yet shall I live. There is no such thing as death, Holly, only a change, and, as you may perhaps learn in time to come, I believe that even here that change could under certain circumstances be indefinitely postponed,’ and again he broke into one of his dreadful fits of coughing.
‘There,’ he said, ‘I must go, you have the chest, and my will will be found among my papers, under the authority of which the child will be handed over to you. You will be well paid, Holly, and I know that you are honest, but if you betray my trust, by Heaven, I will haunt you.’
I said nothing, being, indeed, too bewildered to speak.
He held up the candle, and looked at his own face in the glass. It had been a beautiful face, but disease had wrecked it. ‘Food for the worms,’ he said. ‘Curious to think that in a few hours I shall be stiff and cold—the journey done, the little game played out. Ah me, Holly! life is not worth the trouble of life, except when one is in love—at least, mine has not been; but the boy Leo’s may be if he has the courage and the faith. Good-bye, my friend!’ and with a sudden access of tenderness he flung his arm about me and kissed me on the forehead, and then turned to go.
‘Look here, Vincey,’ I said, ‘if you are as ill as you think, you had better let me fetch a doctor.’
‘No, no,’ he said earnestly. ‘Promise me that you won’t. I am going to die, and, like a poisoned rat, I wish to die alone.’
‘I don’t believe that you are going to do anything of the sort,’ I answered. He smiled, and, with the word ‘Remember’ on his lips, was gone. As for myself, I sat down and rubbed my eyes, wondering if I had been asleep. As this supposition would not bear investigation I gave it up, and began to think that Vincey must have been drinking. I knew that he was, and had been, very ill, but still it seemed impossible that he could be in such a condition as to be able to know for certain that he would not outlive the night. Had he been so near dissolution surely he would scarcely have been able to walk, and carry a heavy iron box with him. The whole story, on reflection, seemed to me utterly incredible, for I was not then old enough to be aware how many things happen in this world that the common sense of the average man would set down as so improbable as to be absolutely impossible. This is a fact that I have only recently mastered. Was it likely that a man would have a son five years of age
