THE STRANGER IN THE LIBRARY.
Edward was up early and abroad for exercise. Despite his gloom he had
slept fairly well and had awakened but once. But that once! He could not
rid himself of the memory of the little picture and it had served him a
queer trick. He had simply found himself lying with open eyes and
staring at the woman herself; it was the same face, but now anxious and
harassed. He was not superstitious and this was clearly an illusion; he
rubbed his eyes deliberately and looked again. The figure had
disappeared. But the mind that entertains such fancies needs
something--ozone and exercise, he thought; and so he covered the hills
with his rapid pace and found himself an hour later in the city and with
an appetite.
The day passed in the arrangement of those minor requirements when large
estates descend to new owners. There was an accounting, an examination
of records. Judge Eldridge gave him assistance everywhere, but there was
no time for private and past histories. In passing he dropped in at
Barksdale's office and left a card.
One of the distinctly marked features of the day was his meeting with a
lawyer, Amos Royson by name. This man held a druggist's claim of several
hundred dollars against the estate of John Morgan for articles purchased
by Rita Morgan, the charges made upon verbal authority from the
deceased. John Morgan had been absent many months just previous to his
death and the account had not been presented.
Edward was surprised to find, upon entering this office, that the lawyer
was the man who had collided with Montjoy's horse the night before.
Royson saluted him coldly but politely and produced the account already
sworn to and ready for filing. It had been withheld at Eldridge's
request. As Edward ran his eye over the list he saw that chemicals had
been bought at wholesale, and with them had been sent one or two
expensive articles belonging to a chemical laboratory. Just what use
Rita Morgan might have for such things he could not imagine. He was
about to say that he would inquire into the account when he saw that
Royson, with a sardonic smile upon his face, was watching him. He had a
distinct impression that antipathy to the man was stirring within him;
he was about to pay the account and rid himself of the necessity of any
further dealings with the man, when, angered by the impudent, irritating
manner, he decided otherwise.
"Have you ever shown this account to Rita Morgan?"
"Oh, yes!"
"And she pronounced it correct, I suppose?"
"She did not examine it; she said that you would pay it now that John
Morgan is dead."
"If the account is a just charge upon the Morgan estate I certainly
will," said Morgan, pocketing the written statement.
"I think after you examine into the matter it will be paid," said
Royson, confidently. Edward thought long upon the man's manner and the
circumstance, but could make nothing out of them. He would see Rita, and
with that resolution he let the incident pass from his mind.
The shadows were falling when he returned to take his first meal in his
new home. He descended to the dining-room to find it lighted by the
fifty or more jets in the large gilt chandeliers. The apartment
literally blazed with light. The sensation under the circumstances was
agreeable, and in better spirits he took the single seat provided. Here,
as afterward ascertained, had been the lawyer's one point of contact
with the social world, and it was here that he had been accustomed, at
intervals varying from weeks to years, to entertain his city
acquaintances.
The room was not American but continental from its Louvre ceiling of
white and gold to its niched half life-size statuary and pictures of
fishing and hunting scenes in gilded frames. But the foreign effects
ended in this room. Outside all else was American.
Edward was silently served by the butler and was pleased to find his
dinner first class in every respect. Then came a box of choice cigars
upon a silver tray.
Passing into the library, he seated himself by the reading light near
the little side table where a leather chair had been placed, and sought
diversion in the papers; but, alas, the European finds but little of
home affairs in one parliament, a regatta, a horse race, a German-army
review, a social sensation--these were all.
He turned from the papers; the truth is the one great overwhelming fact
at that moment was that he, a wanderer all of his life, without family
or parents, or knowledge of them, had suddenly been transplanted among a
strange people and made the master of a household and a vast fortune. On
this occasion, as ever since entering the house, he could not rid
himself of a suggestion so indefinite as to belong to the region of
subconsciousness that he was an interloper, an inferior, and that
jealous, unseen eyes were watching him. The room seemed haunted by an
unutterable protest. He was not aware then that this is a peculiarity of
all old houses.
Something like an oppression seized upon him and he was wondering if
this should continue, would it be possible for him to endure the
situation long? Upstairs was the little desk, the keys to which he held,
and in it information that would lay bare the secret of his life and
reveal the mystery of years ago; which would give him the same chance
for happiness that other men have. All that was left now for him to do
was to ascend the stairs, open the desk and read. He had put it off for
a quiet and convenient moment, and that time had come.
But what was contained in that desk? He remembered Hamlet and understood
his doubts for the first time. It was the gravity of this doubt, the
weight of the revelation to come that caused him to smoke on, cigar
after cigar, in silence. It flashed upon him that it might be wiser to
take his fortune and return to Europe as he was. But as he smoked his
mind rejected the suggestion as cowardly.
It was at this stage in his reverie that Edward Morgan received the
severest shock of his life. Without having noticed any sound or
movement, he presently became conscious that some one besides himself
was in the room, and instantly, almost, his eyes rested on a man
standing before the open bookcase. It was a figure, slender and tall,
clad in light, well-worn trousers, and short smoking jacket. The face
turned from him was lifted toward the shelves, and long black hair fell
in shining masses upon his shoulders. The right hand extended upward,
touching first one, then another of the volumes as it searched along the
line, was white as paraffine and slender as a girl's and a fold of
linen, edged with lace, lay upon the wrists. All the other details of
the figure were lost in the shadow. While thus Edward sat, his brain
whirling and eyes riveted upon the strange figure, the visitor paused in
his search as if in doubt, turned his profile and listened, then faced
about suddenly and the two men gazed into each other's eyes.
Edward had gained his first full view of the visitor's face. Had it been
withdrawn from him in an instant he could at any time thereafter have
reproduced it in every line, so vividly was it impressed upon his
memory. It was new, and yet strangely, dimly, vaguely familiar! It was
oval, pale and lighted by eyes with enormously distended pupils. It
seemed to him that they were not mirrors at that moment, but
scintillating lights burning within their cavities.
But the first effect, startling though it was, passed away immediately;
nothing could have withstood the gentle pleading entreaty that lurked in
all the face lines; an expression childish and girlish. The stranger
gazed for a moment only on the man sitting bolt upright now in his
chair, his hands clutching the arms, and then went quickly forward.
"You are Edward Morgan?" he said, encouragingly. "My uncle told me you
would come some day." The deep, indrawn breath that had made the new
master's figure rigid for the moment escaped back slowly between the
parted lips. He was ashamed that he should have been so startled.
"Yes," he said, presently, "I am Edward Morgan. And you are----"
"Gerald Morgan. But I must say good-bye now. I have a matter of upmost
importance to conclude." He smiled again, returned to the shelves and
this time without hesitation selected a volume and passed out toward the
dining-room.
A faint odor of burning material attracted Edward's attention. He looked
for his cigar; it lay upon the matting, in a circle as large as his hat.
He must have sat there watching the door for fifteen minutes after the
singular visitor had passed through. He stamped out the creeping circle
of fire and rang the bell. The octoroon entered and stood waiting, her
eyes cast down.
"A young man came here a few minutes since and went out through that
door," said he, with difficulty suppressing his excitement: "who is he?"
She looked to him astonished.
"Why, that was Mr. Gerald, sir. Don't you know of him? Mr. Gerald
Morgan?"
"Absolutely nothing. I have never seen him before nor heard of him--no
mention of him has been made in my presence." The woman was clearly
amazed.
"Is it possible! Your uncle never wrote you about Gerald Morgan--the
lawyers have never told you?"
"No one has told me, I say; the man is as new to me as if he had dropped
from the clouds."
She thought a moment. "He must have left papers----"
"Oh!" exclaimed Edward, starting suddenly; "I have not read the papers!
I see! I see!"
"You will find it there," she said, relieved. "I thought you knew
already. It did not occur to me to tell you about him, sir! We have
grown used to not speaking of him. He never goes out anywhere now."
Edward was puzzled and then an explanation flashed upon him.
"He is insane!" he exclaimed.
"Oh, no, sir! But he has always been delicate--not like other children;
and then the medicine they gave him when he had the pains and was a
baby--he has been obliged to keep it up. It is the morphine and opium,
sir, that has changed him." Edward nodded his head; the explanation was
sufficient.
"He has lived here a long time, I presume?"
"Yes, sir. He smokes and reads and paints and does many curious things,
but he never goes out. Sometimes he walks about the place, but generally
at night; and once or twice in the last ten years he has gone down-town,
but it excites him too much and he is apt to die away."
"Die away?"
"Yes, sir; the attacks come on him at any time, and so we let him live
on as he wants to and no one sees him. He cannot bear strangers, but he
is not insane, sir. One trouble is, he knows more than his head can
hold--he studies too much." She said this very tenderly and her voice
trembled a little as she finished and turned her face to work nervously.
"You have not told me who he is."
"I do not know, sir," and then she added: "He was a baby when I came,
and I have done my best by him." She did not meet his eyes. Her
suffering and embarrassment touched Edward.
"I will read the papers," he said, gently; "they will tell me all."
Taking this as a dismissal the woman withdrew.