"No, everything was in his name."
"He was one of the kind who would keep everything in his own hands."
"Even that ranch doesn't belong to Ted, I hear."
"My, what a tragedy it is!"
There seemed to be no end to the talk about the lost money. Helen sat limply in her chair. The leaden dulness of the dinner-talk, the dead propriety and conventionality of the service, the dishes, the guests, had never before so whelmed her spirit as they did to-night. These good people were stung into unusual animation because a man had died leaving his family not poor, but within sight of poverty. For poverty is the deadliest spectre to haunt the merchant class at their lying down and at their uprising.
When the men came in, murmuring among themselves fragments of the same topic, Helen felt as though she might shriek out or laugh hysterically, and as soon as she could she clutched her husband, just as he was sitting down beside Mrs. Pemberton.
"Take me away, Francis. It's awful," she whispered.
"What's the matter?" he asked in quick concern. "Don't you feel well?"
"Yes, yes, I am all right. No, I am tired. My head aches. Can't we leave? I shall do something silly—come!"
As they got into their carriage, he demanded, "What was the matter?"