“Good-night,” cried Ogden, from the bottom of the stairs; and Quackinboss re-entered his chamber and banged the door after him, muttering something to himself about Lexington and Concord, Columbus and Quincy Adams.
CHAPTER XXIII. BROKEN TIES
It was a sorrowful morning at the Villa Caprini on the 22d of November. Agincourt had come to take his last farewell of his kind friends, half heart-broken that he was not permitted even to see poor Layton before he went. Quackinbose, however, was obdurate on the point, and would suffer no one to pass the sick man's door. Mr. Ogden sat in the carriage as the boy dashed hurriedly into the house to say “Good-bye.” Room after room he searched in vain. No one to be met with. What could it mean?—the drawing-room, the library, all empty!
“Are they all out, Fenton?” cried he, at last.
“No, my Lord, Sir William was here a moment since, Miss Leslie is in her room, and Mrs. Morris, I think, is in the garden.”
To the garden he hurried off at once, and just caught sight of Mrs. Morris and Clara, as, side by side, they turned the angle of an alley.
“At last!” cried he, as he came up with them. “At last I have found some one. Here have I been this half-hour in search of you all, over house and grounds. Why, what's the matter?—what makes you look so grave?”
“Don't you know?—haven't you heard?” cried Mrs. Morris, with a sigh.
“Heard what?”