[CHAPTER XXIV.]
WHAT HAPPENED IN THE DEAD-CHAMBER.—THE DIRGE OF A WEALTHY PARENT.
Upon that couch lay the ghastly spectacle of a human corse, stiff and cold. It was that of an old man, and I thought at first that he slept; but, upon looking closer, I perceived that he had been dead for at least an hour; and it appeared as if he had died untended by friend or servant, for the bedclothes had been nearly tossed from the bed in his last convulsion, and now lay tumbled about his limbs and the floor, just as they had fallen. His features were greatly distorted, having an expression of rage upon them that was highly disagreeable to look on; yet I had a vague feeling that I had seen him before.
While I was wondering who he could be, I perceived a paper clutched in his right hand; and, taking it to the light, the secret was at once revealed.
It was a letter from my adorable Alicia to her father, dated that very evening, in which she gave him to understand, in the most romantic language in the world, that his opposition to her wishes in relation to her beloved Dawkins had broken her heart—that she could never think of marrying any one else (as if, indeed, the old gentleman ever wished her)—that she could not live without her Dawkins, and accordingly had made up her mind to fly with him afar from parental severity; and concluded by assuring him that "when he read those lines, penned by a grieved and determined, but still dutifully loving heart" (she said nothing of her fingers), "she would be in the arms of a lawful husband." There was appended a postscript, in which she expressed much contrition, hoped he would forgive her, and hinted that she would be of age in two months.
I looked at the old man again, and wondered I had not known him before. It was old Skinner, sure enough, and the secret of his death was readily explained. He had been sick before, and this elegant epistle had finished him—or rather the necessity, so romantically hinted at in the conclusion, of settling, two months thereafter, his guardian's account with her husband, had done his business. I did not suppose the wound in his parental feelings had done him much hurt; but there was more, perhaps, in that, than any one would have thought that knew the old miser.
And there he lay, then the owner of thousands and hundreds of thousands, with none to mourn him—nay, with not even a hand to smooth the bed-robe over his neglected body. He had squandered health, happiness, good name, and perhaps self-approbation, the true riches of man, in the pursuit of the lucre which cannot purchase back again one of these treasures; and notwithstanding which lucre he was now, and indeed had been at his death-hour, no better off than the beggar in his coffin of deal. He had heaped up gold for his children, that they might begrudge him the breath drawn in pain and infirmity, and rejoice in the moment of his death. He had—But why should I moralize over a subject worn just as threadbare as any other. The old fellow was a miser, and met the miser's fate. Nobody accused even his children of loving him; and while I stood by his side, I had a stronger proof of their regard than spoke in the neglected appearance of his deathbed. I had scarce entered the room before I heard, from some of the apartments below, the sounds of mirth and festivity.
They were not to be mistaken; it was plain that some persons were feasting and making merry in one of the old fellow's parlours; and I doubted not they were his two sons, Ralph and Abbot, both of whom had very bad characters, the latter in particular, who was a notorious profligate. They were young men of promise, I had heard; but the avarice of the parent had ruined them. Their education neglected from indifference, or a miserable spirit of parsimony, their minds and morals uncultivated,—the consciousness of their father's wealth and their own golden prospects at his decease stimulated them to excesses, which were perhaps rendered still more agreeable to their imaginations, and certainly more destructive to their weal, by the difficulty of indulging in them, resulting from the niggardliness of their father.
But the reign of denial was now over; the rattle and crash of glasses and vessels in the room below, the tumbling down of chairs and tables, with the sounds of singing, shouting, and laughter, proclaimed with what a lusty lyke-wake the abandoned sons were honouring the memory of their father—with what orgies of Bacchus they were celebrating their own deliverance from restraint. Suddenly the sound of the singing grew louder, as if some door between the revellers and the dead had been opened; and a moment after I perceived, from the increase and direction of the uproar, that the sots were ascending the stairs, and perhaps approaching the chamber of death.