tear his lungs
asunder. There was a clock in a room below whose striking he could hear
each hour. Between each time it struck he felt as if weeks elapsed.
Sometimes it was months. He had begun to be light-headed and to think
queer things. Once or twice he heard a man talking in a croaking wail,
and after a few minutes realised that it was himself, and that he did not
know what he had said, though he knew he had been arguing with Linthicum,
who was proving to him that his claim was too rotten to have a ghost of a
chance. By the time the afternoon post arrived he was semi-delirious and
did not know how it happened that he at last found himself holding
Minty's letter in his hand. He laughed hysterically when he opened it. It
was all right. There were the two yellowed sheets of paper--small sheets,
written close, and in a peculiar hand. He had often studied the
handwriting, and believed if he had seen it again he should know it. It
was small but strong and characteristic, though that was not what he had
called it.

"Ef I'd hed more time an' could hev worked it out more--an' got him to
write suthin' down--I could hev hed more of a hold," he said,
plaintively, "but Linthicum wouldn't give me no time."

The post arrived earlier than he had expected it, and this gave him time
to lie and fret and listen again for the striking of the clock in the
room downstairs. The waiting became too long, and as his fever increased
he became insanely impatient and could not restrain himself. To lie and
listen for his visitor's footsteps upon the stairs--to lie until seven
o'clock--if he did not come till then, would be more than he could
endure. That would give him too long to think over what Linthicum would
do if the whole sum were not forthcoming--to think of the reasons why the
parson might make up his mind to treat the letters as if they were
worthless. He lay and gnawed his finger-nails anew.

"I wouldn't give nothin' for 'em ef I was in his place," he muttered. "Ef
thar'd been anythin' in 'em that proved anythin' I should hev used 'em
long sence. But then I'm a business man an' he's a parson, an' doesn't
know nothin' about the laws. But he might go to some man--say a man like
Linthicum--who could put him up to things. Good Lord!" in a new panic,
"he mayn't come at all. He might jest stay away."

He became so overwrought by this agonising possibility that instead of
listening for the striking of the clock, he began to listen for the s