"What, sir, please?"

"Jesus _College_."

"Don't know, I'm sure, sir."

"Is he old?"

"Yes, sir, past seventy."

"Ha--well I don't care a farthing about him," said Mr. Dingwell.

"Will you, please, have in the apothecary, sir? I'll fetch him directly, if you wish."

"No--_no_ apothecary, _no_ clergyman; I don't believe in the Apostles'

Creed, ma'am, and I do believe in the jokes about apothecaries. If I'm to go, I'll go quietly, if you please."

Honest Sally Rumble was heavy at heart to see this old man, who certainly did look ghastly enough to suggest ideas of the undertaker and the s.e.xton, in so unsatisfactory a plight as to his immortal part.

Was he a Jew?--there wasn't a hair on his chin--or a Roman Catholic?--or a member of any one of those mult.i.tudinous forms of faith which she remembered in a stout volume, adorned with woodcuts, and ent.i.tled "A Dictionary of all Religions," in a back parlour of her grand-uncle, the tallow-chandler?

"Give me a gla.s.s of cold water, ma'am," said the subject of her solicitude.

"Thank you--that's the best drink--_slop_, I think you call it--a sick man can swallow."

Sally Rumble coughed a little, and fidgeted, and at last she said: "Please, sir, would you wish I should fetch any other sort of a minister?"

"Don't plague me, pray; I believe in the prophet Rabelais and _je m'en vais chercher un grand peuttre_--the two great chemists, Death, who is going to a.n.a.lyse, and Life, to re-combine me. I tell you, ma'am, my head is bursting; I'm very ill; I'll talk no more."

She hesitated. She lingered in the room, in her great perplexity; and Mr. Dingwell lay back, with a groan.

"I'll tell you what you may do: go down to your landlord's office, and be so good as to say to either of those d----d Jew fellows--I don't care which--that I am as you see me; it mayn't signify, it may blow over; but I've an idea it is serious; and tell them I said they had better know that I am _very ill_, and that I've taken no step about it."

With another weary groan Mr. Dingwell let himself down on his pillow, and felt worse for his exertion, and very tired and stupid, and odd about the head, and would have been very glad to fall asleep; and with one odd pang of fear, sudden and cold, at his heart, he thought, "I'm going to die--I'm going to die--at last--I'm going to die."

The physical nature in sickness acquiesces in death; it is the instructed mind that recoils; and the more versed about the unseen things of futurity, unless when G.o.d, as it were, prematurely glorifies it, the more awfully it recoils.

Mr. Dingwell was not more afraid than other sinners who have lived for the earthy part of their nature, and have taken futurity pretty much for granted, and are now going to test by the stake of _themselves_ the value of their loose guesses.

No; he had chanced a great many things, and they had turned out for the most part better than he expected. Oh! no; the whole court, and the adjoining lanes, and, in short, the whole city of London, must go as he would--lots of company, it was not to be supposed it was anything very bad--and he was so devilish tired, _over_-fatigued-- queer--worse than sea-sickness--that headache--fate--the change--an end--what was it? At all events, a rest, a sleep--sleep--could not be very bad; lots of sleep, sir, and the chance--the chance--oh, yes, things go pretty well, and I have not had my good luck yet. I wish I could sleep a bit--yes, let kingdom-come be all sleep--and so a groan, and the brain duller, and more pain, and the immense fatigue that demands the enormous sleep.

When Sarah Rumble returned, Mr. Dingwell seemed, she thought, a great deal heavier. He made no remark, as he used to do, when she entered the room. She came and stood by the bed-side, but he lay with his eyes closed, not asleep; she could see by the occasional motion of his lips, and the fidgety change of his posture, and his weary groanings.

She waited for a time in silence.

"Better, sir?" she half-whispered, after a minute or two.

"No," he said, wearily.

Another silence followed, and then she asked, "Would you like a drink, Mr. Dingwell, sir?"

"Yes--water."

So he drank a very little, and lay down again.

Miss Sarah Rumble stayed in the room, and nearly ten minutes pa.s.sed without a word.

"What did he say?" demanded Mr. Dingwell so abruptly that Sarah Rumble fancied he had been dreaming.

"Who, sir, please?"

"The Jew--landlord," he answered.

"Mr. Levi's a-coming up, sir, please--he expected in twenty minutes,"

replied she.

Mr. Dingwell groaned; and two or three minutes more elapsed, and silence seemed to have re-established itself in the darkened chamber, when Mr. Dingwell raised himself up with a sudden effort, and he said--

"Sarah Rumble, fetch me my desk." Which she did, from his sitting-room.

"Put your hand under the bolster, and you'll find two keys on a ring, and a pocket-book. _Yes._ Now, Sarah Rumble, unlock that desk. Very good. Put out the papers on the coverlet before me; first bolt the door. Thank you, ma'am. There are a parcel of letters among those, tied across with a red silk cord--just so. Put them in my hand--thank you--and place all the rest back again neatly--_neatly_, if you please. Now lock the desk; replace it, and come here; but first give me pen and ink, and bolt the door--try it again."

And as she did so he scrawled an address upon the blank paper in which these letters were wrapt.

The brown visage of his grave landlady was graver than ever, as she returned to listen for further orders.

"Mrs. Sarah Rumble, I take you for an honest person; and as I may die this time, I make a particular request of _you_--take this little packet, and slip it between the feather-bed and the mattress, as near the centre as your arm will reach--thank you--remember it's there. If I die, ma'am, you'll find a ten-pound note wrapped about it, which I give to you; you need not thank--that will do. The letters addressed as they are you will deliver, without showing them, or _saying one word to anyone_ but to the gentleman himself, into whose hands you must deliver them. You understand?"

"Yes, sir, please; I'm listening."

"Well, _attend_. There are two Jew gentlemen--your landlord, Mr. Levi, and the _old_ Jew, who have been with me once or twice--you know _them_; that makes _two_; and there is Mr. Larkin, the tall gentleman who has been twice here with them, with the lavender waistcoat and trousers, the eye-gla.s.s with the black ribbon, the black frock coat--heigho! oh, dear, my head!--the red grizzled whiskers, and bald head."

"The religious gentleman, please, sir?"

"Exactly; the religious gentleman. Well, _attend_. The two Jews and the religious gentleman together make _three_; and those three gentlemen are _robbers_."

"_What_, sir?"

"_Robbers_--robbers! Don't you know what '_robbers_' means? They are all three _robbers_. Now, I don't think they'll want to fiddle with my money till I'm dead."

"Oh, Lord, sir!"

"'Oh, Lord!' of course. That will do. They won't touch my money till I'm dead, if they trust you; but they _will_ want my desk--at least Larkin will. I shan't be able to look after things, for my head is very bad, and I shall be too drowsy--soon knocked up; so give 'em the desk, if they ask for it, and these keys from under the pillow; and if they ask you if there are any other papers, say _no_; and don't you tell them one word about the letters you've put between the beds here.

If you betray me--you're a religious woman--yes--and believe in G.o.d--may G.o.d d--n you; and He will, for you'll be accessory to the villany of those three miscreants. And now I've done what in me lies; and that is all--my last testament."

And Mr. Dingwell lay down wearily. Sarah Rumble knew that he was very ill; she had attended people in fever, and seen them die. Mr. Dingwell was already perceptibly worse. As she was coming up with some whey, a knock came to the door, and opening it she saw Mr. Levi, with a very surly countenance, and his dark eyes blazing fiercely on her.

"How'sh Dingwell now?" he demanded, before he had time to enter, and shut the door; "_worse_, is he?"

"Well, he's duller, sir."

"In his bed? Shut the door."