"Call your maid
and have her put a dressing-gown around you."
I left soon after. There was little I could do. But I comforted her as
best I could, and said good night. My heart was heavy as I went down
the stairs. For, twist things as I might, it was clear that in some
way the Howell boy was mixed up in the Brice case. Poor little
troubled Lida! Poor distracted boy!
I had a curious experience down-stairs. I had reached the foot of the
staircase and was turning to go back and along the hall to the side
entrance, when I came face to face with Isaac, the old colored man
who had driven the family carriage when I was a child, and whom I had
seen, at intervals since I came back, pottering around Alma's house.
The old man was bent and feeble; he came slowly down the hall, with
a bunch of keys in his hand. I had seen him do the same thing many
times.
He stopped when he saw me, and I shrank back from the light, but he
had seen me. "Miss Bess!" he said. "Foh Gawd's sake, Miss Bess!"
"You are making a mistake, my friend," I said, quivering.
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