walked briskly over and opened the door. Sylvester was standing without.
"Come, have they?" inquired Captain Elisha.
"Yes."
"Fetch 'em right in here. Steve, stand over nigher that corner. This way, Caroline, if you please."
He took his niece by the arm and led her to the side of the room not visible from the doorway. She was too astonished to resist, but asked an agitated question.
"What is it?" she cried. "Who is coming?"
"Some friends of yours," was the quiet reply. "Nothin' to be frightened about. Steve, stay where you are."
The boy was greatly excited. "Is it they?" he demanded. "Is it? By gad! Now, Sis, be a sensible girl. If he should try to hedge, you hold him. Hold him! Understand?"
"Steve, be quiet," ordered the captain.... "Ah, Mrs. Dunn, good afternoon, ma'am. Mr. Dunn, good afternoon, sir."
For the pair who, followed by Sylvester, now entered the room were Mrs. Corcoran Dunn and Malcolm.
They were past the sill before Captain Elisha's greeting caused them to turn and see the three already there. Mrs. Dunn, who was in the lead, stopped short in her majestic though creaking march of entrance, and her florid face turned a brighter crimson. Her son, strolling languidly at her heels, started violently and dropped his hat. The lawyer, bringing up in the rear, closed the door and remained standing near it. Caroline uttered an exclamation of surprise. Her brother drew himself haughtily erect. Captain Elisha remained unperturbed and smiling.
"Good afternoon, ma'am," he repeated. "It's been some time since you and I run across each other. I hope you're feelin' pretty smart."
Mrs. Dunn had faced some unpleasant situations in her life and had proved equal to them. Usually, however, she had been prepared beforehand. For this she had not been prepared--as yet. She had come to the offices of Sylvester, Kuhn, and Graves, at the senior partner's request, to be told, as she supposed, the full and final details of the financial disaster threatening the Warren family. If those details should prove the disaster as overwhelming as it appeared, then--well, then, certain disagreeable duties must be performed. But to meet the girl to whom her son was engaged, and whom she and he had carefully avoided meeting until the lawyers should acquaint them with the whole truth--to meet this girl, and her brother, and her guardian, thus unexpectedly and unprepared, was enough to shake the composure and nerve of even such a veteran campaigner as Mrs. M. Corcoran Dunn.
But of the three to whom the meeting was an absolute surprise,--Caroline, Malcolm and herself--she was characteristically the first to regain outward serenity. For a moment she stood nonplused and speechless, but only for a moment. Then she hastened, with outstretched arms, to Caroline and clasped her in affectionate embrace.
"My dear child!" she cried; "my dear girl! I'm _so_ glad to see you! I've thought of you so much! And I pity you so. Poor Malcolm has--Malcolm," sharply, "come here! Don't you see Caroline?"
Malcolm was groping nervously for his hat. He picked it up and obeyed his mother's summons, though with no great eagerness.
"How d'ye do, Caroline," he stammered, confusedly. "I--I--It's a deuce of a surprise to see you down here. The mater and I didn't expect--that is, we scarcely hoped to meet anyone but Sylvester. He sent for us, you know."
He extended his hand. She did not take it.
"Did you get my letter?" she asked, quickly. Mrs. Dunn answered for him.
"Yes, dear, he got it," she said. "The poor fellow was almost crazy. I began to fear for his sanity; I did, indeed. I did not dare trust him out of my sight. Oh, if you could but know how we feel for you and pity you!"
Pity was not what Caroline wanted just then. The word jarred upon her. She avoided the lady's embrace and once more faced the embarrassed Malcolm.
"You got my letter?" she cried. "You _did_?"
"Yes--er--yes, I got it, Caroline. I--by Jove, you know--"
He hesitated, stammered, and looked thoroughly uncomfortable. His mother regarded him wrathfully.
"Well," she snapped, "why don't you go on? Caroline, dear, you really must excuse him. The dear boy is quite overcome."
Captain Elisha stepped forward.
"Excuse me for interruptin', ma'am," he said, addressing the ruffled matron; "but I know you're sort of surprised to see us all here and maybe I'd better explain. Mr. Sylvester told me you and your son had an appointment with him for this afternoon. Now there was something we--or I, anyhow--wanted to talk with you about, so I thought we might as well make one job of it. Sylvester's a pretty busy man, and I know he has other things to attend to; so why not let him go ahead and tell you what you come to hear, and then we can take up the other part by ourselves. He's told me what you wanted to see him about, and it's somethin' we're all interested in, bein' as we're one family--or goin' to be pretty soon. So suppose he just tells you now. Ain't that a good idea?"
Mrs. Dunn looked at the speaker, and then at the lawyer, and seemed to have caught some of her son's embarrassment.
"I--we did have an appointment with Mr. Sylvester," she admitted, reluctantly; "but the business was not important. And," haughtily, "I do not care to discuss it here."
The captain opened his eyes. "Hey?" he exclaimed. "Not important? You surprise me, ma'am. I judged 'twas mighty important. 'Twas about the real size of your father's estate, Caroline," turning to the girl. "I thought Mrs. Dunn and Mr. Malcolm must think 'twas important, for I understand they've been telephonin' and askin' for appointments for the last two days. Why, yes! and they come way down here in all this storm on purpose to talk it over with him. Am I wrong? Ain't that so, ma'am?"
It was so, and Mrs. Dunn could not well deny it. Therefore, she took refuge in a contemptuous silence. The captain nodded.
"As to discussin' it here," he went on with bland innocence, "why, we're all family folks, same as I said, and there ain't any secrets between us on _that_ subject. So suppose we all listen while Mr. Sylvester tells just what he'd have told you and Mr. Malcolm. It's pretty hard to hear; but bad news is soon told. Heave ahead, Mr. Sylvester."
Mrs. Dunn made one more attempt to avoid the crisis she saw was approaching.
"Surely, Caroline," she said testily, "you don't wish your private affairs treated in this public manner. Come, let us go."
She laid a hand on the girl's arm. Captain Elisha quietly interposed.
"No, no," he said. "We'll all stay here. There's nothin' public about it."
Caroline, crimson with mortification, protested indignantly.
"Mr. Sylvester," she said, "it is not necessary to--"
"Excuse me;" her uncle's tone was sharper and more stern; "I think it is. Go on, Sylvester."
The lawyer looked far from comfortable, but he spoke at once and to the point.
"I should have told you and your son just this, Mrs. Dunn," he said. "I intimated it before, and Miss Warren had already written you the essential facts. A new and unexpected development, the nature of which I am not at liberty to disclose now or later, makes Abijah Warren's estate absolutely bankrupt. Not only that, but many thousand dollars in debt. His heirs are left penniless. That is the plain truth, I'm very sorry to say. There is no hope of anything better. You'll forgive me, Miss Warren, I hope, for putting it so bluntly; but I thought it best to avoid every possible misunderstanding."
It was blunt, beyond doubt. Even Captain Elisha winced at the word "penniless." Stephen muttered under his breath and turned his back. Caroline, swaying, put a hand on the table to steady herself. The Dunns looked at each other.