The Heart of a Mystery

by T. W. Speight

"Certainly not. I had no occasion to do so. I did not even light the gas, but searched for and found my umbrella in the dark. I was not more than two minutes in the office."

"I shall have to keep this office locked up till the jury have visited it," said Mace. "I have no doubt the Coroner will be able to sit this afternoon."

John looked at him for a moment as though he hardly understood his meaning; then following Mace's lead, they all left the office, the door of which was carefully re-locked. They had just got back to the other office when Clement Hazeldine rushed in, white and breathless.

Although lame, Ephraim Judd, with the assistance of his stick, could get over the ground as quickly as most people, and it did not take him many minutes to reach Clement Hazeldine's door. Clem lodged with the widow of the practitioner to whose business he had succeeded. He was still in bed when Ephraim knocked, having been attending a patient till four A.M.; but the summons sent upstairs was so peremptory that he lost no time in coming down. In what words Ephraim told his terrible tidings he never afterwards knew; it is sufficient that they were told.

"What about your brother?" asked Ephraim, as soon as Clement seemed in some measure to be recovering from the shock. "Ought he not to know as soon as possible?"

"Will you please go and tell him, Mr. Judd, while I go down to the Bank? There's my mother and sister, too; but Edward must break the news to them. It seems impossible that it can be true--impossible to. think that I shall never see my poor father alive again! What wretch's hand has done this deed?"

Beecham, the suburb of Ashdown, where Edward Hazeldine lived, was a clear mile and a half away. Ephraim would have hired a fly, but there was none to be had at that early hour. He was far from being easy in his mind as he walked along. It was almost a certainty that during his absence Mr. Mace would discover the blood-stains on the office floor, and Ephraim felt terribly afraid lest, by some means or other, they should be traced back to him. He did not well see how they could be, but his conscience made a coward of him. He had taken away the knife that had cut his hand, and it was now locked up in his trunk at home, while the cut itself, although it had bled a good deal at the time, had not proved a severe one. It was in the palm of the hand, and he had covered it with a little gold-beater's skin to keep the air out. He made a mental note that on no account must Mr. Mace's eyes be permitted to discover the wound.

Edward Hazeldine was an early riser. While breakfasting, he made a point of running through his correspondence. It was a saving of valuable time. He had just sat down to table with his heap of letters before him when Mr. Judd was announced. Edward, who knew that Ephraim was employed at the Bank, leaped in a moment to the conclusion that his visitor could only be the bearer of ill news, and one glance at the latter's grave face was enough to assure him that such was the case.

"My father--what is amiss?" he said, as he started to his feet.

Then Ephraim had to break the same news to him that he had already broken to his brother. Edward's face blanched, and his eyes filled with horror as the tale was told.