"Henry is not guilty," he said calmly.
He turned with a quick gesture and thrust the envelope into the flame of one of the candles; but Helen sprang forward and caught away the blazing packet and smothered the flame between her hands.
"We will keep the proof," she said in a tone of triumph; and I knew then how completely she had believed in her father.
"I don't know what is in that packet," said Gillespie slowly, speaking for the first time. "It has never been opened. My lawyer told me that father had sworn to a statement about the trouble with Holbrook Brothers and placed it with the notes. My father was a peculiar man in some ways," continued Gillespie, embarrassed by the attention that was now riveted upon him. "His lawyer told me that I was to open that package—before—before marrying into"—and he grew red and stammered helplessly, with his eyes on the floor—"before marrying into the Holbrook family. I gave up that packet"—and he hesitated, coloring, and turning from Helen to Rosalind—"by mistake. But it's mine, and I demand it now."
"I wish Aunt Pat to open the envelope," said Rosalind, very white.
Henry turned a look of appeal upon his brother; but Miss Pat took the envelope from Helen and tore it open; and we stood by as though we waited for death or watched earth fall upon a grave. She bent down to one of the candles nearest her and took out the notes, which were wrapped in a sheet of legal cap. A red seal brightened in the light, and we heard the slight rattle of the paper in her tremulous fingers as she read. Suddenly a tear flashed upon the white sheet. When she had quite finished she gathered Gillespie's statement and the notes in her hand and turned and gave them to Henry; but she did not speak to him or meet his eyes. She crossed to where Arthur stood beside me, his head bowed, and as she advanced he turned away; but her arms stole over his shoulders and she said "Arthur" once, and again very softly.
"I think," she said, turning toward us all, with her sweet dignity, her brave air, that touched me as at first and always, beyond any words of mine to describe, but strong and beautiful and sweet and thrilling through me now, like bugles blown at dawn; "I think that we do well, Arthur, to give Henry his money."
And now it was Arthur's voice that rose in the shop; and it seemed that he spoke of his brother as of one who was afar off. We listened with painful intentness to this man who had suffered much and given much, and who still, in his simple heart, asked no praise for what he had done.
"He was so strong, and I was weak; and I did for him what I could. And what I gave, I gave freely, for it is not often in this world that the weak may help the strong. He had the gifts, Pat, that I had not, and troops of friends; and he had ambitions that in my weakness I was not capable of; so I had not much to give. But what I had, Pat, I gave to him; I went to Gillespie and confessed; I took the blame; and I came here and worked with my hands—with my hands—" And he extended them as though the proof were asked; and kept repeating, between, his sobs, "With my hands."