The Sword of Damocles Part 22

"About twelve; when I went out to lunch."

A quick gasp sounded at their side, followed by a hurried cough.

Turning, Bertram encountered for the fifth time the eyes of Hopgood. He had entered unperceived by the small door that separated the inner inclosure from the outer, and was now standing very close to them, eying with side-long looks the safe at their back, the faces of the gentleman speaking, yes, and even the countenances of the clerks, as they bent busily over their books.

"Did you ring, sir?" asked he, catching Bertram's look of displeasure.

"No."

The man seemed to feel the rebuke implied in this short response, and ambled softly away. But in another moment he was stopped by Bertram.

"What is the matter with you to-day, Hopgood? Can you have anything of real importance on your mind; anything connected with my uncle?"

The janitor started, and looked almost frightened. "Be careful what you say," whispered he; then with a keen look at Mr. Wheelock just then on the point of entering the directors' room, he was turning to escape by the little door just mentioned, when it opened and Mr. Stuyvesant came in. With a look almost of terror the janitor recoiled, throwing himself as it were between the latter and the door of the safe; but recovering himself, surveyed the keen quiet visage of the veteran banker with a rolling of his great eyes absolutely painful to behold. Mr. Stuyvesant, who was somewhat absorbed in thought, did not appear to notice the agitation he had caused, and with just a hurried nod followed Mr.

Wheelock into the Directors' room. Instantly the janitor drew himself up with an air of relief, and shortly glancing at the clock which lacked a few minutes yet of the time fixed for the meeting, slided hastily away from Bertram's detaining hand, and disappeared in the crowd without. In another moment Bertram saw him standing at the outer door, looking anxiously up and down the street.

"Something _is_ wrong," murmured Bertram. "What?" And for a moment he felt half tempted to return Mr. Stuyvesant's friendly bow with a few words expressive of his uneasiness, but the emphasis with which Hopgood had murmured the words, "Be careful what you say," unconsciously deterred him, and concealing his nervousness as best he might, he entered the Directors' office.

It was now time for the meeting to open, and the gentlemen were all seated around the low green baize table that occupied the centre of the room. Impatience was written on all their countenances. Mr. Stuyvesant especially was looking at the heavy gold watch in his hand, with a frown on his deeply wrinkled brow that did not add to its expression of benevolence. The empty seat at the head of the table stared upon Bertram uncompromisingly.

"My wife gives a reception to-day," 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 to-day; 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 its sparkling diamonds; never a lip in the whole vast throng curled with more self-complacent pride, or melted into a more alluring smile, than that of her who now lay here, a marble image beneath the eye of day. It was as if a flowery field had split beneath the dancing foot of some laughing siren. One moment your gaze is upon the swaying voluptuous form, the half-shut beguiling eye, the white out-reaching arms upon whose satin surface a thousand loves seem perching; the next you stare horror-stricken upon the closing jaws of an awful pit, with the flash of something bright in your eyes, and the sense of a hideous noiseless rush in which earth and heaven appear to join, sink and be swallowed! Bertram felt his heart grow sick. Moving on, he pa.s.sed the bronze image of Luxury lying half asleep on its bed of crumpled roses. Hideous mockery! What has luxury to do with death? She who was luxury itself has vanished from these halls. Shall the mute bronze go on smiling over its wine cup while she who was its prototype is carried by without a smile on the lips once so vermeil with pride and tropical languors!

Arrived at the top of the house, Bertram knocked at the door with the strange lock, and uttering his own name, asked if there was anything he could do here or elsewhere to show his sympathy and desire to be of use in this great and sudden bereavement. There was no immediate reply and he began to fear he would be obliged to retire without seeing his uncle, when the door was slowly opened and Mr. Sylvester came out. Instantly Bertram understood the anxiety of the servant. Not only did Mr.

Sylvester's countenance exhibit the usual traces of grief and horror incident to a sudden and awful calamity, but there were visible upon it the tokens of another and still more unfathomable emotion, a wild and paralyzed look that altered the very contour of his features, and made his face almost like that of a stranger.