he
being so reticent--from a disease which nowadays physicians call
angina pectoris, a disease that grips a man by the chest, as 'twere
his breastbones are ground together, with breathlessness and
exquisite pain. As he grew older, the attacks recurred more
frequently and with greater violence, and after one of them, the
first I had seen with my own eyes, he sent for Mr. Vetch, the
attorney, and was closeted with him a great while in his room.
Mistress Pennyquick's face was very grave when she spoke to me
about it afterwards.

"'Tis a bad sign when a man sends for his lawyer, Humphrey," she
said. "I can't abide 'un, for they always make me think of my
latter end. Your father have made his will, I'll be bound, and I
wish he spoke more free of things. But there, 'tis always the way;
empty barrels make the most noise, as the saying is, and I will
groan with the toothache while the poor master will suffer his
agonies without a word."

One night as we were sitting reading, my father had an attack which
terrified us. All at once, without a moment's warning, he dropped
his book, and stood up, bending forward, his face blue, his eyes
almost starting from his head. We hastened to him, but he motioned
us away, and then Mistress Pennyquick bade me ride for Mr. Pinhorn.
I snatched my cap, and, knowing that with my long legs I could
reach the town by the fields more quickly than on horseback by the
road, I did not stay to saddle Jerry, but set off at full speed
across five-acre, vaulted the gate into the spinney, and so on till
I gained the bridge, by which time I was blowing like a furnace.

It was dark, being October, and though I knew every yard of our
ground, I marvel now to think how I escaped breaking my leg in a
ditch or coming to some other mishap. I raced on to Raven Street,
where Mr. Pinhorn lived, and by good luck found him just alighting
at the door from his nag. I told him my errand in gasps; the good
surgeon understood without much telling, and he leaped again into
the saddle (his foot never having left the stirrup) and galloped
away.

My knees shook so violently with the exertions I had made that I
would fain have rested awhile before returning. But the thought
that my father might die in my absence struck me with a chill, and
I set off at a swinging stride after the surgeon.

I had gone but a few yards, however, when ahead of me, by the light
of a flickering oil lamp, hanging from a bracket before one of the