The thing was so fine and generous and knightly that
it brought the moisture to his eyes. Presently
he said to himself: “What to do is as plain
as day, now. My Lord Berkeley is dead—let
him stay so. Died creditably, too; that will
make the calamity the easier for my father. And
I don’t have to report to the American Claimant,
now. Yes, nothing could be better than the way
matters have turned out. I have only to furnish
myself with a new name, and take my new start in life
totally untrammeled. Now I breathe my first
breath of real freedom; and how fresh and breezy and
inspiring it is! At last I am a man! a man on
equal terms with my neighbor; and by my manhood; and
by it alone, I shall rise and be seen of the world,
or I shall sink from sight and deserve it. This
is the gladdest day, and the proudest, that ever poured
it’s sun upon my head!”
“God bless my soul, Hawkins!”
The morning paper dropped from the Colonel’s
nerveless-grasp.
“What is it?”
“He’s gone!—the bright, the
young, the gifted, the noblest of his illustrious
race—gone! gone up in flames and unimaginable
glory!”
“Who?”
“My precious, precious young kinsman—Kirkcudbright
Llanover Marjoribanks Sellers Viscount Berkeley, son
and heir of usurping Rossmore.”
“No!”
“It’s true—too true.”
“When?”
“Last night.”
“Where?”
“Right here in Washington; where he arrived
from England last night, the papers say.”
“You don’t say!”
“Hotel burned down.”
“What hotel?”
“The New Gadsby!”
“Oh, my goodness! And have we lost both
of them?”
“Both who?”
“One-Arm Pete.”
“Oh, great guns, I forgot all about him.
Oh, I hope not.”
“Hope! Well, I should say! Oh, we
can’t spare him! We can better afford
to lose a million viscounts than our only support and
stay.”
They searched the paper diligently, and were appalled
to find that a one-armed man had been seen flying
along one of the halls of the hotel in his underclothing
and apparently out of his head with fright, and as
he would listen to no one and persisted in making for
a stairway which would carry him to certain death,
his case was given over as a hopeless one.
“Poor fellow,” sighed Hawkins; “and
he had friends so near. I wish we hadn’t
come away from there—maybe we could have
saved him.”
The earl looked up and said calmly:
“His being dead doesn’t matter.
He was uncertain before. We’ve got him
sure, this time.”
“Got him? How?”
“I will materialize him.”
“Rossmore, don’t—don’t
trifle with me. Do you mean that? Can you
do it?”
“I can do it, just as sure as you are sitting
there. And I will.”
