Miss Thusa’s strength was slowly, gently wasting. Disease had struck her at first like a sharp poignard, but life flowed away from the wound without much after suffering. The greater part of the time she lay in a comatose state, from which it was difficult to rouse her.
Arthur sat by the fire, with a book in his hand, which at times seemed deeply to interest him, and at others, he dropped it in his lap, and gazing intently into the glowing coals, appeared absorbed in the mysteries of thought.
About midnight, when reverie had deepened into slumber, he was startled by a low knock at the door. He had not fastened it as elaborately as Helen had done, and quickly and noiselessly opening it, he demanded who was there. It was a young boy, bearing him a note from the family he had visited the preceding night. His patient was attacked with some very alarming symptoms, and begged his immediate attendance. Having wakened the woman and commissioned her to watch during his absence, Arthur departed, surprised at the unexpected summons, as he had seen the patient at twilight, who then appeared in a fair way of recovery. His surprise was still greater, when arriving at the house he found that no summons had been sent for him, no note written, but the whole household were wrapped in peaceful slumbers. The note, which he carried in his pocket, was pronounced a forgery, and must have been written with some dark and evil design. But what could it be? Who could wish to draw him away from that poor, lone cottage, that poor sick, dying woman? It was strange, inexplicable.
Mr. Mason, the gentleman in whose name the note had been written, and who fortunately happened to be the sheriff of the county, insisted upon accompanying him back to the cottage, and aiding him to discover its mysterious purpose. It might be a silly plot of some silly boy, but that did not seem at all probable, as Arthur was so universally respected and beloved—and such was the dignity and affability of his character, that no one would think of playing upon him a foolish and insulting trick.
The distance was not great, and they walked with rapid footsteps over the crisp and frozen ground. Around the cabin, the snow formed a thick carpet, which, lying in shade, had not been glazed, like the general surface of the landscape. Their steps did not resound on this white covering, and instead of crossing the stile in front of the cabin, they vaulted over the fence and approached the door by a side path. The moment Arthur laid his hand upon the latch he knew some one had entered the house during his absence, for he had closed the door, and now it was ajar. With one bound he cleared the passage, and Mr. Mason, who was a tall and strong man, was not left much in the rear. The inner door was not latched, and opened at the touch. The current of air which rushed in with their sudden entrance rolled into the chimney, and the fire flashed up and roared, illuminating every object within. Near the centre of the room stood a man, wrapped in a dark cloak that completely concealed his figure, a dark mask covering his face, and a fur cap pulled deep over his forehead. He stood by the side of Miss Thusa’s wheel, which presented the appearance of a ruin, with its brazen bands wrenched asunder, and its fragments strewed upon the floor. He was evidently arrested in the act of destruction, for one hand grasped the distaff, the other clinched something which he sought to conceal in the folds of his cloak.
Miss Thusa, partly raised on her elbow, which shook and trembled from the weight it supported, was gazing with impotent despair on her dismembered wheel. A dim fire quivered in her sunken eyes, and her sharpened and prominent features were made still more ghastly by the opaque frame-work of white linen that surrounded them. She was uttering faint and broken ejaculations.
“Monster—robber!—my treasure! Take the gold—take it, but spare my wheel! Poor Helen! I gave it to her! Poor child! It’s she you are robbing, not me! Oh, my God! my heart-strings are breaking! My wheel, that I loved like a human being! Lord, Lord, have mercy upon me!”
These piteous exclamations met the ear of Arthur as he entered the room, and roused all the latent wrath of his nature. He forgot every thing but the dark, masked figure which, gathering up its cloak, sprang towards the door, with the intention of escaping, but an iron grasp held it back. Seldom, indeed, were the strong but subdued passions of Arthur Hazleton suffered to master him, but now they had the ascendency. He never thought of calling on Mr. Mason to assist him quietly in securing the robber, as he might have done, but yielding to an irresistible impulse of vengeance, he grappled fiercely with the mask, who writhed and struggled in his unclinching hold. Something fell rattling on the floor, and continued to rattle as the strife went on. Mr. Mason, knowing that by virtue of his authority he could arrest the offender at once, looked on with that strange pleasure which men feel in witnessing scenes of conflict. He was astonished at the transformation of the young doctor. He had always seen him so calm and gentle in the chamber of sickness, so peaceful in his intercourse with his fellow-men, that he did not know the lamb could be thus changed into the lion.
Arthur had now effected his object, in unmasking and uncloaking his antagonist, and he found himself face to face with—Bryant Clinton. The young men stood gazing at each other for a few moments in perfect silence. They were both of an ashy paleness, and their eyes glittered under the shadow of their darkened brows. But Clinton could not long sustain that steadfast, victor glance. His own wavered and fell, and the blood swept over his face in a reddening wave.
“Let me go,” said he, in a low, husky voice, “I am in your power; but be magnanimous and release me. I throw myself on your generosity, not your justice.”