Heinrich disappeared. Presently he rushed into the room. “They didn’t answer.... I couldn’t make them answer,” he said. “Something’s wrong.”
He disappeared. Von Essen was not pacing up and down the room now; he was running. Cold sweat dripped from his forehead, yet he was hot, burning. His eyes burned; his head was on fire. His daughter could hear the hoarse gasps of his breathing, could see the labored rise and fall of his great chest. His eyes were more bulging than ever, threatening to start from his head, and the whites of them were tinged with red.... It was frenzy that she saw, a frenzy of fear. Herman von Essen felt the noose about his neck.
Once he rushed toward her, a light not of sanity in his eyes, and she cowered back of her table. But he reeled away, muttering hoarsely.
Some one rapped on the door. Von Essen rushed to it, tore it open. Philip’s wife stood there, a bit of paper in her hand.
“Philip said to give this to you, sir. He rushed in, grabbed some papers in a case, and rushed out.... What is it, sir? I’m frightened.... The way he acted!”
“Out!” roared von Essen. “Out!” He waved his hand wildly in her direction, and she fled.
He snatched open the paper, read it, lifted it above his head in a clenched fist, as if he were shaking it in the face of Heaven. He uttered a sound which was not a cry, not a bellow, not a cry of agony. It was compounded of all three—was hoarse, harsh, piercing. It cut to Hildegarde’s heart with a knife of terror. She watched her father, bound to the spot where she stood as if by the power of some magnet. She could not have moved or spoken.
He seemed to snort—to cough. The sounds were hideous. He lunged forward like a blinded lion, his hands clutching first breast, then throat, then temples. As if he had been stricken by mighty ax, he was no longer erect, was groveling on the floor, his breath issuing in stertorous, wheezing gasps.... Then he was still.
Hildegarde moved along the table an inch at a time, resting on her hands, pushing first one foot, then the other, not lifting them from the floor. Her hands crept along the table, clutching it. She tried to hold back, but she was drawn, dragged. Inch by inch she emerged and approached her father. Presently she stood over him, bent slowly, slowly. Dropped to her knees and looked upon his face. It was purple, almost black, distorted, horrible.... She did not touch him, could not have forced herself to touch him ... but she knew he was dead ... dead!
Mechanically she reached for the paper that had stricken down her father, smoothed it open. It was brief: