“But, Margot, little girl, don’t be so sure. It’s scarcely probable——” began Adrian, compassionately, shrinking from sight of her bitter disappointment, should disappointment come. Alas! it would be almost as great to him, and whether a glad or sorry one he could not yet realize.
“His face! Look at your father’s face. That tells the story. The bonds are there, and ’tis Philip Romeyn’s daughter shall bring them to the light.”
Indeed, the banker’s expression confirmed her faith. Its frenzied eagerness had given place to a satisfied expectation, and a normal color tinged his cheeks. But he still watched intently, saying nothing.
“Catch them, Adrian, catch them! But hold them fast, the horrible, accursed things!”
One after one, stooping, the exultant daughter lifted and flung them out. The folded papers seemingly so worthless but of such value; the little canvas bags of gold; the precious documents and vouchers, hidden from all other men by one unhappy man, in his miserly aberration. The price of fifteen years of agony and shame. Now, fifteen years to be forgotten, and honor restored.
In that far past Philip Romeyn’s story had been simple and it had been true. He had been unaccountably anxious and had risen in the night and gone to the bank. He believed that the safe had not been locked, though he had been assured it should be by Mr. Wadislaw, the only other person who had a key to it. To his surprise he had found the banker in his office, but in dire mishap. He was lying on the floor, unconscious, bleeding from a wound upon his temple. The safe was open, empty. The steel bar which, at night, was padlocked upon it for extra security lay on the floor, beside the senseless man. Mr. Romeyn had picked this up and was standing with it in his hand, horrified and half-stupefied by the shocking affair, when the watchman, discovering light and noise, had entered and found them. It was his hasty, accusing voice which started the cry of robbery and murder; and the circumstances had seemed so aggravated, the circumstantial evidence so strong, that the judge had imposed the heaviest penalty within his power. The hypothesis that Mr. Wadislaw had himself put the contents of the safe away, had even perverted them to his own use; and that he had injured himself by falling against the sharp corner of the safe’s heavy and open door, had been set aside as too trivial for consideration.
The hypothesis had been correct, the circumstantial evidence incorrect; yet in the name of justice, the latter had prevailed.
“Count them! have you counted them, Adrian?”
“Yes, Margot. It is all here. The very sum of which I have so often heard. Thank God, that it is found!”