"But I stepped forward, and the man did not dare obey him, and Huckins himself looked cowed and dropped his hand from the door-knob. "'Where are you going?' I asked, moving rapidly to his side. "'Isn't she dead?' was his only answer, given with a mixture of mockery and triumph difficult to describe. "'Yes,' I assented, 'she is dead; but that does not justify you in flying the house.' "'And who says I am flying?' he protested. 'Cannot I go out on an errand without being told I am running away?' "'An errand,' I repeated, 'two minutes after your sister has breathed her last! Don't talk to me of errands. Your appearance is that of flight, and that bundle in your arms looks like the cause of it.' "His eye, burning with a passion very natural under the circumstances, flashed over me with a look of disdain. "'And what do you know of my appearance, and what is it to you if I carry or do not carry a bundle out of this house? Am I not master of everything here?' "'No,' I cried boldly; then, thinking it might perhaps be wiser not to undeceive him as to his position till I had fully sounded his purposes, I added somewhat nonchalantly: 'that is, you are not master enough to take anything away that belonged to your sister. If you can prove to me that there is nothing in that bundle save[38] what is yours and was yours before your sister died, well and good, you may go away with it and leave your poor dead sister to be cared for in her own house by strangers. But while I have the least suspicion that property of any nature belonging to this estate is hidden away under that roll of old clothes, you stop here if I have to appeal first to the strength of my arms and then to that of the law.' [38] "'But,' he quavered, 'it is mine—mine. I am but carrying away my own. Did you not draw up the will yourself? Don't you know she gave everything to me?' "'What I know has nothing to do with it,' I retorted. 'Did you think because you saw a will drawn up in your favor that therefore you had immediate right to what she left, and could run away with her effects before her body was cold? A will has to be proven, my good man, before an heir has any right to touch what it leaves. If you do not know this, why did you try to slink away like a thief, instead of walking out of the front door like a proprietor? Your manner convicts you, man; so down with
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