Danger: Wounded in the House of a Friend

“Come, Fanny,” said Mr. Wilmer Voss, speaking to his wife, “you must get to bed.  It is past twelve o’clock, and you cannot bear this loss of rest and sleep.  It may throw you all back again.”

The woman addressed was sitting in a large easychair with a shawl drawn closely about her person.  She had the pale, shrunken face and large, bright eyes of a confirmed invalid.  Once very beautiful, she yet retained a sweetness of expression which gave a tenderness and charm to every wasted feature.  You saw at a glance the cultured woman and the patient sufferer.

As her husband spoke a fierce blast of wind drove the fine sand-like snow against the windows, and then went shrieking and roaring away over housetops, gables and chimneys.

“Oh what a dreadful night!” said the lady, leaning forward in her chair and listening to the wild wail of the storm, while a look of anxiety, mingled with dread, swept across her face.  “If Archie were only at home!”

“Don’t trouble yourself about Archie.  He’ll be here soon.  You are not yourself to-night, Fanny.”

“Perhaps not; but I can’t help it.  I feel such an awful weight here;” and Mrs. Voss drew her hands against her bosom.

“All nervous,” said her husband.  “Come!  You must go to bed.”

“It will be of no use, Wilmer,” returned the lady.  “I will be worse in bed than sitting up.  You don’t know what a strange feeling has come over me.  Oh, Archie, if you were only at home!  Hark!  What was that?”

The pale face grew paler as Mrs. Voss bent forward in a listening attitude.

“Only the wind,” answered her husband, betraying some impatience.  “A thousand strange sounds are on the air in a night like this.  You must compose yourself, Fanny, or the worst consequences may follow.”

“It’s impossible, husband.  I cannot rest until I have my son safe and sound at home again.  Dear, dear boy!”

Mr. Voss urged no further.  The shadow of fear which had come down upon his wife began to creep over his heart and fill it with a vague concern.  And now a thought flashed into his mind that he would not have uttered for the world; but from that moment peace fled, and anxiety for his son grew into alarm as the time wore on and the boy did not come home.

“Oh, my husband,” cried Mrs. Voss, starting from her chair, and clasping her hands as she threw them upward, “I cannot bear this much longer.  Hark!  That was his voice! ’Mother!’ ’Mother!’ Don’t you hear it?”

Her face was white as the snow without, her eyes wild and eager, her lips apart, her head bent forward.

A shuddering chill crept along the nerves of Mr. Voss.

“Go, go quickly!  Run!  He may have fallen at the door!”

Ere the last sentence was finished Mr. Voss was halfway down stairs.  A blinding dash of snow came swirling into his face as he opened the street door.  It was some moments before he could see with any distinctness.  No human form was visible, and the lamp just in front of his house shone down upon a trackless bed of snow many inches in depth.  No, Archie was not there.  The cry had come to the mother’s inward ear in the moment when her boy went plunging down into the engulfing river and heart and thought turned in his mortal agony to the one nearest and dearest in all the earth.

When Mr. Voss came back into the house after his fruitless errand, he found his wife standing in the hall, only a few feet back from the vestibule, her face whiter, if that were possible, and her eyes wilder than before.  Catching her in his arms, he ran with her up stairs, but before he had reached their chamber her light form lay nerveless and unconscious against his breast.

Doctor Hillhouse, the old family physician, called up in the middle of that stormy night, hesitated to obey the summons, and sent his assistant with word that he would be round early in the morning if needed.  Doctor Angier, the assistant, was a young physician of fine ability and great promise.  Handsome in person, agreeable in manner and thoroughly in love with his profession, he was rapidly coming into favor with many of the old doctor’s patients, the larger portion of whom belonged to wealthy and fashionable circles.  Himself a member of one of the older families, and connected, both on his father’s and mother’s side, with eminent personages as well in his native city as in the State, Doctor Angier was naturally drawn into social life, which, spite of his increasing professional duties, he found time to enjoy.

It was past two o’clock when Doctor Angier made his appearance, his garments white with snow and his dark beard crusted with tiny icicles.  He found Mrs. Voss lying in swoon so deep that, but for the faintest perceptible heart-beat, he would have thought her dead.  Watching the young physician closely as he stood by the bedside of his wife, Mr. Voss was quick to perceive something unusual in his manner.  The professional poise and coolness for which he was noted were gone, and he showed a degree of excitement and uncertainty that alarmed the anxious husband.  What was its meaning?  Did it indicate apprehension for the condition of his patient, or—­something else?  A closer look into the young physician’s face sent a flash of suspicion through the mind of Mr. Voss, which was more than confirmed a moment afterward as the stale odor of wine floated to his nostrils.

“Were you at Mr. Birtwell’s to-night?” There was a thrill of anxious suspense in the tones of Mr. Voss as he grasped the physician’s arm and looked keenly at him.

“I was,” replied Doctor Angier.

“Did you see my son there?”

“Yes, sir.”

“At what time did you leave?”

“Less than an hour ago.  I had not retired when your summons came.”

“Was Archie there when you left?”

“No, I think not.”

“Are you sure about it?”

“Yes, very sure.  I remember now, quite distinctly, seeing him come down from the dressing-room with his hat in his hand and go through the hall toward the street door.”

“How long ago was that?”

“About an hour and a half; perhaps longer.”

A groan that could not be repressed broke from the father’s lips.

“Isn’t he at home?” asked the young physician, turning round quickly from the bed and betraying a sudden concern.

“No; and I am exceedingly anxious about him.”  The eyes of Mr. Voss were fixed intently on Doctor Angler, and he was reading every varying expression of his countenance.

“Doctor,” he said, laying his hand on the physician’s arm and speaking huskily, “I want you to answer me truly.  Had he taken much wine?”

It was some moments before Doctor Angier replied: 

“On such occasions most people take wine freely.  It flows like water, you know.  I don’t think your son indulged more than any one else; indeed, not half so much as some young men I saw there.”

Mr. Voss felt that there was evasion in the answer.

“Archie is young, and not used to wine.  A single glass would be more to him than half a dozen to older men who drink habitually.  Did you see him take wine often?”

“He was in the supper-room for a considerable time.  When I left it, I saw him in the midst of a group of young men and girls, all with glasses of champagne in their hands.”

“How long was this before you saw him go away?”

“Half an hour, perhaps,” replied the doctor.

“Did he go out alone?”

“I believe so.”

Mr. Voss questioned no further, and Doctor Angler, who now understood better the meaning of his patient’s condition, set himself to the work of restoring her to consciousness.  He did not find the task easy.  It was many hours before the almost stilled pulses began beating again with a perceptible stroke, and the quiet chest to give signs of normal respiration.  Happily for the poor mother, thought and feeling were yet bound.

Long before this the police had been aroused and every effort made to discover a trace of the young man after he left the house of Mr. Birtwell, but without effect.  The snow had continued falling until after five o’clock, when the storm ceased and the sky cleared, the wind blowing from the north and the temperature falling to within a few degrees of zero.

A faint hope lingered with Mr. Voss—­the hope that Archie had gone home with some friend.  But as the morning wore on and he did not make his appearance this hope began to fade away, and died before many hours.  Nearly every male guest at Mrs. Birtwell’s party was seen and questioned during the day, but not one of them had seen Archie after he left the house.  A waiter who was questioned said that he remembered seeing him: 

“I watched him go down the steps and go off alone, and the wind seemed as if it would blow him away.  He wasn’t just himself, sir, I’m afraid.”

If a knife had cut down into the father’s quivering flesh, the pain would have been as nothing to that inflicted by this last sentence.  It only confirmed his worst fears.

The afternoon papers contained a notice of the fact that a young gentleman who had gone away from a fashionable party at a late hour on the night before had not been heard of by his friends, who were anxious and distressed about him.  Foul play was hinted at, as the young man wore a valuable diamond pin and had a costly gold watch in his pocket.  On the morning afterward advertisements appeared offering a large reward for any information that would lead to the discovery of the young man, living or dead.  They were accompanied by minute descriptions of his person and dress.  But there came no response.  Days and weeks passed; and though the advertisements were repeated and newspapers called public attention to the matter, not a single clue was found.

A young man, with the kisses of his mother sweet on his pure lips, had left her for an evening’s social enjoyment at the house of one of her closest and dearest friends, and she never looked upon his face again.  He had entered the house of that friend with a clear head and steady nerves, and he had gone out at midnight bewildered with the wine that had been poured without stint to her hundred guests, young and old.  How it had fared with him the reader knows too well.