A cold, bitter night, with the snow falling swiftly and silently, only
to be caught up by the tempestuous bursts of wind, and swept into heavy
drifts of dazzling whiteness. It was snowing hard all over the great
city of New York, up-town as well as down. And in the open space in
front of the fine old mansion in which Mr. Dexter lived, it had gathered
in great heaps, on which bright streams of light shone from the
curtained window of the comfortable library. But cold and dreary and
desolate as it was without, within this richly furnished room was
warmth, comfort and hospitality. The master of the house was lying with
a shawl thrown over his slight figure, upon a couch, which had been
drawn up in front of the great open wood-fire, and about him were
gathered three or four of his best friends.
Mr. Van Kuren was there, and his sister, whom the children always
addressed as “Aunt Emma,” and who, on account of her delicate health,
seldom ventured far away from home. It must have been business of
importance that brought her from the great hotel, in which they were
staying, to this mansion above the Harlem river, on such a cold and
tempestuous night. Another guest, a portly, grey-haired, smooth-shaven
man of judicial aspect, was the lawyer, who had been summoned by Mr.
Dexter, in order to draw up a new will. Neither of the Van Kuren
children were present, Harry having been sent away on a short trip with
his tutor, while Laura had remained at the hotel in the care of her
English governess.
On a table, which had been drawn up closely to Mr. Dexter’s lounge, was
an open letter, which each member of the company had carefully
scrutinized in turn, and with many expressions of indignation and
distrust. It was the letter which the money-lender had written and sent
from his office at Eldridge Street, and which had been so cruelly
planned to excite and distress the kindly old gentleman, that not only
his lawyer, but his intimate friends, the Van Kurens, had been hastily
summoned. The doctor fearing that the shock might prove serious, if not
fatal, to the venerable patient.
“I am inclined to think, on the whole,” said Mr. Van Kuren, after he had
examined the money-lender’s letter for the twentieth time, “that there
is not a word of truth in what he says, and that this has been written
simply in the hope of bringing about a reconciliation with you. You know
what my opinion of your nephew is and always has been. I told you when
we talked the matter over in Paris that he was not a man to be trusted,
and I was not at all surprised to learn that he had been running his
little pawnshop down on the east side, and, I have no doubt, swindling
every one of the unfortunates who are compelled by their necessities to
deal with him. If I were you, I would throw this letter into the fire,
and dismiss all thought of the matter from my mind. Don’t you agree with
me, sir?” he added, turning to the kindly lawyer, who had been an
attentive listener to his words.
“No, Horace,” said Mr. Dexter, “I am inclined to think that there is
some truth in what my nephew—rascal that he is—has hinted at, and that
brings me to speak of a conversation that I had with your daughter Laura
at the time that we were so much together in Paris. I did not mention
this before, because she regarded it as a secret, and, I suppose, did
not care to have her interest in the matter known.”
Both Mr. Van Kuren and his sister smiled broadly at the thought that
Laura, whom they regarded as a volatile and rather foolish young girl,
should have been able to give their old friend any important or reliable
information on a subject of vital importance to him, and Miss Van Kuren
rejoined: “I wouldn’t pay too much attention to my niece, if I were you,
for she has, like most children of her age, some very romantic and silly
notions.”
“But I assure you,” exclaimed Mr. Dexter, earnestly, “that what she told
me on this occasion made quite an impression on me—an impression which
has been growing stronger and stronger ever since. It was in Paris, one
morning when I called at your apartment, and there was no one there but
Miss Laura. She intimated that she had something of importance to say to
me, and when I encouraged her to go on she told me a story about a young
boy of her acquaintance who, having come up to see me on an errand,
recognized, or fancied that he recognized, the house and grounds as
something that he had seen in his earliest childhood.
“She gave me his address, and I actually wrote him a letter asking him
to give me such information as he could about his family, but I never
received any reply, for it was not long afterwards that I left Paris for
Switzerland and Italy, and subsequently sailed for New York. It is just
possible, therefore, that his letter may be at this very moment
following me about the continent of Europe. I was rather inclined to
believe that there was some grain of truth in the story, because I
remembered the young lad myself quite distinctly, and he had a pleasant,
bright, open face, and did not seem to be the sort of a boy who would
invent a piece of pure fiction and try to palm it off as the truth.”
“Who was the boy? Do you recall his name?” said Mr. Van Kuren.
“Certainly I do. He is employed in the fire department in some capacity,
and his name is Bruce Decker, and there was just enough similarity
between his name and mine—Dexter and Decker—to suggest——”
“Bruce Decker!” interrupted Mr. Van Kuren savagely; “well, I can tell
you from my own personal experience with that young rascal, that he is
quite capable of inventing any story, and of deceiving you with it as
well. And so he took Laura into his confidence, did he? Well, I have no
doubt he answered your letter, and you will be very fortunate if he
doesn’t hunt you up, and establish some sort of a claim on you, before
you realize what he’s doing! Now I’ll tell you my experience with that
bright, honest-looking, open-faced young scamp. He got acquainted with
my children, I think it was by picking Harry up in the road one
afternoon, when he met with an accident, and I asked him up to dinner,
so that I might see for myself, what sort of a boy he was. As you know
quite well, I am very democratic in my ideas, and I don’t want Harry to
grow up with a notion that he’s made of better clay than the boy whose
coat is not quite as good as his. In fact, I have no objection to his
playing with boys in humbler circumstances than himself, providing only
they are decent and honest, and as this Decker lad made a very good
impression on me—for there is no denying that he has a good face and
decent manners—I saw no reason why he should not come to the house now
and then, and I was glad to have Harry go and visit him, when he was
laid up in the hospital. The first thing I knew, the young vagabond had
repaid me by entering into a sly correspondence with Laura, and I
discovered that she had actually been down to the hospital, to call on
him, without saying a word to either her aunt or myself. As you can well
imagine, I put a stop to the intimacy without a moment’s delay, and as I
never heard either of the children mention the boy’s name again, I
concluded that they had dismissed him from their thoughts, as I had from
the house. Now it seems though that he has found some means of
communication with Laura, and has been filling her head with this
romantic story about recognizing your house and grounds. Well, I shall
put a stop to that, I can tell you, and I am very sorry to think that
Laura should disobey me, as she evidently has.”
“My dear Horace,” exclaimed Mr. Dexter, raising himself with some
difficulty as he spoke, “I am very sorry I said anything that will get
your daughter into trouble, and I am sure that what she learned from
this lad she learned from his own lips before you forbade the intimacy.
In fact, if I remember rightly, she said as much to me herself. I still
have the young man’s address, and to-morrow morning, or as soon as my
health will allow it, I will either go to see him or send for him, and
you may be sure that I will learn exactly how much truth there is in
this story that he tells. Meantime, let me beg of you to say nothing to
Miss Laura, for it would really break my heart to think that I had been
the means of getting her into trouble.”
The old gentleman seemed to be so deeply in earnest that both Mr. Van
Kuren and his sister readily promised to accede to his wishes, and Mr.
Van Kuren was even induced to forego the intention he had formed of
going the very next morning to the quarters of the hook and ladder
truck, and lodging a complaint with the chief of the battalion.
It was late when they finished their discussion, much later than they
had thought, and as they arose to take their leave, a servant, coming in
with an armful of wood for the fire, informed them that the snow had
accumulated in such heavy drifts, as to make the roads almost
impassable.
And this information was confirmed by a glance through the window at the
storm which was raging without.
“You must not think of going home to-night!” exclaimed Mr. Dexter. “It
will never do for you in the world, my dear Emma, to think of going out
into such an awful storm as this. No, there are plenty of rooms in the
house, and I will have fires built at once, so that you will be just as
comfortable as you would be at that big hotel you’re stopping at. Not
one of you shall leave the house to-night.”
“But just think of poor little Laura all alone in that great, big
hotel,” exclaimed Miss Van Kuren. “Suppose anything were to happen to
her; why, I would never forgive myself to the last day of my life for
leaving her there. And just fancy a fire breaking out in that place in
the middle of the night! No, I really think that I ought to——”
“You’ll stay where you are, all of you,” put in the hospitable old
gentleman, in a voice that was full of pleasant authority, “and as for
the hotel, it’s warranted strictly fire-proof. And I’m sure Laura is
just as safe there as she would be if you were with her.”
And so it was settled that the Van Kurens and Mr. Dexter’s lawyer should
remain all night. And an hour later the last light was extinguished in
the old mansion, and there was no sound to be heard about it save the
raging of the storm.