The Third Generation

RICHARD POLWHELE the first, aged seventy, and Richard Polwhele the third, aged seven, were driving home from Fairmount Park in a state of profound and mutual satisfaction. Richard Polwhele the second, an excellent man of business, but otherwise of no especial significance, had been dead four years. To his father he was a fastfading memory; to his little son, a name only, a name spoken occasionally in his mother’s most impressive tones: “ Your dear father, Dicky! ” whereupon Dicky unconsciously assumed a visage de circonstance. He had the facile sympathy of a child, and a child’s fortunate forgetfulness. Mrs. Polwhele believed that he still remembered his father, just as she believed that she still mourned her husband. Indeed, she naturally attributed one phenomenon to the other.

The truth was that grandfather and grandson were, for the time being, allsufficient for each other. To Dicky his grandfather’s house was a paradise of delights, where ginger-cakes, diamond and heart-shaped,dwelt in the unguarded seclusion of the pantry, where bulky and beautiful picture-books lay upon the centre-table, and where ivory chessmen assumed their proper functions as playthings for a child. To old Richard Polwhele, Dicky was simply the centre of the universe. He had been all his life a man of active interests and of calm affections. His wife had died when his only child was born. He had been, in technical language, “ faithful to her memory,” — that is, he had never felt the smallest disposition to marry his housekeeper, or little Richard’s governess, or any of the more eligible young women who had from time to time crossed his horizon. Those were the days when the firm of Polwhele & Shepperton, importers of woolens, was struggling in heavy waters, was righting itself bravely, was laying the solid foundations of wealth; and the senior partner had as little leisure to mourn his wife as to replace her.

The sandy-haired child in the nursery grew up to be a sandy-haired schoolboy — looked after with intermittent zeal by a dozen aunts and cousins — and was ready for college before his father had an opportunity to observe what, in another man’s son, he would have been disposed to call dullness. It was not until after his admission into the firm that Richard the second manifested those sterling qualities which won the deep respect of Richard the first, and helped to make the name of Polwhele & Shepperton a synonym for success. When he married a widow with two little girls he was admittedly the best of husbands and stepfathers. Four years later he died, leaving one child, Richard the third, who had already begun to focus the rays of his grandfather’s affection into perilous intensity.

By the time Dicky was seven, Mr. Polwhele’s friends—elderly, unsympathetic gentlemen who had survived their own ardors and enthusiasms —grew visibly apprehensive whenever the grandson’s name was mentioned. Dicky was not a child of brilliant parts, and the anecdotes they were compelled to hear were lamentably akin to those related by the immortal Mr. Woodhouse in praise of his grandchildren. Even Mr. Polwhele’s repeated and rapturous assurances that the little boy bore the most amazing resemblance to himself at that early age failed to interest other grandfathers who were enjoying a somewhat similar distinction. “ The child can’t and won’t learn his multiplication-table,” was one of the many confidences imparted to the long-suffering Mr. Shepperton, who had nine grandchildren of his own. “ By George! I would n’t either when I was a brat "; and the astute old merchant wagged his head over this remarkable inheritance of antipathy.

So it was that Richard Polwhele experienced a pure delight in driving two hours on a chill November afternoon with a fidgety little boy, who stood up every few minutes in the victoria, and dragged the carriage-rug from his rheumatic knee. So it was that his pleasure deepened when, as they neared town, the tired child nestled close to his side, and he could feel the pressure of the beloved little body against his own.

They had turned into 21st Street when Dicky raised his head. “ Mother said I must go straight home,” he announced.

His grandfather’s face lengthened. “ But I thought you were coming to see Alexander’s kittens,” he protested, with a note of almost ludicrous disappointment in his voice.

Dicky sighed. “ Mother said I could see the kittens to-morrow. She said to tell you I went to dancing-school this morning, and Murray Nelson comed home with me to dinner, and we played at shipwrecks, and I was tired, and three things was enough for Saturday; and I had n’t studied any lessons, and — ”

“ Well, well,” interrupted Mr. Polwhele, who knew from experience that his daughter-in-law’s arguments were cumulative rather than convincing, “ you must do as your mother bids you ”; and they drove for a few minutes in silence.

Then Dicky wrinkled his brows. His thoughts were still dwelling with Alexander. “Agnes says ” — Agnes was his elder half-sister— “ that cats don’t like boys. She says they almost never do. Did cats like you when you were a little boy, grandfather? ”

Mr. Polwhele hesitated. He had been a country lad, with the straightforward, unimaginative brutality of his class, and he felt a pang of late remorse when he contrasted his little grandson’s gentleness with his own slaughterstained childhood. “ I am afraid not, Dicky,” he said soberly; and then — glad of the diversion — “ there is your mother coming up the street just in time to meet you.”

Dicky sprang up joyfully, and Mrs. Polwhele quickened her step when she saw the carriage stopping at her door. She was a comely woman with brown inquisitive eyes, crisp hair, a serene temper, and a talent for discovering and interpreting the obvious.

“ I am glad you brought him home early, father,” she said. ” He goes to a dancing-class on Saturday mornings, and to-day he had a little friend to dine with him, and they played so hard, and he seemed tired and fretful, and it is better for him to be indoors before dark, and you know he dines with you anyway to-morrow, and can play with the kittens all afternoon. It is not worth while to let children wear themselves out on Saturdays, simply because they don’t go to school.”

“Quite right, quite right!” interjected Richard Polwhele. “ Don’t stand in the cold, Emily. Good-night, Dicky. Drive on, James! ”

And as the carriage rolled off, the old gentleman tucked the rug snugly around his knees, and meditated on the conversational proficiency of women. “ And Emily has had two husbands! ” he muttered to himself. “ Odd thing, very! To be sure, Richard — but Gordon Bright was a clever fellow, a really clever fellow. Far from domestic, though. Older than she was by a good bit, and very far from domestic.”— And Mr. Polwhele chuckled softly. He had the indulgence common to threescore years and ten for long-remembered delinquencies.

It is a world of disappointments, even for good little boys. When Dicky arrived at his grandfather’s house the next forenoon (Mr. Polwhele dined at two on Sundays, and his grandson had for the past year or so shared — with restrictions— this comfortable meal), Alexander’s kittens were nowhere to be found. Alexander herself, with an assumption of innocence so elaborate that only Dicky could have been deceived, sat toasting her paws by the fire, and accepted with supercilious composure the little visitor’s soft caresses and condolences. She had the arrogant and suspicious nature of an upstart. Lifted from obscurity to affluence by Dicky’s notice and esteem, she received, as due to her own worth, the suddenly acquired luxuries of life. Dicky had brought her out of kitchen and cellar, to sit unmolested — where never cat had sat before — on Mr. Polwhele’s hearth-rug. From Dicky’s hands she had taken her first saucer of cream. He had named her after the conqueror of the world. He had established her rights in his grandfather’s household, and for his sake her offspring had been welcomed as princes of the earth. But what should a baseborn cat know of honor or confiding trust? Alexander’s kittens had disappeared from their box, and Dicky’s bitter disappointment was smothered under pity for her bereavement.

Mr. Polwhele looked on with blissful amusement as his little grandson patted the sleek head, and sighed sympathetically over the maternal pangs. Then the idea of frustrating, without betraying, Alexander came into his mind.

“ Listen, Dicky,” he said. “ Why don’t you go and find those kittens? They must be somewhere about the house. She could n’t have carried them — I mean they could n’t have gotten out in the night when the doors were locked. Go and look until you find them, and tell Charles to search the cellar carefully.”

Dicky scrambled to his feet. “ But they are so little, grandfather,” he said. “ They don’t know how to walk yet, and they can’t see. Somebody must have stolen them.”

“ I think not, my boy. No great demand for kitten-stock in the market. If you look hard, you’ll find them.”

Dicky started for the door. Alexander raised her perfidious head as he went out; then, reflecting on the safety of her hiding-place, shut her eyes and settled down to a comfortable nap. Her drowsy purr bespoke contentment and a mind at ease. Mr. Polwhele finished his newspaper, and took up the Voyage of the Beagle. The fire glowed on the hearth. The autumn sunlight slanted through the windows. The room was wrapt in warmth and silence and security.

It was a long while before Dicky came back. He brought no kittens, but held in his hands an oblong tortoiseshell box. His face was flushed, his eyes troubled. He went straight to his grandfather’s chair. “ I broke this, grandfather,” he said. “I let it fall, and it broke.”

Mr. Polwhele closed his book. He looked first at his grandson, and then at the tortoise-shell box. It was of beautiful workmanship. Delicate gold arabesques and scrolls ornamented the four corners, and from each corner a gold unicorn came leaping through the intricate tracery. There was no key, but the tiny gold hinges had been wrenched loose in the fall, and the lid hung half-open. On a gold plate was engraved the name Felicia Leigh. The box held nothing but letters.

“ Where did you find this, Dicky?” asked Mr. Polwhele.

“ In — in — you know, grandfather. — In the room that was grandmother’s.”

“ Whereabouts in your grandmother’s room? ”

There was no answer.

“Whereabouts in your grandmother’s room? ”

No answer.

“Whereabouts in your grandmother’s room? ”

“In grandmother’s desk.” The voice quavered so pitifully that Mr. Polwhele stopped scrutinizing the box, and looked at his grandson.

“You are not going to cry, are you? ” he said sharply.

Dicky rather thought he was. His little breast heaved, and the room, seen through a blur of tears, grew dim and wavering. But he struggled bravely and answered, “ No, grandfather.”

“ That’s right. You are not a girl, remember! You went into your grandmother’s room to look for the kittens, Dicky? ”

“ Yes, grandfather.”

“ But you did not think the kittens were in your grandmother’s desk? ”

“ No, grandfather.”

“ Why did you open it? ”

A pause.

“I wanted to, grandfather.”

Mr. Polwhele put out his arm, and drew his grandson to his side. “ That is n’t a good and sufficient reason, Dicky,” he said. “ Do you know the meaning of the word dishonorable?”

Dicky’s brows wrinkled. It was a trick the child had when thoughtful or perplexed. At present he believed he did understand what his grandfather meant; but definitions are difficult things, so he preserved a discreet silence.

“ You had a right to go into your grandmother’s room,” said Mr. Polwhele remorselessly, “ but no right to open your grandmother’s desk. That was being a prying little boy. It is because I do not expect you to do such things that I trust you to play where and how you please. Do you understand that much, Dicky? ”

The child nodded. Then he wedged himself closer to his grandfather, as though conscious that proximity was his best defense, and ventured upon a change of theme. “ Charles says the kittens are not in the cellar,” he murmured softly.

Mr. Polwhele accepted the flag of truce proffered with timid confidence. He understood Dicky’s little well-bred effort to reëstablish friendly relations. His mind flew backward over sixty years, and he saw himself — a convicted culprit — endeavoring to engage his mother in amicable conversation, while her darkened brow and the near prospect of his father’s homecoming gave him just cause for uneasiness. A delicious warmth filled his heart as he contemplated the beloved little inheritor of his own proclivities. They were alike, though seemingly so different. In the drawer of his writingtable lay a daguerreotype of a boy, — a square-headed, snub-nosed boy in a clumsy jacket, — and many times had he traced with a cunning hand the points of resemblance between this picture and the smooth-browed, serious child at his knee. His sense of contentment grew strong and sweet when Dicky’s arm stole around his neck, and Dicky’s gray eyes mutely begged for pardon. He was by nature stern, and held that all transgressions should be paid for heavily; but the dearest thing in life to him was his grandson’s intimacy of affection. Not for worlds would he have risked the loss of this comradeship. The child was not characteristically fearless; he had learned that from his grandfather there was nothing to be feared.

Perhaps Mrs. Polwhele was right when she laid stress upon what no one else had ever been able to perceive, — Dicky’s nervous temperament. Certainly the breaking of the box, or the loss of Alexander’s kittens, or some other cause unknown, had lowered his spirits and subdued his customary activity. He ate very little dinner, and refused a second plate of ice-cream. Even Alexander’s disappearance, which occurred immediately after the meal was eaten, failed to arouse him to pursuit; and he spent the afternoon looking languidly over his favorite books, Retzsch’s Outlines of Faust, and Finden’s Beauties of Moore. The latter volume was his soul’s delight. Prone on the hearth-rug, he sped from engraving to engraving, dwelling amorously on the opulent charms which each lady so lavishly displayed. The Desmond’s Love was preëminently a favorite, though Nourmahal and Zelica pressed her hard. Kathleen weeping over her unresponsive saint, and Lea dying in the arms of her radiant angel, thrilled his little heart; while to the adventurous damsel who wandered over Erin, encumbered with “ rich and rare ” gems, he paid the homage of an infant Galahad.

His absorption in his harem of beauties grew more profound as he surrendered his soul to their seduction; and when his half-sisters called for him at four o’clock, they found him — no unusual occurrence — exceedingly unwilling to go home. He clung to his grandfather’s chair, inventing one excuse after another to necessitate a few moments’ delay; and, when departure became inevitable, his brow clouded, and only the timely recollection that he was not a girl saved him from the degradation of tears. Mr. Polwhele smiled as the troubled little face was lifted to his own. Even while enjoining obedience, he exulted secretly over Dicky’s reluctance to obey. At the last moment the child’s gray eyes sought his grandfather’s with an impelling earnestness of gaze. A little choking sob rose in his throat. He made a futile effort to hold back as he was led through the doorway, an effort frustrated with pardonable impatience by the sisters. There was a slight but audible scuffle in the hall, and the door closed between grandfather and grandson. The Sunday’s visit was over.

Mr. Polwhele stirred the fire, put on another log, lit a second cigar, picked up the Voyage of the Beagle, and abandoned it for the Beauties of Moore, which had been left open on an adjoining chair. He glanced with amusement at the Desmond’s disheveled love, and at the still more disheveled Eveleen mourning in her dishonored bower. His mind was filled with the thought of Dicky lying on the hearth-rug, turning the pages with elaborate care, and seeking now and then a word of explanation. Why was the angel with beautiful folded wings called a Peri, and the lady sitting in the forest a “ stricken deer ”? Mr. Polwhele’s smile broadened as the image of his grandson became more and more distinct, and he rehearsed meditatively the incidents of the day.

Then before his mental vision the seven-year-old Dicky grew to be seventeen, to be twenty-seven. What glorious chances would be his in life! Mr. Polwhele held, theoretically, that young men should work their way through the world. He had well-defined views on the value of incentives, and subscribed cordially to the current American belief that scant education, hard toil, and early anxieties, make a strong and successful citizen. Yet, none the less, he exulted in the thought of the great wealth which would be his grandson’s portion, and of the limitless opportunities it would give him. None the less he rejoiced in his heart that Dicky would not have to work as he had worked, to save as he had saved, to know the sharp insistent cares which had been familiar to his early manhood. He had sown; his grandson should reap. He had fought the battle; his grandson should enjoy the victory. Richard Polwhele the third, a fair and unstained name, for the old merchant held his honor high. There was good blood flowing in his veins, and Dicky should inherit traditions as well as wealth, — traditions which should rob wealth of its perils. In a reverie so deep and blessed that the waning of the November day was unperceived, Mr. Polwhele sat smoking by the fire, and tasted with the tranquillity of old age the unstinted sweetness of life.

The entrance of the butler aroused him from his dream. Charles lit the lamps, observed austerely that the open window was chilling the room, and he wondered if Master Dicky had n’t caught his death of cold, closed it with ostentatious firmness, drew the curtains, replenished the fire, put the Beauties of Moore back in its exact place on the table, with Retzsch’s Outlines on top of it, straightened the chairs, and withdrew. He was an indulgent servant, although his manner was severe, and his master stood in no real fear of him. Mr. Polwhele merely raised the window again as soon as he was alone, and had once more opened the Voyage of the Beagle when his glance fell on the tortoise-shell box with the broken lid. He sighed as he picked it up, and surveyed the damage wrought by Dicky’s awkward little fingers.

Poor Felicia! How many years had sped by since she handled this pretty toy! That his wife’s desk, his wife’s toilet-table, his wife’s little bookshelf, should have been left untouched since her death was not proof of any deep sentiment on her husband’s part. Everything under his roof had remained for that length of time in its accustomed place. The Beauties of Moore had lain in the same spot on the table when Felicia was alive, and Retzsch’s Outlines on top of it. The bronze thermometer with a scantily draped female leaning aimlessly against a fluted column, the hollow glass ball inclosing a winter landscape which, when reversed, was hidden by whirling snow, had cumbered his writing-table since the beginning of his married life. And for thirtyseven years, yes, fully thirty-seven, the tortoise-shell box with its gold unicorns had been hidden in Felicia’s desk.

Poor Felicia! She must have had some presentiment of her fate, for she had grown sad and silent during the last months of her life, and there was the shadow of fear in her charming eyes. Mr. Polwhele had never been an imaginative man, and business cares were then pressing upon him mercilessly; but he had learned to know that look of disquietude, and to pity it. There were times when he had felt a pang of apprehension, and had wondered painfully if many young wives paid with their lives for what was after all their highest happiness as well as their supreme duty. The end had come suddenly. Felicia had been swept from his path as a leaf is swept by the blast. She had never rallied, never regained consciousness after the premature birth of her baby; and the sad eyes with the tortured look in them had closed wearily and indifferently upon the world.

It was a great pity. Richard Polwhele’s regret went no further than this pang of sympathy for the dead who had lost so much by dying. No sense of personal loss had survived thirty-seven years to stab his heart at sight of his wife’s trinket. He looked with approval at the beautiful little box he held, and lifted the broken lid. It was more than half-filled with letters addressed to Felicia; but crushed on top of these was a sheet of her own writing, the lines slanting nervously downward in a fashion her husband well remembered. He had many times laughed at her inability to “ write straight,” and had offered to rule paper for her, as for a child. He thought of this now as he took up the flimsy crumpled sheet.

There was an intricate monogram in one corner, a foolish tangle of letters, and beneath it came leaping from the paper the words, “ For God’s sake, Dickon dear.” — “ Dickon! ” Richard Polwhele lifted his head, and frowned. When had Felicia ever called him Dickon? He had been Richard all his life. Not even in boyhood had his name been softened into Dick, and Dickon was an unfamiliar substitute. He had never known but one Dickon, Dickon Voss, and his frown grew heavier at the recollection. With the unhesitating impulse which forces us to face some hidden menace and put it forever to flight, Mr. Polwhele opened his wife’s letter and read: “ For God’s sake, Dickon dear, come to me and take me away! The baseness of my own soul is killing me. I cannot bear it, indeed I cannot bear it any longer. If you do not take me away before your child is born, I shall never — ”

That was all. There was no date, nor any need of one. Those faltering downward lines were the last Felicia Polwhele had ever written. Death had come in her lover’s place, and had ended her degradation. As the meaning of the words forced itself upon Richard Polwhele’s mind, and a confused throng of incidents, indications, details, whirled madly through his memory, his first conscious sentiment was pity, — pity chilled by abhorrence of the thing he pitied. What weeks and months of agony had been borne by his young wife, who was so unfitted, physically and spiritually, for endurance. He knew now why the shadow of fear had deepened in her eyes, the desperate fear of a weak creature caught in a trap. The thirty-seven years that had passed since Felicia’s death dulled for a moment his own sense of wrong. He looked back through a soft obscuring haze upon his blighted home. The baby —

Suddenly, as if a swift and scorching fire shot through his veins, came the thought of Dicky, Dicky his little grandson. No, not his, not his at all. Dickon Voss’s grandson. Not his. God! could it be? There came a roaring in his ears, a horrible spasm of pain gripped his heart, his breath labored fearfully. Dicky! He raised his ashen face, and his staring eyes saw in the lamplight the little figure still lying on the hearth-rug, — the beloved little figure that was all the world to him. Then there rushed upon him tumultuously, mercilessly, the memory of the happy hours he had spent with his grandson by his side, the memory of the happier minutes when he had traced his own features, his own gestures, his own personality, in the inheritor of his name.

The bitterness which flooded his soul was acrid, hideous, unbearable. There was even something grotesque in the excess of his affection for this child of alien birth, this innocent impostor who had awakened the first overpowering emotion of his life. Mingling with his sense of personal downfall was a confused impression of general disaster, as if the walls of his house were swaying in an earthquake. The social fabric, built of necessity on woman’s fealty, the well-ordered processes of civilization, which have for their sole support a thing so frail as woman’s virtue, crashed into nothingness. Sickened by the shock, he steadied himself with an effort, and, as his vision cleared, his desolation deepened. He stood dishonored and alone in his old age. He had no grandson, and the child whom he loved better than his life was but the symbol of degradation and defeat.

The logs smouldered in the fireplace, a few red embers glowed and darkened, the curtains swayed in the rising wind. The room, so full an hour ago of warmth and comfort, looked sombre and menacing; but Richard Polwhele sat quietly by his blackened hearth, with his dead hopes for company.

DEAR MR. POLWHELE, —
Mother bids me tell you that Dicky is ill. He was feverish all night. Dr. Ellis fears it is diphtheria. He is isolated on the third floor with mother and a nurse. She says you had better not come to the house. She will not be able to see anybody, but Esther and I will keep you informed by telephone. Dr. Ellis was here before breakfast, and is coming again in the afternoon. He thinks, if it is diphtheria, it will be a light case. Mother says please not to worry.
Affectionately,
AGNES BRIGHT.

This was the missive which, on Monday morning, carried consternation to the heart of Mr. Polwhele’s household. The servants gossiped solemnly about their master’s infatuation for his grandson, and reached a unanimous conclusion that Dicky’s diphtheria was a “ warning.” They were all of them fond of the child, who had been gently reared, and who, as the cook observed, gave no more trouble to anybody than the blessed Saint Aloysius himself; yet none the less were they convinced that Dicky would die, and that his death would convey a salutary lesson. As for Mr. Polwhele, there was that in his face which forbade any approach to condolence. Even Charles did not dare to do more than transmit to his master whatever messages the telephone might have brought in his absence.

For five days these messages swayed from bad to good, from good to bad again; and there was a moment of sickening suspense whenever the sharp insistent clamor of the alarm was heard in the silent house. Mr. Polwhele went every day to his office, dictated his correspondence, and met Mr. Shepperton’s open-hearted concern with a leaden composure, extremely disconcerting to that honest gentleman, who had been long accustomed to smile whenever the word “ Dicky ” was spoken. But those five days wrought in the senior partner a change too startling to be overlooked even by the poverty-pinched, lighthearted office-boy, who stared furtively at his master’s averted face.

Richard Polwhele did not know that his eyes looked like the eyes of his dead wife, — hunted and desperate. He knew only that, hour after hour through the long day and longer night, his mind revolved wearily, ceaselessly, around one grim confronting question. If Dicky died, — his heart contracted at the thought, — the question would be answered. If Dicky lived, how should he, Richard Polwhele, deal with Dickon Voss’s grandson? It was the same child whom he had taken into his arms on Sunday. The serious eyes, the soft curved lips, the loving little heart, were all the same. Could he eliminate the stain of parentage, and hold the boy as his own, simply because he loved him?

Whenever this thought grew sweet and warm, there came a cold breath of pride, and chilled it in his soul. Tradition and the instincts of race were too strong to be routed by affection. There were times when the image of Dicky fighting for his life obliterated all other bitterness, and deadened all other pain.

“He cries out for you constantly,” Agnes had telephoned on the third evening. “Almost always he calls the doctor ‘ grandfather,’ and to-day for a long time he thought you were in his room, and kept begging you not to go.”

Mr. Polwhele whitened to the lips when he received this message. He did not groan aloud, because Charles, always eager for news, was standing by his side; but his step, as he climbed the stairs, was so unsteady that the servant longed, but did not dare, to offer him assistance. He had never been a hale man, though this made little difference. No mere bodily vigor could have withstood the two-fold pressure, the unceasing, unresting conflict which was grinding his life away. Dicky cried for him. Dicky called the doctor “ grandfather.” The little grating laugh which followed this recollection was not good to hear. As well the doctor as another. In his misery he envied happier grandfathers whose little true grandsons lay dying. Their grief was sacred. If their hopes were broken, they had peace with honor; while from his roof peace and honor had forever fled. Dicky cried for him. Dicky, in his fever, begged him not to go. Dimly he perceived the sweetness which would have underlain fear and pain, had not sin robbed sorrow of its worth.

The sixth day brought a change of news. Dicky was better. The antitoxine had done its work. The throat was clearing. The fever was gone. Dicky was very weak, but the doctor was encouraging, and they were all full of hope. So the messages ran, and the servants in Mr. Polwhole’s house, having kind Irish hearts, rejoiced in the downfall of their predictions, which is a generous thing to do. Sunday, the seventh day, brought many visitors, sympathetic and congratulatory, but Mr. Polwhele saw no one. On Monday morning he did not go to his office. He could not face the felicitations of his partner. He could not trust himself to say with a smile that his grandson was improving. He feared to let his haggard eyes rest on the eyes of friends. At breakfast-time word came that Dicky had slept well and was visibly stronger. At noon one of the sisters telephoned that Dr. Ellis pronounced the little patient to be “ doing splendidly.” In the evening the doctor himself informed Mr. Polwhele over the wire that he had just left his grandson, and considered him out of danger.

So it had come to this. There would be no intervention of Providence to take from him, Richard Polwhele, the duty of decision. Dicky would live. He would get well, and come again to the house, as in the old innocent days, and lie on the hearth-rug, and look at the Beauties of Moore, and play with Alexander’s kittens, and lean his little fair head upon his grandfather’s shoulder. The man who had been Richard Polwhele ten days ago would have been happier than the angels in Heaven at the bare thought of such felicity. The man who was Richard Polwhele tonight shivered and grew cold at heart. Dicky would live. He would grow up to inherit a name and a fortune which should never have been his father’s, and to which he had no right. Dickon Voss’s grandson. Mr. Polwhele knew the stock from which the child had sprung. Twenty years ago Dickon Voss had died, and the tongues which had spoken evil of him were silent now, because he had been forgotten by his world. But his was a tarnished memory to lie hidden under the shelter of an honest man’s name.

Hour after hour, hour after hour, Mr. Polwhele bade himself decide. It had never been his life’s habit to postpone any decision when the time for resolution had come; and, if the child were out of danger, the time had come to-night. Hour after hour, hour after hour, love fought a losing battle with pride, and shame, and anger, and with the invincible force of inherited purposes and principles. Love fought hard, bringing up again and again and again the image of Dicky in the firelight, whispering with Dicky’s voice, touching the bowed head with Dicky’s gentle fingers, pressing soft kisses with Dicky’s lips upon the withered cheek. But like a wall of ice around the old man’s heart was the thought of Dickon Voss’s grandson. At midnight the struggle was over. Love was routed. Mr. Polwhele wrote, with infinite difficulty but in a legible hand, a letter to his lawyer, appointing an hour for a meeting the next day. The letter, stamped and sealed, was found on his table in the morning, but no one thought to mail it, for Mr. Polwhele was lying unconscious on the floor, and at first the servants thought that he was dead.

He did not die until thirty-two hours later. Mrs. Polwhele, properly disinfected and with the connivance of the doctor, hurried to his bedside, and tried to tell him, amid many tears, that Dicky was getting well, that Dicky sent him love. She looked worn and white with anxiety, and she gave every one to understand that, Dicky’s illness had been too much for the grandfather who idolized him. Striving tenaciously to force her way through the barriers which hedge the dying, she knelt for hours by the bed, saying over and over again, “ Father dear, Dicky is not going to die. Dicky is going to live. Father dear, he loves you so, he longs so to see you. Father, do you understand ? ”

But there was no answering light in the old man’s eyes, no least pressure of the old man’s hand.

“Do you think he is absolutely unconscious?” Mrs. Polwhele asked the doctor; and the grim answer was: “No one has ever come back from this stage to tell us anything.”

When night fell, Charles hounded the other servants to their beds, but refused, himself, to leave his master’s side. He sat with the nurse, and watched the spark of life which was so feeble and yet so terribly hard to extinguish. With the earliest dawning of day Mr. Polwhele died.

“ The fact is,” observed Mr. Shepperton after the funeral, “ that the shock of the boy’s illness killed him. He looked like a dead man the first day he got the news. When I heard he’d had a stroke, I knew all was over with him, and I was n’t a bit surprised either. I’d expected something of the kind from the start. There never was a man or woman so wrapped up in a child. And here’s Dicky just as well as ever.”

“ I suppose the boy will inherit everything?” said Mr. Shepperton’s son-inlaw, freeing himself from his black gloves.

“ Everything, without a shadow of a doubt. A few legacies off the lump, and all the rest goes to Dicky.”

“ It’s a great deal too much for one boy,” said the son-in-law peevishly. “ Send him straight to the bad, in all likelihood.”

“ Well, I would n’t say that,” corrected Mr. Shepperton. “ He is a nice little lad, and he has good blood in him, good blood.” — And the junior partner sighed deeply. Richard Polwhele had been his lifelong friend, and he sorrowed sincerely for his death.