"Mr. Roon was lookin' for a place to bring his daughter who has consumption. He didn't want to take her to a reg'lar consumptive community, he said, an' so he was lookin' for a quiet place where she wouldn't be associatin' with lungers all the time. Some big doctor in New York told him to come up here an' look around. That was his business, Mr. Barnes, an' I guess you'd call it respectable, wouldn't you?" "Perfectly. But why should he be troubled by my presence here if--" Miss Thackeray put an end to the discussion in a most effectual manner. "Oh, for the Lord's sake, cut it out! Wait till he's dead, can't you?" she whispered fiercely. "You've got all the time in the world to talk, and he hasn't more than ten minutes left to breathe unless that rube doctor gets here pretty soon. If you've GOT to settle the question right away, at least have the decency to go out of this room." Barnes flushed to the roots of his hair. Jones was aghast, dumb with surprise and anger. "You are right, Miss Thackeray," said the former, deeply mortified. "This is not the time nor the place to----" "He can't understand a word we say," said Putnam Jones loudly. "You better get out of here yourself, young woman. This is a job for men, not--" "I think he's going now," she whispered in an awe-struck voice. "Keep still, all of you. Is he breathing, Mr. Barnes? That awful cough just now seemed to--" "Come away, please," said Barnes, taking her gently by the arm. "I--I believe that was the end. Don't stay here, Miss Thackeray. Dillingford, will you be good enough to escort Miss--" "I've never seen any one die before," she said in a low, tense voice. Her eyes were fixed on the still face. "Why--why, how tightly he holds my hand! I can't get it away--he must be alive, Mr. Barnes. Where is that silly doctor?" Barnes unclasped the rigid fingers of the man called Andrew Paul, and, shaking his head sadly, drew her away from the improvised bier. He and the shivering Mr. Dillingford conducted her to the dining-room, where a single kerosene lamp gave out a feeble, rather ghastly light. The tall Bacon followed, the upper part of his person enveloped in the blanket Putnam Jones had hastily snatched from the mattress before it was slipped under the dying man. Several of the women of the house, including the wife of the landlord, clogged the little entrance hall, chattering in hushed undertones. "Would you like a little brandy?" inquired Barnes, as she sat down limply in the chair he pulled out for her. "I have a flask upstairs in my--" "I never touch it," she said. "I'm all right. My legs wabble a little but--Sit down, Mr. Barnes. I've got something to say to you and I'd better say it now, because it may come in pretty handy for you later on. Don't let those women come in here, Dilly." Barnes drew a chair close beside her. Bacon, with scant regard for elegance, seated himself on the edge of the table and bent an ear.