“It has come this minute,” she said, watching him as he sat down before his desk, adjusted his spectacles, and tore open the envelope. If only Frithiof could send news that would cheer him! If only some little ray of brightness would come to lighten that dark day! She had so persuaded herself that the message must be from Frithiof that the thought of the business anxieties had become for the time quite subservient. The telegram was a long one. “How extravagant that boy is!” she thought to herself. “Why, it would have been enough if he had just put ‘All right.’” Then a sudden cry broke from her, for her father had bowed his head on his desk like a man who is overwhelmed. “Father, father!” she cried, “oh! what is the matter?” For a minute or two neither spoke nor moved. At last, with an effort, he raised himself. He looked up at her with a face of fixed despair, with eyes whose anguish wrung her heart. “Sigrid,” he said, in a voice unlike his own, “they have taken the agency from me. I am bankrupt!” She put her hand in his, too much stunned to speak. “Poor children!” he moaned. “Ah! my God! my God! Why—?” The sentence was never ended. He fell heavily forward: whether he was dead or only fainting she could not tell. She rushed to the door calling for help, and the servants came hurrying to the study. They helped to move their master to the sofa, and Sigrid found a sort of comfort in the assurances of her old nurse that it was nothing but a paralytic seizure, that he would soon revive. The good old soul knew nothing, nor was she so hopeful as she seemed, but her words helped Sigrid to keep up; she believed them in the unreasoning sort of way in which those in trouble always do catch at the slightest hope held out to them. “I will send Olga for the doctor,” she said breathlessly. “Ay, and for your uncle, too,” said the nurse. “He’s your own mother’s brother, and ought to be here.” “Perhaps,” said Sigrid hesitatingly. “Yes, Olga, go to Herr Grönvold’s house and just tell them of my father’s illness. But first for the doctor—as quick as you can.” There followed a miserable time of waiting and suspense. Herr Falck was still perfectly unconscious; there were signs of shock about his face, which was pale and rigid, the eyelids closed, the head turned to one side. Sigrid took his cold hand in hers, and sat with her fingers on the pulse; she could just feel it, but it was very feeble and very rapid. Thus they waited till the doctor came. He was an old friend, and Sigrid felt almost at rest when she had told him all he wanted to know as to the beginning of the attack and the cause. “You had better send for your brother at once,” he said. “I suppose he will be at the office?” “Oh, no!” she said, trembling. “Frithiof is in England. But we will telegraph to him to come home.” “My poor child,” said the old doctor kindly, “if he is in England it would be of no possible use; he would not be in time.”