“Do? Repent in dust and ashes and never let me see your face again!” cried the tortured Madam, who felt as if the hearts of all her ancestors were being consumed in that blazing pile, where so many Waldrons had lived and died and which she had not left, even on her own marriage.
Barnes crept away; nor was it known that ever afterward she did present herself before the mistress she had served for half a century.
There was no saving anything. From the beginning the old house, that was what the firemen called a “tinder box,” burned swiftly; and when Tipkins came back from market, with his well-filled basket on his arm, he found but a heap of smoldering ruins where had been his lifelong home. It seemed to the faithful old man that his heart broke then and there. But was ever a broken heart known to interfere with what an English butler considered his “duty?” In a moment he had found his mistress and stood before her awaiting her orders, almost as quietly as if it had been the giving of a dinner order, merely. There was none of the frantic remorse of poor Barnes and his quietude helped Madam infinitely, though now, to outward appearance, she, too, was calm enough.
“Well, Tipkins, we must get under shelter at once. Find Jessica, order a carriage—I don’t suppose our own is available—and take me to the Fifth Avenue hotel. Ask the druggist, please, if he has a private room where I can remain until the hack arrives.”
The room was found, and the lady conveyed thither; but when Jessica was sought she was not to be discovered. The knowledge of this came to “Forty-niner” first by Tipkins saying, in his most impassive voice yet with quivering lips:
“Just speak to your little lady, Marsh, and tell her the Madam is waiting. We’re to go to a hotel for the present.”
“Eh? Who? What?” demanded Ephraim, still standing a bit apart from the waning crowd, with arms folded and gaze fixed contemplatively upon the smoking walls. “What a pity! What a horrible pity!”
“Yes. Don’t mention it, not yet, please, man. Tell Miss Jessica, right away. I must get Madam to her shelter.”
“Jes-si-ca! My ‘Little Captain,’ you mean? Man alive, isn’t she with Madam?”
“No. She hasn’t seen her, I fancy. Leastwise, she bade me find the child and fetch her. Hurry up. Madam Dalrymple isn’t one to mix with a crowd like this, even under such circumstances. Hurry, now. I’m signalling that hack.”