"I _am_ distrustful--too much so," answered, in writing, the deaf man.

"A little suspicion soon overspreads the whole nature, and yet, I think, one can be generous even with suspicion. Among the disciples were a traitor, a liar, a coward, and a doubter; but none upbraid the last, poor Thomas, and he is sainted in our faith. Do you know that suspicion made me deaf? Yes; if we mock Nature with distrust, she stops our ears.

Do you not remember what happened to Zacharias, the priest? He would not believe the angel who announced that his wife would soon become a mother, and for his unbelief was stricken dumb!"

The deaf guest had either stumbled into this ill.u.s.tration, or written it with full design. He looked at Agnes, and the pale and purple colors came and went upon her face as she bent her body forward over the table.

Duff Salter arose and spoke with that lost voice, like one in a vacuum, while he folded his tablet.

"Agnes," he said, "it has been cruel to a man of such a sceptical soul as mine to educate him back from the faith he had acquired to the unfaith he had tried to put behind him. Why did you do it? The suppression of the truth is never excusable. The secret you might have scattered with a word, when suspicion started against you, is now diffused through every family and rendezvous in Kensington."

She looked miserable enough, and still received the stab of her guest's magisterial tongue like an affliction from heaven.

"I had also become infected with this imputation," continued Duff Salter. "All things around you looked sinister for a season. A kind Providence has dispelled these black shadows, and I see you now the victim of an immeasurable mistake. Your weakness and another's obstinacy have almost ruined you. I shall save you with a cruel hand; let the remorse be his who hoped to outlive society and its natural suspicions by a mere absence."

"I will not let you upbraid him," spoke Agnes Wilt. "My weakness was the whole mistake."

"Agnes," said the grave, bearded man, "you must walk through Kensington to-morrow with me in the sight of the whole world."

She looked up and around a moment, and staggered toward a sofa, but would have fallen had not Duff Salter caught her in his arms and placed her there with tender strength. He whispered in her ear:

"Courage, little _mother_!"

CHAPTER VIII.

A REAL ROOF-TREE.

Ringing the bell at the low front step of a two-story brick dwelling, Duff Salter was admitted by Mr. Knox Van de Lear, the proprietor, a tall, plain, commonplace man, who scarcely bore one feature of his venerable father. "Come in, Mr. Salter," bellowed Knox, "tea's just a-waitin' for you. Pap's here. You know Cal, certain! This is my good lady, Mrs. Van de Lear. Lottie, put on the oysters and waffles! Don't forgit the catfish. There's nothing like catfish out of the Delaware, Mr. Salter."

"Particularly if they have a corpse or two to flavor them," said Calvin Van de Lear in a low tone.

Mrs. Knox Van de Lear, a fine, large, blonde lady, took the head of the table. She had a sweet, timid voice, quite out of quant.i.ty with her bone and flesh, and her eyelashes seemed to be weak, for they closed together often and in almost regular time, and the delicate lids were quite as noticeable as her bashful blue eyes.

"Lottie," said Rev. Silas Van de Lear, "I came in to-night with a little chill upon me. At my age chills are the tremors from other wings hovering near. Please let me have the first cup of coffee hot."

"Certainly, papa," said the hostess, making haste to fill his cup. "You don't at all feel apprehensive, do you?"

"No," said the old man, with his teeth chattering. "I haven't had apprehensions for long back. Nothing but confidence."

"Oh, pap!" put in Knox Van de Lear, "you'll be a preachin' when I'm a granddaddy. You never mean to die. Eat a waffle!"

"My children," said the old man, "death is over-due with me. It gives me no more concern than the last hour shall give all of us. I had hoped to live for three things: to see my new church raised; to see my son Calvin ready to take my place; to see my neighbor, Miss Wilt, whom I have seen grow up under my eye from childhood, and fair as a lily, brush the dew of scandal from her skirts and resume her place in our church, the handmaid of G.o.d again."

"Amen, old man!" spoke Calvin irreverently, holding up his plate for oysters.

"Why, Cal," exclaimed the hostess, closing her delicately-tinted eyelids till the long lashes rested on the cheek, "why don't you call papa more softly?"

"My son," spoke the little old gentleman between his chatterings, "in the priestly office you must avoid abruptness. Be direct at all important times, but neither familiar nor abrupt. I cannot name for you a model of address like Agnes Wilt."

"Isn't she beautiful!" said Mrs. Knox. "Do you think she can be deceitful, papa?"

"I have no means to pierce the souls of people, Lottie, more than others. I don't believe she is wicked, but I draw that from my reason and human faith. That woman was a pillar of strength in my Sabbath-school. May the Lord bring her forth from the furnace refined by fire, and punish them who may have persecuted her!"

"Cal is going into a decline on her account," said Knox. "I know it by seeing him eat waffles. She refused Cal one day, and he came home and eat all the cold meat in the house."

"Mr. Salter," the hostess said, raising her voice, "you have a beautiful woman for a landlady. Is she well?"

"Very melancholy," said Duff Salter. "Why don't you visit her?"

"Really," said the hostess, "there is so much feeling against Agnes that, considering Papa Van de Lear's position in Kensington, I have been afraid. Agnes is quite too clever for me!"

"I hope she will be," said Duff Salter, relapsing to his coffee.

"He didn't hear what you said, Lot," exclaimed Calvin. "The old man has to guess at what we halloo at him."

"Have you appraised the estate of the late William Zane?" asked the minister, with his bold pulpit voice, which Salter could hear easily.

"Yes," replied the deaf guest. "It comes out strong. It is worth, clear of everything and not including doubtful credits, one hundred and eighty thousand dollars."

"That is the largest estate in Kensington," exclaimed the clergyman.

"I shall release it all within one week to Miss Agnes," said Duff Salter. "You are too old, Mr. Van de Lear, to manage it. I have finished my work as co-executor with you. The third executor is Miss Wilt. With the estate in her hands she will change the tone of public opinion in Kensington, perhaps, and the fugitive heir must return or receive no money from the woman he has injured!"

"I am entirely of your opinion," said Reverend Mr. Van de Lear. "Agnes was independent before; this will make her powerful, and she needs all the power she can get to meet this insensate suburban opinion. When I was a young man, commencing to minister here, I had rivals enough, and deeply sympathize with those who must defend themselves against the embattled gossip of a suburban society."

Mrs. Knox Van de Lear opened and closed her eyes with a saintly sort of resignation.

"I am glad for Agnes," she said. "But I fear the courts will not allow her, suspected as she is, to have the custody of so much wealth that has descended to her through the misfortunes of others, if not by crimes."

"You are right, Lot," said Calvin. "Her little game may be to get a husband as soon as she can, who will resist a trustee's appointment by the courts."

"Can _she_ get a husband, Cal?"

"Oh, yes! She's lightning! There's old Salter, rich as a Jew. She's smart enough to capture him and add all he has to all that was coming to Andrew Zane."

Mr. Salter drew up his napkin and sneezed into it a soft articulation of "Jericho! Jericho!"

"Cal, don't you think you have some chance there yet?" asked Knox Van de Lear. "I hoped you would have won Aggy long ago. It's a better show than I ever had. You see I have to be at work at six o'clock, winter and summer, and stay at the bookbindery all day long, and so it goes the year round."

"Indeed, it is so!" exclaimed the hostess, slowly shutting down her silken lids of pink. "My poor husband goes away from me while I still sleep in the dark of dawn; he only returns at supper."

"Well, haven't you got brother Cal?" asked the bookbinder. "He's better company than I am, Lottie."

"But Calvin is in love with Miss Wilt," said the lady, softly unclosing her eves.

"No," coolly remarked Calvin, "I am not in love with her. You know that, Lottie."

"Well, Calvin, dear, you would be if you thought she was pure and clear of crime."