was called to meet Him face
to face at the judgement seat.

Sir Omicron Pie had been sent for from London. That great man had
shown himself a wonderful adept at keeping life still moving within
an old man's heart in the case of good old Bishop Grantly, and it
might be reasonably expected that he would be equally successful with
a dean. In the meantime Dr. Fillgrave and Mr. Rerechild were doing
their best, and poor Miss Trefoil sat at the head of her father's
bed, longing, as in such cases daughters do long, to be allowed to
do something to show her love--if it were only to chafe his feet
with her hands, or wait in menial offices on those autocratic
doctors--anything so that now in the time of need she might be of
use.

The archdeacon alone of the attendant clergy had been admitted for
a moment into the sick man's chamber. He had crept in with creaking
shoes, had said with smothered voice a word of consolation to the
sorrowing daughter, had looked on the distorted face of his old
friend with solemn but yet eager scrutinising eye, as though he said
in his heart "and so some day it will probably be with me," and then,
having whispered an unmeaning word or two to the doctors, had creaked
his way back again into the library.

"He'll never speak again, I fear," said the archdeacon as he
noiselessly closed the door, as though the unconscious dying man,
from whom all sense had fled, would have heard in his distant chamber
the spring of the lock which was now so carefully handled.

"Indeed! Indeed! Is he so bad?" said the meagre little prebendary,
turning over in his own mind all the probable candidates for the
deanery and wondering whether the archdeacon would think it worth his
while to accept it. "The fit must have been very violent."

"When a man over seventy has a stroke of apoplexy, it seldom comes
very lightly," said the burly chancellor.

"He was an excellent, sweet-tempered man," said one of the vicars
choral. "Heaven knows how we shall repair his loss."

"He was indeed," said a minor canon, "and a great blessing to all
those privileged to take a share in the services of our cathedral.
I suppose the government will appoint, Mr. Archdeacon. I trust we
may have no stranger."

"We will not talk about his successor," said the archdeacon, "while
there is yet hope."

"Oh, no, of course not," said the minor canon. "It would be
exceedingly indecorous; but--"

"I know of no man," said the meagre little prebendary,