstead and bring him the two big envelopes I should find there.”

“You are right, that is the beginning. Go on with your story.”

“I had never been asked to unlock this drawer before; he had always managed to do it himself; but I had no difficulty in doing it or in bringing him the papers he had asked for. I just lifted out the whole batch, and laying them down in his lap, asked him to pick out the ones he wanted.”

“Did he do it?”

“Yes, immediately.”

“Before you moved away?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Then you caught a glimpse of the papers he selected?”

“I did, sir. I could not help it. I had to wait, for he wished me to relieve him of the ones he didn’t want.”

“And you did this?”

“Yes; I took them from his hand and laid them on the table to which he pointed.”

“Now for the ones he kept. Describe them.”

“Two large envelopes, sir, larger than the usual legal size, brown in color, I should say, and thick with the papers that were in them.”

“Had you ever seen any envelopes like these before?”

“Yes, on Mr. Bartholomew’s desk the day I was called in to witness his signature.”

“Very good. There were two of them, you say?”

“Yes, sir, two.”

“Were they alike?”

“Exactly, I should say.”

“Any mark on either one?”

“Not that I observed, sir. But I only saw the face of one of them and that was absolutely blank.”

“No red marks on either.”

“Not that I saw, sir.”

“Very good. Proceed, Mr. Clarke. What did Mr. Bartholomew say, after you had laid the other papers aside?”

“He bade me look for Mr. Edgar; said he was in a hurry and wanted to see him at once.”

“Was that all?”

“Yes, sir, he was not a man of many words. Besides, I left the room immediately and did not enter it again till Mr. Edgar left him.”

“Where were you when he did this?”

“At the end of the hall talking to Wealthy. There is a little cozy corner there where she sits and where I sometimes waited when I was expecting Mr. Bartholomew’s ring.”

“Did you see Mr. Edgar, as you call him, when he came out?”

“Yes, sir; crossing over to his room.”

“And what did you do after that?”

“Went immediately to Mr. Bartholomew to see if he was wishing to go to bed. But he was not. On the contrary, he had another errand for me. He wanted to see his other nephew. So I went below searching for him.”

“Was Mr. Bartholomew still sitting by the fire when you went in?”

“He was.”

“With the two big envelopes in his hands?”

“Not that I noted, sir; but he had pockets in his gown large enough to hold them and they might have been in one of these.”

“Never mind the _might have beens_; just the plain answer, Mr. Clarke.”

“Yes, sir. Excuse me, sir. Feeling afraid that he would get very tired sitting up so long, I hurried downstairs, found Mr. Quenton, as we call him, in the library and brought him straight up. Then I went back to Wealthy.”

“Is there a clock in the cozy corner?”

“There is, sir.”

“Did you look at it as you came and went?”

“I did this time.”

“Why this time?”

“First, because I was anxious for Mr. Bartholomew not to tire himself too much and--and--”

“Go on; we want the whole truth, Mr. Clarke.”

“I was curious to see whether Mr. Bartholomew would keep Mr. Quenton any longer than he did Mr. Edgar.”

“And did he?”

“A little, sir.”

“Did you and the woman Wealthy exchange remarks upon this?”

“We--we did, sir.”

At this admission, I took a quick look at Mr. Jackson and was relieved to see him make another entry in his little book. He had detected, here, as well as I, an opening for future investigation. I heard him, as it were in advance, putting this suggestive query to the present witness:

“What had you and Wealthy been saying on this subject?” I know very little of courts or the usages of court procedure, but I know that I should have put this question if I had been conducting this examination.