pray God to keep John Stukeley alive and
clear headed till oi coomes back again."

It was many years since Luke Marner's legs had carried him so fast as
they now did into Marsden. The driving rain and hail which beat against
him seemed unheeded as he ran down the hill at the top of his speed.
He stopped at the doctor's and went in. Two or three minutes after the
arrival of this late visitor Dr. Green's housekeeper was astonished at
hearing the bell ring violently. On answering the bell she was ordered
to arouse John, who had already gone to bed, and to tell him to put the
horse into the gig instantly.

"Not on such a night as this, doctor! sureley you are not a-going out on
such a night as this!"

"Hold your tongue, woman, and do as you are told instantly," the doctor
said with far greater spirit than usual, for his housekeeper was, as a
general thing, mistress of the establishment.

With an air of greatly offended dignity she retired to carry out his
orders. Three minutes later the doctor ran out of his room as he heard
the man servant descending the stairs.

"John," he said, "I am going on at once to Mr. Thompson's; bring the gig
round there. I shan't want you to go further with me. Hurry up, man, and
don't lose a moment--it is a matter of life and death."

A quarter of an hour later Dr. Green, with Mr. Thompson by his side,
drove off through the tempest toward Varley.

The next morning, as Ned was at breakfast, the doctor was announced.

"What a pestilently early hour you breakfast at, Ned! I was not in bed
till three o'clock, and I scarcely seemed to have been asleep an hour
when I was obliged to get up to be in time to catch you before you were
off."

"That is hard on you indeed, doctor," Ned said, smiling; "but why this
haste? Have you got some patient for whom you want my help? You need not
have got up so early for that, you know. You could have ordered anything
you wanted for him in my name. You might have been sure I should have
honored the bill. But what made you so late last night? You were surely
never out in such a gale!"

"I was, Ned, and strange as it seems I never went in answer to a call
which gave me so much satisfaction. My dear lad, I hardly know how to
tell you. I have a piece of news for you; the greatest, the best news
that man could have to tell you."

Ned drew a long breath and the color left his cheeks.

"You don't mean, doctor, you can't mean"--and he paused.

"That you are cl