The Old Secretaire: A Christmas Story

In Woodside Manor, there was an old servant – a terrible man, almost ninety years old, with thick white eyebrows and sharp black eyes – who recalled the tragedy – Silas Brooks, the valet of the unfortunate Arundel Secretan. But even he never spoke about it, but only listened when the story was mentioned with suspicion and hatred, flashing in his evil dark eyes. The servants said he was crazy – that the recollection had turned his brain. One day, many years ago, he told this story, and never heard of mentioning it again. Arundel Secretan had too much of a swashbuckler in his blood...