d had gripped the key to his
treasures in a last instinctive grasp.

Stuart drew the curtains of scarlet and gold, touched a spring and
raised the massive broad window. The death-chamber was flooded with
fresh balmy air and dazzling sunlight. All that was left of him who
boasted his mastery of the world lay on the magnificent bed, a lump of
white cold flesh and projecting bones. The little body looked stark and
hideous in the sunlight.

The reporters down stairs were prying into his affairs like so many
ferrets to find out how much he left. One of them asked Stuart his
opinion.

The lawyer gazed at the young reporter, thoughtfully, while he slowly
answered:

"There's only one thing sure, young man, he left it all!"

Through the open window Stuart caught the perfume of flowers on the
lawn. The Italian gardeners were working on the flower beds the little
man loved. The great swan-like form of a Hudson River steamer swept by,
piling the white foam of the clear waters on her bow, bearing high on
the side the gilded name of a man who was once Bivens's associate in
great ventures, but who was now wearing a suit of convict's stripes
behind the walls of a distant prison.

A long line of barges loaded with brick for new houses came floating
down the stream behind a busy little tug. On the soft morning breezes
the young Southerner's keen car caught the twang of a banjo and the
joyous music of negro brickmen singing an old-fashioned melody of his
native state; while over all, like an eternal chorus, came the dim
muffled roar of the city's life.

He looked again at the lump of cold clay, and wondered what was passing
in the soul of the woman who was now the heir of all his millions.

Why had she shown such strange and abject terror over his death--an
event she had foreseen and desired? He recalled the hoarse unnatural
voice and the blind fumbling at her telephone.

A horrible suspicion suddenly flushed through his mind!

He determined to know at once. A few skilful questions would reveal the
truth. She might be able to conceal it from the world, but not from
him. He called a servant and asked to see Mrs. Bivens immediately.

CHAPTER IX

THE EYES OF PITY

As he had feared, Nan refused point blank to enter the death chamber
and asked him to come to her boudoir.

He found her standing by a window, apparently calm. Stuart looked at
her a moment with a curious detached interest. Suddenly aware of his
presence