"Margie," said the feeble voice, "pray for me, that peace may come."
She looked at Archer, hesitated a moment, then knelt by the bedside. He stood silent, and then, urged by some uncontrollable impulse, he knelt by her side.
The girlish voice, broken, but sweet as music, went up to Heaven in a petition so fervent, so simple, that God heard and answered. The peace she asked for the dying man came.
Her pleading ceased. Mr. Trevlyn lay quiet, his countenance serene and hopeful. His lips moved, they bent over him, and caught the name of "Caroline."
Trevlyn's hand sought Margie's and she did not repulse him. They stood together silently, looking at the white face on the pillows.
"He is dead!" Archie said, softly: "God rest him!"
After the funeral of John Trevlyn, his last will and testament was read. It created a great deal of surprise when it was known that all the vast possessions of the old man were bequeathed to his grandson—his sole relative—whom he had despised and denied almost to the day of his death. In fact, not a half-dozen persons in the city were aware of the fact that there existed any tie of relationship between John Trevlyn, the miser, and Archer Trevlyn, the head clerk of Belgrade and Company.
Arch's good fortune did not change him a particle. He gave less time to business, it is true, but he spent it in hard study. His early education had been defective, and he was doing his best to remedy the lack.
Early in the autumn following the death of his grandfather, he went to Europe, and after the lapse of a year, returned again to New York. The second day after his arrival, he went out to Harrison Park. Margie had passed the summer there, with an old friend of her mother for company, he was told, and would not come back to the city before December.