“I must have left the window open,” Hugh said with an effort. He went to the casement. “No,” he said with a puzzled frown. “I did close it—tight.” He crossed to Helen again and stood looking down on her—worried and at sea. She sighed and looked up—almost he could see her mood of exaltation, or emotion, or whatever it was, pass. She spoke to him in a clear, natural voice. “What are we going to do, Hugh? We must do something.”
“I don’t know,” he said hopelessly—and began moving restlessly about the room.
Suddenly Helen sat upright and gave a swift half-frightened look over her shoulder.
“Hugh!”
He came to her at once. “Yes.”
“Don’t think me hysterical—but we don’t know that Daddy couldn’t come back—we can’t be sure. What if he were here, in this room now, trying to tell us something, and we couldn’t understand?”
“Helen, my dearest,” Hugh deprecated.
“Wait,” she whispered, rising slowly. “Wait!” For an instant she stood erect, her slim height carved by the last of the sunshine out of the shadows—trance-like, rigid. But at that sybil-moment Stephen Pryde opened the door softly and came through it. The girl’s taut figure quivered, relaxed, and with a moan—“No—no—I—no—no——” she sank down again and buried her face in her hands.
Richard Bransby come from the dead could scarcely have confounded Stephen more than the sight of Hugh did. For a moment of distraught dismay the elder brother stood supine and irresolute on the threshold. Then forcing himself to face dilemma, and to deal with it, if possible, as such natures do at terribly crucial moments—until they reach their breaking point—he called his brother by name.
Hugh swung round with a glad exclamation of surprise, and held out his hand. Stephen gripped it; and, when he could trust his voice, he said,