"What a fool was I not to have written you!" I groaned.

He drew his chair around the table, and close to mine.

"Had the news that you escaped death been cried aloud in the streets, my
lad, 'twould never have got to your grandfather's ear," he said, in lower
tones. "I will tell you what happened, tho' I have it at second hand,
being in the North, as you may remember. Grafton came in from Kent and
invested Marlboro' Street. He himself broke the news to Mr. Carvel, who
took to his bed. Leiden was not in attendance, you may be sure, but that
quack-doctor Drake. Swain sent me a message, and I killed a horse
getting here from New York. But I could no more gain admittance to your
grandfather, Richard, than to King George the Third. I was met in the
hall by that crocodile, who told me with too many fair words that I
could not see my old friend; that for the present Dr. Drake denied him
everybody. Then I damned Dr. Drake, and Grafton too. And I let him know
my suspicions. He ordered me off, Richard--from that house which has
been my only home for these twenty years." His voice broke.

"Mr. Carvel thought me dead, then."

"And most mercifully. Your black Hugo, when he was somewhat recovered,
swore he had seen you killed and carried off. Sooth, they say there was
blood enough on the place. But we spared no pains to obtain a clew of
you. I went north to Boston, and Lloyd's factor south to Charleston.
But no trace of the messenger who came to the Coffee House after you
could we find. Hell had opened and swallowed him. And mark this for
consummate villany: Grafton himself spent no less than five hundred
pounds in advertising and the like."