She staggered blindly forward, and then, with one piercing shriek, fell to the ground.  In doing so, she struck against her father, who was still standing beside the table.  Awakened suddenly, with that wild cry in his ears, he opened his eyes wide, put out feeble hands, as if to keep something back, and with a strangled cry fell dead on the ’door beside his daughter.  Sal, horror-struck, did not lose her presence of mind, but, snatching the papers off the table, she thrust them into her pocket, and then called aloud for the servants.  But they, already attracted by Madge’s wild cry, came hurrying in, to find Mark Frettlby, the millionaire, lying dead, and his daughter in a faint beside her father’s corpse.

CHAPTER XXXI.

HUSH-MONEY.

As soon as Brian received the telegram which announced the death of Mark Frettlby, he put on his hat, stepped into Calton’s trap, and drove along to the St. Kilda station in Flinders Street with that gentleman.  There Calton dismissed his trap, sending a note to his clerk with the groom, and went down to St. Kilda with Fitzgerald.  On arrival they found the whole house perfectly quiet and orderly, owing to the excellent management of Sal Rawlins.  She had taken the command in everything, and although the servants, knowing her antecedents, were disposed to resent her doing so, yet such were her administrative powers and strong will, that they obeyed her implicitly.  Mark Frettlby’s body had been taken up to his bedroom, Madge had been put to bed, and Dr. Chinston and Brian sent for.  When they arrived they could not help expressing their admiration at the capital way in which Sal Rawlins had managed things.

“She’s a clever girl that,” whispered Calton to Fitzgerald.  “Curious thing she should have taken up her proper position in her father’s house.  Fate is a deal cleverer than we mortals think her.”

Brian was about to reply when Dr. Chinston entered the room.  His face was very grave, and Fitzgerald looked at him in alarm.

“Madge—­Miss Frettlby,” he faltered.

“Is very ill,” replied the doctor; “has an attack of brain fever.  I can’t answer for the consequences yet.”

Brian sat down on the sofa, and stared at the doctor in a dazed sort of way.  Madge dangerously ill—­perhaps dying.  What if she were to die, and he to lose the true-hearted woman who stood so nobly by him in his trouble?

“Cheer up,” said Chinston, patting him on the shoulder; “while there’s life there’s hope, and whatever human aid can do to save her will be done.”

Brian grasped the doctor’s hand in silence, his heart being too full to speak.

“How did Frettlby die?” asked Calton.

“Heart disease,” said Chinston.  “His heart was very much affected, as I discovered a week or so ago.  It appears he was walking in his sleep, and entering the drawing-room, he alarmed Miss Frettlby, who screamed, and must have touched him.  He awoke suddenly, and the natural consequences followed—­he dropped down dead.”