Explore "Hermia Suydam" by Gertrude Atherton on Textopian. Read with annotations and highlights.
Hermia attended her uncle's funeral because Frank came over and insisted upon it; and she and her brother-in-law were the only mourners. But few people were in the church, a circumstance which Hermia remembered later with gratitude. The Suydams had lived on Second Avenue since Second Avenue had boasted a brick or brownstone front, but no one cared to assume a respect he did not feel. Among the tablets which graced the interior of St. Mark's was one erected to the dead man's father, who had left many shekels to the diocese; but John Suydam was lowered into the family vault with nothing to perpetuate his memory but his name and the dates of his birth and death engraved on the silver plate of his coffin.
Hermia took no interest in her uncle's death; she was even past the regret that she would be the poorer by twenty-five dollars a year. When she received the letter from Suydam's lawyer, informing her that she was heiress to a million dollars, her hands shook for an hour.