Algernon possessed too much delicacy to ask the girl if Mark treated Mrs. Hurdlestone ill; but whilst groping his way in the dark to his brother’s room, he was strongly tempted to question her more closely on the subject.  The account she had already given him of the unfortunate lady filled his mind with indignation and regret.  At the end of a long gallery the girl suddenly stopped, and pointing to a half-open door, told him that “that was the Squire’s room,” and suddenly disappeared.  The next moment, Algernon was by the sick-bed of his brother.

Not without a slight degree of perturbation he put aside the curtain; Mark had sunk into a kind of stupor; he was not asleep, although his eyes were closed, and his features so rigid and immovable, that at the first glance Algernon drew back, under the impression that he was already dead.

The sound of his brother’s footsteps not only roused the miser to animation, but to an acute sense of suffering.  For some minutes he writhed in dreadful pain, and Algernon had time to examine his ghastly face, and thin attenuated figure.

They had parted in the prime of youthful manhood—­they met in the autumn of life; and the snows of winter had prematurely descended upon the head of the miser.  The wear and tear of evil passions had made such fearful ravages in his once handsome and stern exterior, that his twin brother would have passed him in the streets without recognition.

The spasms at length subsided, and after several ineffectual efforts, Algernon at length spoke.

“Mark, I am here, in compliance with your request; I am very sorry to find you in this sad state; I hope that you may yet recover.”

The sick man rose slowly up in his bed, and shading his eyes with his hand, surveyed his brother with a long and careful gaze, as though he scarcely recognised in the portly figure before him the elegant fashionable young man of former days.  “Algernon! can that be you?”

“Am I so much altered that you do not know me?”

“Humph!  The voice is the voice of Algernon—­but as for the rest, time has paid as little respect to your fine exterior as it has done to mine; but if it has diminished your graces, it has added greatly to your bulk.  One thing, however, it has not taught you, with all its hard teachings.”

“What is that?” said Algernon, with some curiosity.

“To speak the truth!” muttered the miser, falling back upon his pillow.  “You wish for my recovery!—­ha! ha! that is rich—­is good.  Do you think, Algernon, I am such a fool as to believe that?”

“Indeed, I was sincere.”

“You deceive yourself—­the thing is impossible.  Human nature is not so far removed from its original guilt. You wish my life to be prolonged, when you hope to be a gainer by my death.  The thought is really amusing—­so originally philanthropic, but I forgive you, I should do just the same in your place.  Now, sit down if you can find a chair, I have a few words to say to you—­a few painful words.”