“Poor old gentleman!” said Marcus, forgetful of all else, and rushing to the side of his venerable friend.  Directing that the windows be opened, Marcus, aided by the boy Bog, bore the senseless form to the fresh, cool air.  The grateful breeze, and a cup of cold water applied to his brow, soon restored the wretched father to a beginning of consciousness.

As he lay there, more dead than alive, in the arms of his two friends, the ingrate son, having lighted a cigar, looked coldly over the shoulders of the bystanders at the senseless figure of his father, and said, in the sweetest voice: 

“Poor old fellow!  He has only himself to blame for kicking up all this row.  I told him it would be too much for his nerves; but he would insist on dragging me up here.  I forgive him from the bottom of my heart.”

The bystanders looked on in amazement at this speech.

The son continued:  “I’m glad to see that he is in good hands.  Upon my word, nothing would give me greater pleasure than to help a little; but I fear that, when the old man came out of it, and saw me over him, he would go off again.  So I guess I had better leave.”

And young Van Quintem sauntered cheerfully out of the room, in company with his four friends from Brown’s.  The coroner had been waiting at the foot of the stairs for them; and the party adjourned to the nearest drinking saloon, when the coroner, overjoyed at having got rid of a tedious and embarrassing case, stood treat for one round.

But who killed the inventor?

The papers and the police, after groping for weeks in search of the answer, turned it over to the solution of Time, with the comforting assurance that MURDER WILL OUT.

BOOK TENTH.

DONE ON BOTH SIDES.

CHAPTER I.

A FISHER OF MEN.

Mr. Augustus Whedell was a gentleman who had been living handsomely for three years on his wits.

There was nothing remarkable in Mr. Whedell’s personal appearance, with the exception of his wig.  It was his fond belief that this wig looked like natural hair; but everybody knew it was a wig across the street.  He also wore a gold double eyeglass, which he handled as effectively as a senorita her fan.  Most of his loans, credits, and extensions, had been obtained by the dexterous manipulation of that eyeglass.

Mr. Whedell twirled the dangerous instrument, and opened and shut it with more than his usual grace, one evening toward the middle of April.  He was about to broach a disagreeable subject to his daughter, who, blooming, and exquisitely dressed, sat by the fire and yawned.

“My dear Clementina, you are now twenty years old, and ought to be married.  Delays are dangerous.  What do you think of Chiffield?”

Mr. Whedell spoke bluntly, and to the point, because he was addressing his own daughter, and also because short speeches suited his natural languor.