It was now approaching the end of the week, and still there was no sign
of Morris Thornton, to the intense disappointment of his daughter Kitty,
who was all impatience to see him.
As each day in that week of terror to Francis Eversleigh went past, he
sank further and further into a slough of despond, and became a prey to
deep melancholy. The routine of his office work, with its appeal to
long-established habit, and the pressure to keep up appearances so far
as it was possible, helped him a little during the day; but in the
evenings, when his family were around him, and in the long, broken
nights, when his wife lay asleep by his side, he abandoned himself to
the deepest dejection.
Going to his office each morning, he speculated drearily, with aching
heart, whether this day or the next would see Morris Thornton walk in,
bringing ruin with him. "How am I to meet him?" Eversleigh asked himself
over and over again, but saw no answer.
Silwood had not spoken to him again except on such items of business as
had to be discussed by them together. These consultations would have had
something farcical in them for him if the situation had not been so
wholly tragical. He marvelled at the matter-of-fact way Silwood went
about these and other affairs.
Very quietly and methodically Silwood went on maturing his plans, nor
did he refer to them any more when talking to Eversleigh; but he had
paid another visit in disguise to Douglas Street, Stepney, and had
warned his wife to be ready to move when he gave the word. He had also
intimated, but more plainly, to Williamson, that he would take a holiday
very soon--his reason, he alleged for taking it, being the great heat
which still continued. Never had there been known so hot a July.
Williamson admitted in his thoughts that the reason was an excellent
one, but wondered why Mr. Eversleigh, who continued to look very ill,
did not talk of taking a vacation instead of his partner, who seemed to
be very much in his usual health.
On the Saturday of that week, Cooper Silwood, whose punctuality had
hitherto been invariable, did not appear at the office when half-past
ten came round, and Williamson waited for him in vain for some time. A
little after eleven, however, the head-clerk received a note from him,
saying that he had gone to the Continent, and intended making for the
north of Italy, where he had been some years before. He went on to say
he was not certain how long he would be away, but it would be for two or
three weeks, perhaps a month.
Carefully as Silwood had prepared the way, Williamson could not but be
surprised at the suddenness with which, in the end, his principal had
departed, and naturally his suspicions of there being something wrong
were increased; but they remained indefinite and vague, for he could
fasten on nothing tangible.
In the course of the morning, Francis Eversleigh, for the purpose of
asking Silwood a question, went into the latter's room, and found it
empty. It was evident, too, from the state in which it was, that
Silwood had not been there that day. He at once leapt to the conclusion
that Silwood had gone away--in plain terms, had absconded--an
eventuality for which he was not altogether unprepared, as it had been
part of the scheme Silwood had mooted to him after the confession of the
defalcations, and also on the occasion of their interview at Ivydene.
Still, this might not be the explanation, and Eversleigh, after a few
seconds' thought, put on his hat and walked up to Silwood's private
chambers in Stone Buildings. Here he found the door locked, and a sheet
of paper pinned to it, on which was written, "Out of Town."
His conjecture thus confirmed, it was none the less a terrible shock to
Francis Eversleigh; even though he had anticipated it, it was
nevertheless hard to bear.
"He has left me to stand it all alone," he thought, but even as he said
this to himself, his common sense reasserted itself. "But what will his
flight benefit him? Ultimately he will be hunted down; he cannot escape
the law; no one can."
Then, hardly knowing what he was doing, he tried the door again, pulling
at the handle with all his might, but it was to no purpose. He stood
gazing gloomily at the closed door.
"I have a great mind to have it broken open," he muttered. "I can easily
frame some excuse for doing so--say he has forgotten something. But if I
did have the door opened, what would be the use? What good would it do?
It would not bring him back; it would not bring the money back. No, best
leave it alone."
Moving with slow, halting steps down the stairs, he kept asking himself
the question, "What am I to do now?" His agony of mind was almost beyond
human endurance as this question incessantly hammered on his brain,
obscuring and dulling his powers. Then, in a muddled sort of way, he
began to reason.
First, he might go to the authorities and incriminate himself; but no
one, he told himself, was required to do that; it was too much to expect
any one to do.
Second, he might destroy himself, and so make an end. Was this not the
best course to pursue? With this idea in his mind, he remembered a shop
in the Strand, in the window of which he had seen revolvers for sale.
Why not buy one and be done with it all? "Why not?" he asked himself,
and turned his face towards the Strand. But he had only gone a few paces
when the thought of his wife and children was too poignant to allow him
to proceed further with his desperate purpose, and so he faced about and
returned to New Square, thinking, thinking of what he was to do.
There was only one thing to do, he concluded, and that was to continue
doing his work at the office as best he could till the crash came. It
could not be long in coming, he reflected with indescribable bitterness,
for was not Morris Thornton already overdue?
He had scarcely got seated in his own room when his son Ernest came in,
and remarked that Mr. Silwood had gone for a holiday.
"I had not heard that he intended going," he went on; "in fact, I was
astonished to hear of his taking a holiday just now. Mr. Williamson
tells me he has left for the Continent."
"Yes," said Francis Eversleigh, somewhat vacantly, "he has gone for a
holiday. I suppose I have forgotten to mention to you that he was going
abroad for a while," he continued, pulling himself together. "He has not
had a holiday for some years."
"I see. By-the-way," said Ernest, "who in his absence is to look after
his department?"
"I'll do so myself," observed the other, quietly.
"But, father," objected Ernest, "you are not well enough----"
"Oh, yes, I am," protested Eversleigh. "I'll attend to it myself, my
boy."
"Why not let me do it?"
"I had rather not," answered his father, sharply; "I prefer to do it
myself."
Eversleigh knew very well that it would never do to let any one but
himself look after Silwood's department.
The day of Silwood's disappearance wore to its end; the next day,
Sunday, passed. It saw the lovers at Ivydene much engrossed with
themselves, but not to such an extent as to prevent many comments on the
delay in Morris Thornton's coming, and some surmises as to its cause,
the chief of which was that he was carrying out his idea of giving Kitty
a "surprise"--carrying it a little further than she had expected. Though
she was disappointed, she was not alarmed.
On the Monday of that week, Francis Eversleigh, looking more haggard and
wretched than before, was again at 176, New Square.
"Will Thornton come to-day?" he asked himself, despairingly.
He strove to keep calm and hide his sufferings from the world, but every
moment was torture. Yet Monday went the way of all former Mondays, and
still Morris Thornton did not come. And so it was with Tuesday, and
Wednesday, and Thursday, and Friday, and Saturday; the week was gone,
and Thornton had not appeared!
Pondering this fact, Eversleigh, who remembered what Thornton had said
about his ill-health, was inclined to the conclusion that somewhere on
the road his old friend had had an attack, and had broken down. But, if
this were the case, why had he not sent, or caused to be sent, a message
to the firm or to his daughter? Eversleigh knew she had not heard
anything further from her father, nor had the firm heard from Thornton.
In one sense, the non-appearance of Thornton was a relief to Francis
Eversleigh--it put the day of judgment off; but in another, the
prolonging of the suspense intensified his mental agony.
Thornton's silence was as terrible as it was really inexplicable.
Kitty, who was not aware of her father's serious condition, and hence
could not frame from that circumstance a possible explanation of his not
coming, was greatly perplexed.
At first she felt no fear, and kept saying to herself and to Gilbert--to
whom, of course, she talked of all that was in her heart--that she would
see her father to-morrow or next day; but to-morrow became to-day, and
next day to-morrow, and yet he did not appear. And there was nothing
from him--not a single line!
Gilbert, lover-like, did his utmost to cheer her, saying what was
obviously probable--her father had been unexpectedly delayed, but would
be here very soon, and so on--and he spoke with such cheeriness that
she gained some confidence from his. But as the days sped by, and Morris
Thornton came not nor sent word, her apprehensions increased, and all
Gilbert's loving speeches could not allay them. Gilbert, too, began to
wonder not a little what it all meant.
It at length became evident to him that there was something peculiarly
significant in the non-appearance and silence of Morris Thornton. He
spoke what was in his mind to his father, who, in reply, told him the
only hypothesis he could form was that Thornton had fallen ill at some
point in the course of the journey, though that did not account for
nothing being heard of him. Gilbert now learned for the first time of
the precarious state of Thornton's health. He agreed with his father
that nothing should be said about it to Kitty, as it could not but add
to her anxiety.
But what Gilbert had heard made him comply all the more eagerly with a
suggestion Kitty offered on the next Sunday, when they were talking on
this subject, which temporarily had assumed more importance almost than
their love.
This was that a cablegram should be sent to Vancouver to Morris
Thornton, asking when she was to expect to see him in London.
Gilbert despatched the cablegram for her from the Central Telegraph
Office in the Strand, on his return to town late that evening.
No answer was received by the girl till far on in the afternoon of
Monday.
The first thing she noticed on looking at the reply message was that it
was not signed by her father, but by his local agent.
Then she read the whole cablegram, which ran--
"Your father sailed from New York for Southampton by _St. Louis_, July
21. No further advices. Wallace."
"July 21," said Kitty to herself. "Why, he ought to have been here a
week ago at least."
For it was now Monday, August 9th!
Eighteen days had elapsed since the sailing of the _St. Louis_ from New
York, on July 21st!