“You are soon back,” cried Isabel, lifting
her head. “May I go?”
He sat down and took her hand, shrinking from his
task.
“I wish I could comfort you!” he exclaimed,
in a tone of deep emotion.
Her face turned of a ghastly whiteness—as
white as another’s not far away.
“Tell me the worst,” she breathed.
“I have nothing to tell you but the worst.
May God support you, dear Lady Isabel!”
She turned to hide her face and its misery away from
him, and a low wail of anguish broke from her, telling
its own tale of despair.
The gray dawn of morning was breaking over the world,
advent of another bustling day in life’s history;
but the spirit of William Vane, Earl of Mount Severn,
had soared away from it forever.
THE KEEPERS OF THE DEAD.
Events, between the death of Lord Mount Severn and
his interment, occurred quickly; and to one of them
the reader may feel inclined to demur, as believing
that it could have no foundation in fact, in the actions
of real life, but must be a wild creation of the author’s
brain. He would be wrong. The author is
no more fond of wild creations than the reader.
The circumstance did take place.
The earl died on Friday morning at daylight.
The news spread rapidly. It generally does on
the death of a peer, if he has been of note, whether
good or bad, in the world, and was known in London
before the day was over—the consequence
of which was, that by Saturday morning, early, a shoal
of what the late peer would have called harpies, had
arrived, to surround East Lynne. There were creditors
of all sorts; for small sums and for great, for five
or ten pounds up to five or ten thousand. Some
were civil, some impatient, some loud and rough and
angry; some came to put in executions on the effects,
and some—to arrest the body!
This last act was accomplished cleverly. Two
men, each with a remarkably hooked nose, stole away
from the hubbub of the clamorous, and peering cunningly
about, made their way to the side or tradesman’s
entrance. A kitchen-maid answered their gentle
appeal at the bell.
“Is the coffin come yet?” said they.
“Coffin—no!” was the girl’s
reply. “The shell ain’t here yet.
Mr. Jones didn’t promise that till nine o’clock,
and it haven’t gone eight.”
“It won’t be long,” quoth they;
“its on it’s road. We’ll go
up to his lordship’s room, please, and be getting
ready for it.”
The girl called the butler. “Two men from
Jones’, the undertaker’s, sir,”
announced she. “The shell’s coming
on and they want to go up and make ready for it.”
The butler marshaled them upstairs himself, and introduced
them to the room. “That will do,”
said they, as he was about to enter with them, “we
won’t trouble you to wait.” And closing
the door upon the unsuspicious butler, they took up
their station on either side of the dead, like a couple
of ill-omened mutes. They had placed an arrest
upon the corpse; it was theirs until their claim was
satisfied, and they sat down to thus watch and secure
it. Pleasant occupation!
