A SINISTER PAIR

“I beg your pardon,” stammered Sweetwater, starting aside and losing on the instant all further disposition to leave the room.

Indeed, he had not the courage to do so, even if he had had the will.  The joint appearance of these two men in this place, and at an hour so far in advance of that which usually saw Mr. Sutherland enter the town, was far too significant in his eyes for him to ignore it.  Had any explanation taken place between them, and had Mr. Sutherland’s integrity triumphed over personal considerations to the point of his bringing Frederick here to confess?

Meanwhile Dr. Talbot had risen with a full and hearty greeting which proved to Sweetwater’s uneasy mind that notwithstanding Knapp’s disquieting reticence no direct suspicion had as yet fallen on the unhappy Frederick.  Then he waited for what Mr. Sutherland had to say, for it was evident he had come there to say something.  Sweetwater waited, too, frozen almost into immobility by the fear that it would be something injudicious, for never had he seen any man so changed as Mr. Sutherland in these last twelve hours, nor did it need a highly penetrating eye to detect that the relations between him and Frederick were strained to a point that made it almost impossible for them to more than assume their old confidential attitude.  Knapp, knowing them but superficially, did not perceive this, but Dr. Talbot was not blind to it, as was shown by the inquiring look he directed towards them both while waiting.

Mr. Sutherland spoke at last.

“Pardon me for interrupting you so early,” said he, with a certain tremble in his voice which Sweetwater quaked to hear.  “For certain reasons, I should be very glad to know, we should be very glad to know, if during your investigations into the cause and manner of Agatha Webb’s death, you have come upon a copy of her will.”

“No.”

Talbot was at once interested, so was Knapp, while Sweetwater withdrew further into his corner in anxious endeavour to hide his blanching cheek.  “We have found nothing.  We do not even know that she has made a will.”

“I ask,” pursued Mr. Sutherland, with a slight glance toward Frederick, who seemed, at least in Sweetwater’s judgment, to have braced himself up to bear this interview unmoved, “because I have not only received intimation that she made such a will, but have even been entrusted with a copy of it as chief executor of the same.  It came to me in a letter from Boston yesterday.  Its contents were a surprise to me.  Frederick, hand me a chair.  These accumulated misfortunes—­for we all suffer under the afflictions which have beset this town—­have made me feel my years.”

Sweetwater drew his breath more freely.  He thought he might understand by this last sentence that Mr. Sutherland had come here for a different cause than he had at first feared.  Frederick, on the contrary, betrayed a failing ability to hide his emotion.  He brought his father a chair, placed it, and was drawing back out of sight when Mr. Sutherland prevented him by a mild command to hand the paper he had brought to the coroner.