"He's a fine, mature-looking, charitable
young man, anyway."
"Its the old Minister Van de Lear's son, Calvin. He's going to succeed
his venerable and pious poppy in Kensington pulpit. They'll let him in."
The door closed when Calvin Van de Lear entered the residence of the
late William Zane. When it reopened he was seen with a handkerchief in
his hand and his hat pulled down over his eyes, as if he had been
weeping.
"Stop! stop! don't be going off that way!" interposed the fat fishwife.
"You said you would tell us the news."
"My friends," replied Calvin Van de Lear, with a look of the greatest
pain, "Andrew Zane has not been heard from. I fear your suspicions are
too true!"
He crossed the street and disappeared into the low and elderly residence
of his parents.
"Alas! alas!" exclaimed a grave and gentle old man. "That Andrew Zane
should not be here to meet a charge like this! But I'll not believe it
till I have prayed with my God."
Within the Zane residence all was as in other houses on funeral eves. In
the front parlor, ready for an inquest or an undertaker, lay the late
master of the place, laid out, and all the visitors departed except his
housekeeper, Agnes, and her friend, "Podge" Byerly. The latter was a
sunny-haired and nimble little lady, under twenty years of age, who
taught in one of the public schools and boarded with her former
school-mate, Agnes Wilt.
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