At the very last moment Mr. Fielding's friends had to start from London without him. He hoped, he said, to return next day.
Alas! next day saw poor Fielding lying dead in his town house.
On that very Christmas night, while his Scottish home was being consumed by fire, he was closeted with his solicitors.
A very great city commercial failure had taken place the day before, and Fielding was a ruined man; nay, it was even more than ordinary ruin, he was poorer that dread night than some of the beggars who shivered on the Thames embankment.
When his servant went to call him in the morning he found that master had never been to bed.
Yonder he sat in the arm-chair near the fire, apparently asleep.
There was nothing in the grate but cold white ashes, and——master would soon be ashes too. He was dead and stiff.
It is well to pass over the events that occurred immediately after the burning of Benshee, and the death of Fielding. Some things are best not told. But even did I desire to describe the grief of poor Frank, and that of his proud—all too proud—mother, words would fail me.
Suffice it to say that both she and he must now depend, for a time at all events, on the charity of friends and relations. And oh, charity is a cold, cold thing at best, but doled out begrudgingly by the hands of uncles, aunts, or cousins, it is colder and more bitter than poison itself.
Financial ruin, death and fire, and all to happen within forty-eight hours! Am I not right in saying it is a world of change and a world of grief?