He reached the library; his hand was upon the latch; he turned it with a cautious regard to sound, not with premeditation, but because the death-scene he had witnessed made the least noise appear to him like sacrilege. But the door remained firm. It was evidently locked within, for through the keyhole streamed a faint light, and with the light came an indistinct sound of rustling papers and the cautious tread of a footstep. The old man bent his eye to the keyhole and looked in. Directly within the range of his vision stood Mr. Clark’s escritoir wide open, and by it was Ross searching among the papers in an ebony box, which the old man knew as the repository of his master’s most valuable documents. Ross took from this box a voluminous parcel, thrust it in his bosom, and carefully locking the escritoir, held up the light and looked timidly around as if fearful of the very silence. Then, with a quick, noiseless tread, he passed across the room. His face was deathly pale, and the old negro saw that the lamp shook and swaled in his hand. There was a fireplace in the room, but the door commanded no view of it, and the old man strained his sight in vain to secure further knowledge of what was passing within the library. But if his eye was baffled his ear remained keen, and that was directly startled by the sharp rustle of papers apparently torn apart in haste; then the whole room was filled with a glare of light. There was a sudden and faint crackle as of some hastily kindled flame passing up the chimney. Then all was dark and hushed once more. The lamp seemed extinguished; a little smoke, a faint smell of burnt paper, and that was all the poor old negro ever saw of his master’s will. The old man went back to the chamber, knowing too well that his mission was at an end. He knelt down by that death-couch trembling like a culprit, and heart-sick from a consciousness of his own impotence. “Oh, master, master! forgive me—forgive me!” cried the gray-headed old servant, bending his wrinkled forehead to the hands he had clasped upon the death-couch. “Forgive me that I stayed to cry when I should have obeyed the last order you can ever give the old man. I have seen, I have heard—but who will believe me, master? Am I not a slave?” “A slave? Yes; go hence, and forever!” cried a stern voice in the room; “you who have no more discretion than thus to talk with the dead.” The old man arose and stood up; his keen eyes dwelt firmly upon Ross, and with his right hand he drew the covering from the dead. There was something noble in the look and attitude of that old gray-headed negro as he confronted the false friend, the household traitor, who might yet have almost the power of life and death over him.