he my mother. Of how fiercely he guarded his
right to be the sole one to 'do' for me, as he called it, and how, when
the crisis came, he hovered, weeping, but hopeful, at my bedside, until
it was safely passed, when they drove him, weak and exhausted, from the
room. As for me, I knew little about it at the time, and cared less. I
was too busy in my fight with death. To my chimerical vision there was
only a black but gentle demon that came and went, alternating with a
white fairy, who would insist on coming in on her head, growing larger
and larger and then dissolving. But the pathos and devotion in the story
lost nothing in my blunt friend's telling.

"It was during the period of a long convalescence, however, that I came
to know my humble ally as he really was, devoted to the point of
abjectness. There were times when for very shame at his goodness to me,
I would beg him to go away, to do something else. He would go, but
before I had time to realise that I was not being ministered to, he
would be back at my side, grinning and pottering just the same. He
manufactured duties for the joy of performing them. He pretended to see
desires in me that I never had, because he liked to pander to them, and
when I became entirely exasperated, and ripped out a good round oath, he
chuckled with the remark, 'Dah, now, you sholy is gittin' well. Nevah
did hyeah a man anywhaih nigh Jo'dan's sho' cuss lak dat.'

"Why, I grew to love him, love him, oh, yes, I loved him as well--oh,
what am I saying? All human love and gratitude are damned poor things;
excuse me, gentlemen, this isn't a pleasant story. The truth is usually
a nasty thing to stand.

"It was not six months after that that my friendship to Jube, which he
had been at such great pains to win, was put to too severe a test.

"It was in the summer time again, and as business was slack, I had
ridden over to see my friend, Dr. Tom. I had spent a good part of the
day there, and it was past four o'clock when I rode leisurely into
Bradford. I was in a particularly joyous mood and no premonition of the
impending catastrophe oppressed me. No sense of sorrow, present or to
come, forced itself upon me, even when I saw men hurrying through the
almost deserted streets. When I got within sight of my home and saw a
crowd surrounding it, I was only interested sufficiently to spur my
horse into a jog trot, which brought me up to the throng, when something
in the sullen, settled horror in the