Mrs. Halliburton's Troubles

by Mrs. Henry Wood

"Well, I have gone round to my old opinion—that it was some one in the house," returned the sergeant. "But it seems the servants are all on the square. I can't make it out."

"Why on earth should you suppose it to be any one in the house?" questioned Herbert, in considerable wonderment.

"Because I do," was the answer. "We police see and note down what others pass over. There was odds and ends of things at the time that made us infer it; and I can't get it out of my mind."

"It is an impossibility that it could have been a resident of the house," dissented Herbert. "Every one in it is above suspicion."

"Who do you fancy it might have been?" asked the sergeant, abruptly, almost as if he wished to surprise Herbert out of an incautious answer.

But Herbert had nothing to tell him; no suspicion was on his mind to be surprised out of. "If I could fancy it was, or might be, any particular individual, I should come to you and say so, without asking," he replied. "I am as much at fault as you can be. Anthony may have made slight enemies in the town, what with his debts and his temper, and one thing or another; but no enemies of that terrible nature—capable of killing him. I wish I could see cause for a reasonable suspicion," he added with emotion. "I would give my right arm"—stretching it out—"to solve the mystery. As well for my sake as for my dead brother's."

"Well, all I can say is, that I am down on my beam ends," concluded the sergeant.

Meanwhile Henry Ashley was getting little better. He had fallen into a state of utter prostration. Mental anguish had told upon him physically, and his bodily weakness was no doubt great: but he made no effort to rouse himself. He would lie for hours, his eyes half-closed, noticing no one. The medical men said they had seen nothing like it, and Mr. and Mrs. Ashley grew alarmed. The only one to remonstrate with him—he alone held the key to its cause—was William Halliburton.

William's influence over him was very great: he yielded to no one, not even to his father, as he would yield to William. Henry gave the reins to his tongue, and said all sorts of irritating things to William, as he did to every one else. It only masked the deep affection, the lasting friendship, which had taken possession of his heart for William.

"Let me be; let me be," he said to William one day, in answer to a remonstrance that he should rouse himself. "I told you that my life had passed out with her."