A Sunday morning. In their parlour in Burton Crescent, Mr. and Mrs. Joseph Snowdon were breakfasting. The sound of church bells — most depressing of all sounds that mingle in the voice of London — intimated that it was nearly eleven o’clock, but neither of our friends had in view the attendance of public worship. Blended odours of bacon and kippered herrings filled the room — indeed, the house, for several breakfasts were in progress under the same roof. For a wonder, the morning was fine, even sunny; a yellow patch glimmered on the worn carpet, and the grime of the window-panes was visible against an unfamiliar sky. Joseph, incompletely dressed, had a Sunday paper propped before him, and read whilst he ate. Clem, also in anything but grande toilette was using a knife for the purpose of conveying to her mouth the juice which had exuded from crisp rashers. As usual, they had very little to say to each other. Clem looked at her husband now and then, from under her eyebrows, surreptitiously.

After one of these glances she said, in a tone which was not exactly hostile, but had a note of suspicion:

‘I’d give something to know why he’s going to marry Clara Hewett.’

‘Not the first time you’ve made that remark,’ returned Joseph, without looking up from his paper.

‘I suppose I can speak?’

‘Oh, yes. But I’d try to do so in a more lady-like way.’

Clem flashed at him a gleam of hatred. He had become fond lately of drawing attention to her defects of breeding. Clem certainly did not keep up with his own progress in the matter of external refinement; his comments had given her a sense of inferiority, which irritated her solely as meaning that she was not his equal in craft. She let a minute or two pass, then returned to the subject.

‘There’s something at the bottom of it; I know that. Of course you know more about it than you pretend.’

Joseph leaned back in his chair and regarded her with a smile of the loftiest scorn.

‘It never occurs to you to explain it in the simplest way, of course, If ever you hear of a marriage, the first thing you ask yourself is: What has he or she to gain by it? Natural enough — in you. Now do you really suppose that all marriages come about in the way that yours did — on your side, I mean?’

Clem was far too dull-witted to be capable of quick retort. She merely replied:

‘I don’t know what you’re talking about.’

‘Of course not. But let me assure you that people sometimes think of other things besides making profit when they get married. It’s a pity that you always show yourself so coarse-minded.’

Joseph was quite serious in administering this rebuke. He really felt himself justified in holding the tone of moral superiority. The same phenomenon has often been remarked in persons conscious that their affairs are prospering, and whose temptations to paltry meanness are on that account less frequent.

‘And what about yourself?’ asked his wife, having found her retort at length. ‘Why did you want to marry me, I’d like to know?’

‘Why? You are getting too modest. How could I live in the same house with such a good-looking and sweet-tempered and well-behaved —’

‘Oh, shut up!’ she exclaimed, in a voice such as one hears at the street-corner. ‘It was just because you thought we was goin’ to be fools enough to keep you in idleness. Who was the fool, after all?’

Joseph smiled, and returned to his newspaper. In satisfaction at having reduced him to silence, Clem laughed aloud and clattered with the knife on her plate. As she was doing so there came a knock at the door.

‘A gentleman wants to know if you’re in, sir,’ said the house-thrall, showing a smeary face. ‘Mr. Byass is the name.’

‘Mr. Byass? I’ll go down and see him.’

Clem’s face became alive with suspicion. In spite of her careless attire she intercepted Joseph, and bade the servant ask Mr. Byass to come upstairs. ‘How can you go down without a collar?’ she said to her husband.

He understood, and was somewhat uneasy, but made no resistance. Mr. Byass presented himself. He had a very long face, and obviously brought news of grave import. Joseph shook hands with him.

‘You don’t know my wife, I think. Mr. Byass, Clem. Nothing wrong, I hope?’

Samuel, having made his best City bow, swung back from his toes to his heels, and stood looking down into his hat. ‘I’m sorry to say,’ he began, with extreme gravity, ‘that Mr. Snowdon is rather ill — in fact, very ill. Miss Jane asked me to come as sharp as I could.’

‘Ill? In what way?’

‘I’m afraid it’s a stroke, or something in that line. He fell down without a word of warning, just before ten o’clock. He’s lying insensible.’

‘I’ll come at once,’ said Joseph. ‘They’ve got a doctor, I hope?’

‘Yes; the doctor had been summoned instantly.’

‘I’ll go with you,’ said Clem, in a tone of decision.

‘No, no; what’s the good? You’ll only be in the way.’

‘No, I shan’t. If he’s as bad as all that, I shall come.’

Both withdrew to prepare themselves. Mr. Byass, who was very nervous and perspiring freely, began to walk round and round the table, inspecting closely, in complete absence of mind, the objects that lay on it.

‘We’ll have a cab,’ cried Joseph, as he came forth equipped. ‘Poor Jane’s in a sad state, I’m afraid, oh?’

In a few minutes they were driving up Pentonville Road. Clem scarcely ever removed her eye from Joseph’s face; the latter held his lips close together and kept his brows wrinkled. Few words passed during the drive.

At the door of the house appeared Bessie, much agitated. All turned into the parlour on the ground floor and spoke together for a few minutes. Michael had been laid on his bed; at present Jane only was with him, but the doctor would return shortly.

‘Will you tell her I’m here?’ said Joseph to Mrs. Byass. ‘I’ll see her in the sitting-room.’

He went up and waited. Throughout the house prevailed that unnatural, nerve-distressing quietude which tells the presence of calamity. The church bells had ceased ringing, and Sunday’s silence in the street enhanced the effect of blankness and alarming expectancy. Joseph could not keep still; he strained his ears in attention to any slight sound that might come from the floor above, and his heart beat painfully when at length the door opened.

Jane fixed her eyes on him and came silently forward.

‘Does he show any signs of coming round?’ her father inquired.

‘No. He hasn’t once moved.’

She spoke only just above a whisper. The shock kept her still trembling and her face bloodless.

‘Tell me how it happened, Jane.’

‘He’d just got up. I’d taken him his breakfast, and we were talking. All at once he began to turn round, and then he fell down — before I could reach him.’

‘I’ll go upstairs, shall I?’

Jane could not overcome her fear; at the door of the bedroom she drew back, involuntarily, that her father might enter before her. When she forced herself to follow, the first glimpse of the motionless form shook her from head t............