To her own satisfaction she did find out, for the girl almost fainted. She didn’t quite lose consciousness, indeed it was not so much a faint as such a desperate effort to regain her poise, that it unnerved her.
“Now, now, Miss Austin, why do you take it so hard? He was a stranger to you, wasn’t he?”
“Yes—yes, of course he was.”
“Why are you so disturbed then?”
“He was such a—such a fine man—” the girl’s stifled sobs impeded her speech.
“Well, somebody killed him.”
At that, Miss Austin seemed turned to stone. “Killed him!” she whispered, in accent of terror.
“Yes—or else he killed himself—they don’t feel sure.” Mrs. Adams, once embarked on the narrative, told all she knew of the circumstances, and in the exciting recital, almost forgot to watch the effect of the tale on her listener.
But this effect was not entirely unnoted. At the partly open door, Old Salt Adams, stood, eavesdropping, but with a kindly, anxious look on his face, that boded no ill to any one.
And he noticed that the girl’s attention was wandering. She was pitifully white, her face drawn and scared, and soon she exclaimed, with a burst of nervous fury, “Stop! please stop! Leave the room, won’t you?”