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Slowly the minutes passed; eight o'clock struck, when, just as the last vibration ceased, there came a loud knock at the backdoor, and a little boy burst into the kitchen, crying at the top of his voice: "Papa's got a fit! Oh, Mrs. Belden! papa's got a fit; do come!" Rising, as was natural, I hastened towards the kitchen, meeting Mrs. Belden's anxious face in the doorway.
Statira Belden had come to do the decencies; Eliza Marshall received her with the grim inexpressiveness of a granite bowlder. "My husband is resting quietly to-day," she said, in response to Mrs. Belden's inquiries. He was unconscious under chloral, after three nights of open-eyed torment. Mrs. Belden passed one of her large, smooth gloves over the other and praised the house.
"It's all mighty risky business, and it's my fault. I should never have permitted you to start on this trip." "Don't you worry about me, daddy, I'll pull through somehow. Anybody that knows me will understand how little there is in in old lady Belden's gab. I've had a beautiful trip, and I won't let her nor anybody else spoil it for me." McFarlane was not merely troubled. He was distracted.
Belden's room and hastily inquired: "What did you mean this morning when you informed me you had seen this girl? that she was in a certain room where I might find her?" "What I said." "You have, then, been to her room?" "No; I have only been on the outside of it. Seeing a light, I crawled up on to the ledge of the slanting roof last night while both you and Mrs.
Statira Belden's eyes sought the floor. It was she who had made it sure that knowledge of Truesdale's transgression should reach the ears of Susan Bates; yet her own son had just established relations with a "baroness" who still lingered behind on the scene of the late national festivities, and at the climax of an insane extravagance had been openly cast off by his family.
"No, nothing special," answered Truesdale; "I just happened in. And I think," he added to himself, "that I had better lose no time in happening out. The idea of my running up against such a tar-kettle as this! Pouf!" As he went out he passed along the front of Belden's desk.
Then I flew at Cliff and just about choked the life out of him. I'd have ended him right there if he hadn't let go." Mrs. McFarlane, looking upon her daughter in amazement, saw on her face the shadow of the deadly rage which had burned in her heart as she clenched young Belden's throat. "What then? What happened then?" "He let go, you bet." Her smile came back.
It would therefore seem natural, in the conversation which followed his introduction into the house and installment in Mrs. Belden's parlor, that I should begin my narration by showing him Hannah's confession; but it was not so.
She made this introduction with some awkwardness, for her lover's failure to even say, "Howdy," informed her that his jealous heart was aflame, and she went on, quickly: "Mr. Norcross dropped in on his way to the post-office, and I'm collecting a snack for him." Recognizing Belden's claims upon the girl, Wayland rose. "I must be going. It's a long ride over the hill."
And, beginning again, he put question after question concerning the girl's life in the house, receiving answers which only tended to show that she could not have brought the confession with her, much less received it from a secret messenger. Unless we doubted Mrs. Belden's word, the mystery seemed impenetrable, and I was beginning to despair of success, when Mr.
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