Jane leaned over the banisters, called to one of the servants, and dropping the letter to the floor below, said: 

“Take that to Captain Holt’s.  When he comes bring him upstairs here into my sitting-room.”

Before the servant could reply there came a knock at the front door.  Jane knew its sound—­it was Doctor John’s.  Leaning far over, grasping the top rail of the banisters to steady herself, she said to the servant in a low, restrained voice: 

“If that is Dr. Cavendish, please say to him that Martha is just home from Trenton, greatly fatigued, and I beg him to excuse me.  When the doctor has driven away, you can take the letter.”

She kept her grasp on the hand-rail until she heard the tones of his voice through the open hall door and caught the note of sorrow that tinged them.

“Oh, I’m so sorry!  Poor Martha!” she heard him say.  “She is getting too old to go about alone.  Please tell Miss Jane she must not hesitate to send for me if I can be of the slightest service.”  Then she re-entered the room where Martha lay and closed the door.

Another and louder knock now broke the stillness of the chamber and checked the sobs of the nurse; Captain Holt had met Jane’s servant as he was passing the gate.  He stopped for an instant in the hall, slipped off his coat, and walked straight upstairs, humming a tune as he came.  Jane heard his firm tread, opened the door of their room, and she and Martha crossed the hall to a smaller apartment where Jane always attended to the business affairs of the house.  The captain’s face was wreathed in a broad smile as he extended his hand to Jane in welcome.

“It’s lucky ye caught me, Miss Jane.  I was just goin’ out, and in a minute I’d been gone for the night.  Hello, Mother Martha!  I thought you’d gone to Trenton.”

The two women made no reply to his cheery salutation, except to motion him to a seat.  Then Jane closed the door and turned the key in the lock.

When the captain emerged from the chamber he stepped out alone.  His color was gone, his eyes flashing, his jaw tight set.  About his mouth there hovered a savage, almost brutal look, the look of a bulldog who bares his teeth before he tears and strangles —­a look his men knew when someone of them purposely disobeyed his orders.  For a moment he stood as if dazed.  All he remembered clearly was the white, drawn face of a woman gazing at him with staring, tear-drenched eyes, the slow dropping of words that blistered as they fell, and the figure of the nurse wringing her hands and moaning:  “Oh, I told ye so!  I told ye so!  Why didn’t ye listen?” With it came the pain of some sudden blow that deadened his brain and stilled his heart.

With a strong effort, like one throwing off a stupor, he raised his head, braced his shoulders, and strode firmly along the corridor and down the stairs on his way to the front door.  Catching up his coat, he threw it about him, pulled his hat on, with a jerk, slamming the front door, plunged along through the dry leaves that covered the path, and so on out to the main road.  Once beyond the gate he hesitated, looked up and down, turned to the right and then to the left, as if in doubt, and lunged forward in the direction of the tavern.