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Updated: June 28, 2025
After a while he lit a fresh cigar and opened the newspapers. For an hour or two he let his thoughts drift as they led him, and then, as he was folding up one, the following notice met his vision: "Wanted, a private secretary. A young man who has had a classical education preferred. Call upon Mr. Edward Lanhearne, 9 Fifth Avenue." The name struck Roland. He had heard it before.
Only Ada, the youngest child of the house, remained with her father; for the mother had been dead many years, and the preservation of the idea of home was felt by all the Lanhearne children to be in Ada's hands. If she married and went away, who then would keep open the dear old house and give a bright welcome to their yearly visits? Ada, however, was not inclined to marriage.
After this revelation there was a decided relapse, and after a few more days of suffering, of hope, and despair had passed, the end came peacefully from utter exhaustion. Mr. Lanhearne was present, but it was into Denasia's eyes that Roland gazed until this sad earth was lost to vision, and the dark, tearless orbs, once so full of light and love, were fixed and dull for evermore. "It is all past!
Roland closed his eyes, and from under their lids stole two large tears the last he would ever shed. And Mr. Lanhearne was so awed and troubled he could scarcely say: "A face! Whose face, then, Roland?" "My own! My own!" and he spoke with that patience of accepted doom which, while it carries the warrant of death, has also death's resignation and dignity.
Lanhearne entered the room as she spoke, and he sat down and answered her: "To die before one's time, before one has seen and heard, and enjoyed and suffered the full measure of life, may seem hard, Mrs. Tresham, but there is something in this respect much harder. I have just been with a man who has lived after his time.
When Davis knocked at the door she said drearily, "Come in." She thought it was her husband at last. "Are you Mademoiselle Denasia?" inquired a strange voice. A quick sense of trouble came to her; she stood up and answered "Yes." "There is a gentleman at our house, Mr. Tresham; he is very ill indeed. He asks for you constantly. Mr. Lanhearne thinks you ought to come to him at once." "I am ready."
When she reached the door she heard a voice praying heard a voice thanking God amid sobs and tears oh, father, what for? For the death of her baby! Crying out in a passion of gratitude because it was released from hunger and cold and suffering!" Mr. Lanhearne covered his face, and Roland looked at Ada with his large eyes troubled and misty.
It is all over!" cried Denasia, "all over, all over! Oh, Roland! Roland! My dear, dear love!" and Mr. Lanhearne led her fainting with sorrow from the place of death.
There were only strangers to lay him in the grave. His wife was too worn out with watching and grief to leave her bed; his sister was far away. Mr. Lanhearne and two or three gentlemen whose acquaintance Roland had made at the club of which Mr. Lanhearne was a member paid the last pitiful rites, and then left him alone for ever. Ada sat with the sorrowful widow.
But the house had settled for the night; he had a reluctance to awaken the servants; he hoped the warmth would give him ease; he was, in fact, quite unacquainted with the terrible malady which had seized him. In the morning he did not appear, and after a short delay Mr. Lanhearne sent him a message. Roland was, however, by this time in high fever and delirious.
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