The old folk can’t go on living always. The King’s messenger had called at Wyvern, and the old Squire must needs get up and go.

Sickness was a cross he had never been used to bear, and now that it was laid on his old shoulders he knew that he could not keep his feet very long.

He had the Wyvern lawyer, who did the business of the estate, up to his room, and the parson and his own son, Harry Fairfield. He made the attorney read the will, which he had told him to bring up with him, and the Squire listened as it was read slowly.

After the clergyman had gone—

“Have ye ought to say to that, son Harry?” said the old Squire.

“’Tis an old will, father,” said Harry.

“It aint,” said the Squire.

“Eight years less two months,” said the lawyer.

“About the age rum’s fit to drink,” said the old Squire. “What say ye to it—now’s your time, son.”

“Priests, women, and poultry, they say, has never enough. There’s bin changes since, and I don’t see why Wyvern should be charged so heavy.”

“There’s three hundred a year to Alice, that’s what ye mean!” said the old Squire.

His son was silent.

“Well, I don’t owe her nothin’, that’s true, but I’ll let it stand, mind. And Harry, lad, the day ye do a good thing there will be seven new moons.”

“What was parson a whisperin’ about in the window wi’ ye?” he asked of the attorney after a time.

“Some claim upon the vicarage which he thought you said you meant to remit by will.”

“I ’a thought upon it, and I won’t. Paternoster built churches, and Our Father pulled ’em down. There’s o’er many parsons for the churches, and o’er many churches for the people—tell him I won’t.”

“What the devil made you talk about that to him?” said Harry, with a dark look, when he and the attorney had got out of the room.

“My dear sir,” said the lawyer, “we must be true to our clients, and beside, don’t you remember the clergyman said he’d be here tomorrow at one to administer the Lord’s Supper, and he’ll be certain to speak of it then to our client.”

At nightfall the Squire grew worse, and his head wandered.

“Tell that white-faced Vicar Maybell, there’s never a one but the thankless in hell—I’ll not sit under none o’ his sermons—Ay, he frowns at that.”

“Hey, dear!” whispered the housekeeper, gazing at him from the hearth where they were sitting.

“And who does he mean, ma’am?” asked the nurse.

“God knows—old times, I suppose,” she answered.

“There’s a glass broke, Tom, who’s kicking up the row?” mumbled the Squire,—“Play, women, and wine undoes men, laughin’—Ay, light it, I’m very dark—Who’s he, ye fool?—Joan and ray lady’s all one in the dark.”

“That’s Tom Ward he’s thinkin’ on?” said the nurse.

“Ay, he liked Tom ever. He wouldn’t think ’twas Wyvern without Tom,” answered the housekeeper.

In a little time he said more distinctly and sternly—

“The de............