“Avast heavin', Isaiah!” put in Captain Shadrach. “You're way off your course. Zoeth never said that. That's the way I talk, but he don't.”
“He done it this time,” persisted Isaiah. “I turned and looked through the doorway at him and he was standin' in the middle of the kitchen floor. Seems to me he had a piece of white paper in his hand—seem's if he did. And then, afore I could say a word, he kind of groaned and sunk down in—in a pile, as you might say, right on the floor. And I couldn't get him up, nor get him to speak to me, nor nothin'. Yet he must have come to enough to move after I left and to crawl acrost and lean against that chair.”
The horse liniment circular and the Wellmouth Register were there on the kitchen table just where Mr. Hamilton had laid them. There, also, were the two letters addressed to Hamilton and Company. Of the letter which Isaiah seemed to remember as addressed to Zoeth personally, there was no sign.
“Are you sure there was such a letter, Isaiah?” asked Mary.
Mr. Chase was not sure; that is to say, he was not sure more than a minute at a time. The minute following he was inclined to think he might have been mistaken, perhaps it was yesterday or the day before or even last week that his employer received such a letter.
Captain Shadrach lost patience.
“Sure 'twan't last Thanksgivin'?” he demanded. “Are you sure about anything? Are you sure how old you are?”
“No, by godfreys, I ain't!” roared Isaiah in desperation. “I'm so upsot ever since I looked into that kitchen and see the poor soul down on the floor there that—that all I'm sure of is that I ain't sure of nothin.'”
“Well, I don't know's I blame you much, Isaiah,” grunted the Captain. “Anyway, it doesn't make much difference about that letter, so fur as I see, whether there was one or not. What did you want to know for, Mary?”
Mary hesitated. “Why,” she answered, “I—perhaps it is foolish, but the doctor said something about a shock being responsible for this dreadful thing and I didn't know—I thought perhaps there might have been something in that letter which shocked or alarmed Uncle Zoeth. Of course it isn't probable that there was.”