THE MYSTERY ABOUT SYDNEY
The boys stood by in anxious suspense while the doctor made his
examination.
“It is utter collapse from severe mental strain,” he said after a
minute. “He will come around presently.”
He wrote out a prescription and gave it to Scott to take out for him
and then turned to Rex.
“You are Mr. Pell’s brother, I believe?” he said.
“Yes,” answered Rex, for the fact that there was no blood relation
between them was one that very seldom recurred to the boys’ minds.
“Then perhaps you will be able to assign some cause for this seizure.
Was Mr. Pell excited by anything in particular when it took him?”
Rex hesitated. Remembering how Sydney had been affected by learning
that he had revealed the facts about Mr. Tyler’s will to Scott, he felt
that he ought not to speak of the matter to any one else.
“Yes, he was excited by a—a family affair,” he replied, hoping this was
all he need say on the matter.
“Humph!” muttered the physician, and he not only took another critical
look at Sydney’s face, but favored Rex with a long stare, too.
“Will he be well enough to go down to Marley to-night?” asked the
latter.
“You live out of town then?” returned the doctor. “There’s no place
where you could take him here in the city?”
“None, but a hotel,” rejoined Rex. “And I’m sure my mother would rather
have him home.”
At this point Sydney stirred and opened his eyes. He looked first at
the doctor, frowned deeply, and then as Rex came forward within his
range of vision, he beckoned the boy to him.
Rex hurried over and knelt by his side.
“Who is that?” asked Sydney.
“It’s a doctor. You fainted or something and Scott went out to get him.
How do you feel?”
“Pretty weak, but ask him to step into the next room a minute. I want
to speak to you.”
“Doctor, will you mind waiting in the next room a minute? My brother
wants to see me about something.”
Rex was afraid the physician might feel offended or else object to
leaving his patient, but he said, “Why, certainly,” and then came over
to take a close look at the young lawyer before leaving him.
As soon as he had gone Sydney put out one arm and passing it around
Rex’s neck, drew the boy’s ear close to his mouth.
“Did I say anything while I was unconscious?” he whispered.
“No,” replied Rex, mystified. “Nothing at all. But what does all this
mean, Syd? What is worrying you so terribly?”
“Don’t let it worry you and then it will worry me less. What time is
it?”
“Half past five.”
“Then we ought to catch the six o’clock train.”
“But you’re not strong enough to go now,” objected Rex. “You’re as pale
as a ghost.”
“Am I?” A wan smile lit up Sydney’s face for an instant “Well, then,
exercise will perhaps bring some of the color back. You can call the
doctor in now and we’ll see what he says.”
Scott arrived with the filled prescription just as Rex brought the
physician back into the room. Sydney objected to lying on the floor any
longer and they helped him to a chair.
“Yes, you can go home if you don’t do any walking,” said the doctor
after another examination.
“All right, I can go down in the elevator, get a carriage from the
hotel across the street and ride right up to the station. You rush down
and engage one, Rex. Scott will stay here and help the doctor down with
me. Then he can go along with us. Don’t lose any time, Reggie.”
With an immensely relieved mind Rex hurried off to execute the
commission. He had really feared at one time that Sydney was going to
die.
He was rallying rapidly now. When he entered the coach he took out his
pocketbook and paid the doctor for his services.
“We owe you something, Scott,” he added after they had started, “for
what you got at the drug store.”
Scott protested, but was in the end obliged to take what he had paid
out.
“It’s been an exciting afternoon for you fellows,” remarked Sydney, and
Rex could not help but notice that while his tone was light, his face
was still pale and that he did not look at them while he was speaking.
“I want you to promise me one thing, though. That you will not speak of
my fainting spell at home, or you either, Scott. I have a particular
reason for asking that favor.”
Both boys promised to respect his wishes, and then Sydney quickly
changed the subject to the Bowmans’ trip, asking at what hotels they
were going to stop, and so on until the carriage reached the station.
He seemed so much better by this time that when he met a friend on the
train and took a seat with him, Rex and Scott almost forgot that he had
been ill.
They found places together near by, but neither said much during the
short ride. Rex felt that Scott must be thinking of how Sydney had
broken in upon his revelation of their inheritance, and wondering what
it could mean. He couldn’t explain it, so he thought best not to broach
the subject.
And as this filled so large a part of his thoughts there was nothing
else he cared to talk about. After all his trip to Philadelphia had not
been productive of any results. He knew no more now than when he
started about the extent of Mr. Tyler’s fortune.
When they reached Marley, Sydney took a hack that always waited at the
station, and he and Rex rode down to the Pellery, Scott living close to
the station in the other direction.
“Do you feel all right, Syd?” asked Rex during the ride.
Sydney nodded without making any reply, and soon they reached home. Rex
was unusually silent during dinner. He looked up in surprised fashion
when he learned that Sydney had gone off without his breakfast that
morning. Sydney explained that it was due to urgent business in town.
Rex wondered what the family would think if they knew about the scene
at the office that afternoon.
Nobody said anything about Mr. Tyler after Sydney had admitted that he
died before he left him the previous night. Rex was the one most likely
to discourse on the subject, but now he had his reasons for not
broaching it.
The next morning Sydney did not go to the city. He devoted himself to
making arrangements for Mr. Tyler’s burial. The death was published in
all the Philadelphia papers, and the Pells expected that some one might
come down, claiming to be a relative.
But no one appeared, and on Saturday the funeral was held in the little
house in Burdock. All the Pells were present, and a great number of
people from Marley.
The news that the miser was very wealthy and had left all his money,
except a small legacy to his servant, to Mrs. Pell, spread rapidly and
created a great sensation.
Everybody connected it with Roy’s act of rescue on the trestle, and so
many spoke to him about it that he was almost afraid to show himself in
public.
“What do you care?” said Jess, when he complained to her about it. “It
certainly isn’t a thing you are ashamed of.”
“But I don’t know what to say,” he returned. “It sounds silly to tell
them it wasn’t anything, and I can’t say, yes, I think it was a very
brave act. So there I am.”
“You poor boy. What do you do, usually?”
“Try to get around it by telling them that I’m not the heir but mother.
I suppose that’s kind of mean, too, for I know she hates to be spoken
to about it as much as I do.”
The Pells were the observed of all observers at the funeral. Eva had
declared at first that she thought they ought not to go.
“We’ll just make a show of ourselves,” she said. “It was very
unfortunate all this got out before Mr. Tyler was buried.”
But Mrs. Pell announced that respect for the dead demanded their
presence, so they went. Every one remarked on the pallor of Sydney. His
mother had worried over it considerably.
“You must be the first to take advantage of our altered circumstances,
my dear boy,” she had told him. “I want you to give up work for a while
and go away for a good long rest.”
“Oh, no, no!” he cried out in such terror that the poor woman was
startled.
He noticed it and tried to smile as he went on:
“Of course all this business about the Tyler will has been an extra
strain on me, but that will soon be off now. It is you and the children
who must benefit by the money that has come so unexpectedly. You will
make me, oh, so much happier, if you will not count me in on it. You
will not need my help now, and my income will be abundant for my own
wants.”
Seeing that he felt so strongly on the matter, Mrs. Pell said no more
at the time, but she often thought of that talk later and shivered as
she recalled it.