It was long past midnight, and between the small hours that usher in the
light of a new day, when the stillness of the mansion on the cliff was
broken by a piercing shriek. It was an appalling cry of distress that
awoke the slumberers and froze the timid ones to their couches with
fear. Mr. Heath sprang from his bed, and ran precipitately to his
daughter-in-law's apartment, whence the cry proceeded. Poor Mercedita
met him at the door in her night-dress, and in answer to his inquiries
pointed in speechless horror at the floor of her dressing-room, where
lay stiff and stark the body of her husband!
Jack Heath had come home the previous night for the first time since his
fortnight's debauch. He was in a shocking condition, with filthy
clothes, and a bad bruise over one eye, resulting, doubtless, from a
fall. His wife, incensed at his conduct, refused to speak or notice him;
and Jack, still tipsily stupid, threw himself on a lounge in the
dressing-room to sleep. During the night he awoke; tormented by the
"horrors," and thirsting for some stimulating liquid, he seized a
crystal flask of cologne that lay on the toilet-table, and drank it to
appease the infernal craving that possessed him. The congested condition
of his brain, super-excited by this fiery draught, induced apoplexy, and
the stroke was fatal. His wife, asleep in the adjoining room, awoke soon
after, and not hearing his usual heavy breathing, was much surprised.
She imagined he must have left the room, and after waiting awhile, arose
from her bed, went into the dressing-room, where there was a dim light
burning, and found that he had fallen from the lounge and lay on the
floor. She shook him without effect; raised his arm--it fell rigidly.
She tried to arouse him, called him loudly, but the dull ear heard not,
for the sleep that bound him knew no waking; and then, as the truth
flashed on her, with a shriek she summoned the household. They led her
away, agitated, probably, more by terror than grief, but Mr. Heath
remained gazing at the corpse of his only son. What a spectacle to meet
a father's eye was this inert bulk, repulsive with the stigmas of
dissipation fresh upon it! In the middle ages the heir of the house fell
in battle, killed perhaps by the shot of an arquebuse or the blow of a
partisan; or he met his death in some midnight encounter, and was
brought home with a broken rapier and doublet dripping with blood--there
is romance in that. But now he falls a victim to the bottle, and
furnishes but a vulgar theme. Nevertheless the drama is none the less
real. Mr. Heath's contemplation was sad, but full of worldly reasoning.
The curse of unearned wealth, he mused, has fallen on my son. Had he
been the child of a bricklayer or born to labor, he would have been
alive now; or had not the blood of the Obershaws with its coarse
appetites, predominated, he might have been an honor to me. Unmoved
remained Mr. Heath as he philosophized thus, until the sight of his
daughter's emotion, as she covered her dead brother's face with tears
and kisses, stirred the parent within him, and his eyes clouded and cold
features relaxed.
* * * * *
Another funeral, another solemn procession to the tolling of the bell of
St. Jude's, and the body of John Peter Heath was laid beside that of his
grandsire in the family vault, in the yard of the little church.