After that midnight parting the first thing I can recall was the touch
of a gentle hand upon my face. When my eyes opened I saw Hester bending
over me.
“You are at home now, Kendric,” said she. Such a feeling of weakness
came over me that I could not speak. I thought a nail had been driven
into my brain, but the tears that began rolling down my cheeks and the
moans that broke from my lips seemed to loosen it.
Many days passed before I was able to reflect upon this last tragic
episode in my life or to take any thought of the morrow. One evening
I awoke from a deep sleep feeling a new interest in life. There were
people sitting in the room and talking in low tones.
“Has he asked for Rayel yet?” said one of them.
“Not yet,” was the answer.
“Better not let him know about it yet. There's time enough. He'll be
around soon.”
I called to them and they came quickly to my bedside. There were Hester
and Mr. Earl and his good wife, all looking down upon me with smiling
faces.
“You need not be afraid to tell me now. I know that Rayel is dead.”
They made no answer.
“I know he is dead, but tell me how it happened,” I said. “There is no
danger; I am quite strong now.”
Mr. Earl took my hand and told me in a low, calm voice, all he knew of
the tragedy. He only knew, however, that the lamp had exploded and that
Rayel had been horribly burned by the oil.
“I suppose,” said he, “that the lamp was on a table near his bed when it
exploded. In a moment the whole room was afire, and you, no doubt, being
asleep at the time, he lifted you up and ran with you down the stairway
and out of the open door. But in the meantime he had been horribly
burned, and he fell in a faint as soon as he reached the pavement.
Strangely enough you were unconscious for some moments, although you
were not badly burned. Probably it was the smoke.”
Then no one knows, thought I, what really did happen that night. The
lamp must have fallen almost directly upon Rayel's head, and the oil had
no doubt saturated his hair and clothing.
“And the house?” I asked. “Is that--”
“In ashes,” he replied.
Then every trace of that strange event, which no eye save mine had
witnessed, was wiped out forever. The hideous secret had better never be
told.
“If I was not badly burned, tell me why I have been lying ill.”
“Brain fever, my boy,” said he. “Too much excitement, I presume--but
you're out of danger now, and will be on your feet again in a few days.”
Fortunately the latter assurance was rightly spoken. The first day
that brought me strength enough to put on my clothes and walk about the
house, Mr. Earl invited me into the library to talk business. We were
no sooner seated than he unlocked a drawer and handed me a document to
read.
It was a deed of all my father's real and personal property.
“They have both confessed,” said he.
“Confessed what?” I asked, wondering if the secret of my father's death
had come out.
“The conspiracy against your life. There were two accomplices--one Count
de Montalle, formerly a servant of Cobb, and now a convict in America,
and the other a man named Fenlon, who is under arrest. These were the
men who tried to take your life. Fenlon came over on the steamer with
you, I believe.”
“And my stepmother--where is she?”
“Gone to answer for her sins at a higher court,” said he. “Her last
deposition is annexed to the deed. The old hussy ran into the fire like
a miller, and stood there screaming, 'Look at that picture on the
wall! Oh, God! do you see it?' she shouted to the fellow who found her
standing in the smoke and flames. The chap was so excited he really
thought that he did see the picture of a woman holding a knife.”
“That is strange, isn't it?” said I. “Who was the man?”
“A detective,” said he, “whom I hired to watch the house that night. He
heard some disturbance, it seems, and, fearing mischief, he immediately
forced the door open and ran pell-mell into your cousin, noble fellow,
who was then bringing you down-stairs. If he had been one moment later
the woman would have been burned to death, and we would never have got
this deposition. Cobb wouldn't have been the first to weaken, you may be
sure of that. But after she had told the whole story, why, there was no
use in holding out. Badly burned? No, strange to say, she was not badly
burned, but frightened out of her wits. The nervous shock was too much
for her and soon led to fatal results. Cobb will go to prison.”
I made no reply. I could not have found words to express the thoughts
that came trooping through my brain.
“I have to tell you,” he continued, “that your cousin left a will
bequeathing to you his father's house and a number of valuable
paintings.”
I turned away and burning tears of sorrow came to my eyes. It was indeed
a sad inheritance--the earthly part of his great riches--and of little
moment to me. I could not bear to think or speak of it then, and I
begged my friend to hide the will from my sight until time might give me
strength to read it with composure.
One evening in early spring Hester and I were walking along the shore of
the Mediterranean at Marseilles. I had been traveling through southern
Europe since my recovery, accompanied by Mr. and Mrs. Earl. Hester had
recently joined us in this ancient city of Provence. The sun was sinking
below the distant horizon of water, and his shafts, glancing from the
western edge of the sea, shot far into the immeasurable reaches above
us. We stood in silence while the great wall of night loomed into the
zenith, and then fell westward through the luminous slope of heaven. The
broad terrace from which we viewed the scene was quite deserted.
“If it is a hopeless love I cherish, let me know it now, Hester,” I said
as we turned to go. “I cannot wait any longer.”
“You can wait half an hour longer, I am sure,” she said, hurrying me
along. “We will be at home, then.”
Some months after Hester had become my wife we received a call in London
from our old friend, Mr. Murmurtot.
“You have been playing in a great life drama,” said he to Hester, “and
I, too, have had a part in it. Lest you may think that it was the
fool's part, let me tell you that I am the man who arrested the Count de
Montalle.”
“And the man who brought Fenlon to justice?” I asked.
“The same. He confessed within three hours after you were introduced to
him.”
* * * * * * *
Every week my wife and I visit Rayel's grave and strew fresh flowers
upon it. A tall shaft of marble marks the spot where he lies at rest.
His name is graven in the stone, and underneath it are these words: “He
was a man without selfishness or vanity.”
THE END.
End of Project Gutenberg's The Master of Silence, by Irving Bacheller