Doctor Grimshawe's Secret by Nathaniel Hawthorne

At the breakfast-table the next morning, however, appeared Doctor Grimshawe, wearing very much the same aspect of an uncombed, unshorn, unbrushed, odd sort of a pagan as at other times, and making no difference in his breakfast, except that he poured a pretty large dose of brandy into his cup of tea; a thing, however, by no means unexampled or very unusual in his history. There were also the two children, fresher than the morning itself, rosy creatures, with newly scrubbed cheeks, made over again for the new day, though the old one had left no dust upon them; [Endnote: 1] laughing with one another, flinging their little jokes about the table, and expecting that the Doctor might, as was often his wont, set some ponderous old English joke trundling round among the breakfast cups; eating the corn-cakes which crusty Hannah, with the aboriginal part of her, had a knack of making in a peculiar and exquisite fashion. But there was an empty chair at table; one cup, one little jug of milk, and another of pure water, with no guest to partake of them.

"Where is the schoolmaster? " said Ned, pausing as he was going to take his seat.