He, too, was
worn out by the fatigue of the past twenty-four hours, and he slept
soundly all through the night, and slept as calmly as a child.
It was eight o'clock next morning when he went down the steep, old-
fashioned staircase of the inn. He found a strange hubbub and confusion
below. Awful tidings had just been brought from the castle. Sir Oswald
Eversleigh had been found seated in his library, DEAD, with the lamp
still burning near him, in the bright summer morning. One of the grooms
had come down to the little inn, and was telling his story to all
comers, when the pedlar came into the open space before the bar.
"It was Millard that found him," the man said. "He was sitting, quite
calm-like, with his head lying back upon the cushion of his arm-chair.
There were papers and open letters scattered all about; and they sent
off immediately for Mr. Dalton, the lawyer, to look to the papers, and
seal up the locks of drawers and desks, and so on. Mr. Dalton is busy
at it now. Mr. Eversleigh is awfully shocked, he is. I never saw such a
white face in all my life as his, when he came out into the hall after
hearing the news. It's a rare fine thing for him, as you may say; for
they say Sir Oswald made a new will last night, and left his nephew
everything; and Mr. Eversleigh has been a regular wild one, and is deep
in debt. But, for all that, I never saw any one so cut up as he was
just now.
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