CHAPTER X.
A DYING BED.
In a handsome chamber of a handsome house in Birmingham, an old man lay dying. For most of his life he had been engaged in a large wholesale business—had achieved local position, had accumulated moderate wealth. But neither wealth nor position can ensure peace to a death-bed; and the old man lay on his, groaning over the past.
The season was that of mid-winter. Not the winter following the intended removal of Mr. Halliburton from London, as spoken of in the last chapter, but the winter preceding it—for it is necessary to go back a little. A hard, sharp, white day in January: and the fire was piled high in the sick room, and the large flakes of snow piled themselves outside on the window frames and beat against the glass. The room was fitted up with every comfort the most fastidious invalid could desire; and yet, I say, nothing seemed to bring comfort to the invalid lying there. His hands were clenched as in mortal agony; his eyes were apparently watching the falling snow. The eyes saw it not: in reality they were cast back to where his mind was—the past.
What could be troubling him? Was it that loss, only two years ago, by which one-half of his savings had been engulfed? Scarcely. A man dying—as he knew he was—would be unlikely to care about that now. Ample competence had remained to him, and he had neither son nor daughter to inherit. Hark! what is it that he is murmuring between his parched lips, to the accompaniment of his clenched hands?
"I see it all now; I see it all! While we are buoyed up with health and strength, we continue hard, selfish, obstinate in our wickedness. But when death comes, we awake to our error; and death has come to me, and I have awakened to mine. Why did I turn him out like a dog? He had neither kith nor kin, and I sent him adrift on the world, to fight with it or to starve! He was the only child of my sister, and she was gone. She and I were of the same father and mother; we shared the same meals in childhood, the same home, the same play, the same hopes. She wrote to me when she was dying, as I am dying now: 'Richard, should my poor boy be left fatherless—for my husband's health seems to be failing—be his friend and protector for Helen's sake, and may Heaven bless you for it!' And I scoffed at the injunction when the boy offended me, and turned him out. Shall I have to answer for it?"
The last anxious doubt was uttered more audibly than the rest; it escaped from his lips with a groan. A woman who was dozing over the fire started up.
"Did you call, sir?"
"No. Go out and leave me."