Elbridge gave his hat a turn on his hand, before he looked up. "Well, no, he hain't been, yet—"
Adeline made no sound, but she sank down as a column of water sinks.
At the confusion of movements and voices that followed, Suzette came to the door of the library, and looked wonderingly into the hall, where this had happened, with a book clasped over her finger. "What in the world is the matter?" she asked with a sort of sarcastic amaze, at sight of Elbridge lifting something from the floor.
"Don't be alarmed, Miss Suzette," said Mr. Wade, "Your sister seems a little faint, and—"
"It's this sickening heat!" cried the girl, running to the door, and setting it wide. "It suffocates me when I come in from the outside. I'll get some water." She vanished and was back again instantly, stooping over Adeline to wet her forehead and temples. The rush of the cold air began to revive her. She opened her eyes, and Suzette said, severely, "What has come over you, Adeline? Aren't you well?" and as Adeline answered nothing, she went on: "I don't believe she knows where she is. Let us get her into the library on the lounge."
She put her strength with that of the young clergyman, and they carried Adeline to the lounge; Suzette dispatched Elbridge, hanging helplessly about, for some of the women. He sent the parlor-maid, and did not come back.
Adeline kept looking at her sister as if she were afraid of her. When she was recovered sufficiently to speak, she turned her eyes on the clergyman, and said huskily, "Tell her."
"Your sister has had a little fright," he began; and with his gentle eyes on the girl's he went on to deal the pain that priests and physicians must give. "There's the report of a railroad accident in the morning paper, and among the passengers—the missing—was one of the name of Northwick—"
"But father is at the Mills!"
"Your sister had telegraphed before the funeral, to make sure—and word has come that he—isn't there."