"Won't you stay to breakfast?" Witherspoon asked. "It will be ready in a few minutes. Hum"—looking at his watch—"ought to have been ready long ago. Everything goes wrong. Can't even get anything to eat. I'll swear I never saw the like."
"I'm much obliged, but I can't stay," Brooks answered.
"Well, I suppose I shall be down to the store some time to-day. If anybody calls to see me, just say that I am at home, standing round begging for something to eat. Good morning."
Henry laughed, and the merchant gave him a strained look. For a moment the millionaire bore a striking likeness to old Andrew, at the time when he declared that the devil had gone wrong. The young man sought to soothe him when Brooks was gone; he apologized for laughing; he said that he keenly felt that there was cause for worry, but that the picture of a Chicago merchant standing about at home begging for his breakfast, while important business awaited him at the store, was enough to crack the thickest crust of solemnity. The merchant's dignity was soon brought back; never was it far beyond his reach. At breakfast he was severe with silence.
Over and over again during the day Henry repeated Richmond's words, "Whom does it benefit" and these words went to bed with him, and as though restless, they turned and tossed themselves upon his mind throughout the night, and like children, they clamored to be taken up at early morning, to be dressed in the many colors of supposition.
CHAPTER XXI.
A HELPLESS OLD WOMAN.
In Kansas City was arrested a suspicious-looking man, who, upon being taken to jail, confessed that his name was Dare Kittymunks and owned that he had killed old man Colton. Thus was ended the search for the murderer, the newspapers said, and the vigilance of the Kansas City police was praised. But it soon transpired that the prisoner had been a street preacher in Topeka at the time when the murder was committed, that he had on that day created a sensation by announcing himself John the Baptist and swearing that all other Johns the Baptist were base impostors. The fellow was taken to an asylum for the insane, and the search for Dave Kittymunks was resumed.
Old Mrs. Colton had not moved a muscle since the night of the murder. She lay looking straight at the ceiling, and in her eyes was an expression that seemed constantly to repeat, "My body is dead, but my mind is alive." Once every week the pastor of her church came to see her. He was an old man, threatened with palsy, and had long ago ceased to find pleasure in the appetites and vanities of this life. He came on Sunday, just before the time for evening services in the church, and kneeling at the old woman's chair, which he placed near her bedside, lifted his shaking voice in prayer. It was a touching sight, one infirmity pleading for another, palsy praying for paralysis; but upon these devotions Brooks began to look with a frown.