"
When he had quite finished, he came into the light. He did not
look in the direction he had avoided from the first, but his voice
had a different note as he remarked:
"I am your father's friend, and I have promised to be yours. You
may expect me here in the morning, as I am one of the few persons
your father has asked to be present at your first interview. If
after this interview you wish anything more from me, you have only
to signify it. I am blunt, but not unfeeling, Mr. Ostrander."
A slight lift of the hand, visible now in the shadow, answered
him; and with a silent bow he left the room.
In the passage-way he met Deborah.
"Leave him to himself," said he. "Later, perhaps, you can do
something for him."
But she found this quite impossible. Oliver would neither eat nor
sleep. When the early morning light came, he was sitting there
still. Was his father keeping vigil also? We shall never know.
XXXIII
THE CURTAIN LIFTED
Ten o'clock! and one of the five listed to be present had arrived-
-the rector of the church which the Ostranders had formerly
attended.
He was ushered into the parlour by Deborah, where he found himself
received not by the judge in whose name he had been invited, but
by Mr. Black, the lawyer, who tendered him a simple good morning
and pointed out a chair.
There was another person in the room,--a young man who stood in
one of the windows, gazing abstractedly out at the line of gloomy
fence rising between him and the street.
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