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 Something infinitely precious, something supremely vital had gone. It was as though one of his own limbs had been amputated. He recalled now something he had heard Aunt Verona mutter a few days back about her manuscript, about its being "wicked" and "futile." Life appeared for the first time menacing, sardonic.

Aunt Verona went upstairs to her cold bedroom, and Paul tried to eat some dinner, ignoring Becky's croaking, growling, throat-scratching commentary. Some instinct warned him to report the morning's happenings, and he called at Dr. Wilcove's house on the way to school.

On his return at four o'clock he found that his instinct had been more than justified. Becky's eyes were rolling and she was as incoherently voluble as some hybrid of dog and monkey. Mr. Silva was sitting in the kitchen, cap in hand, shaking his head solemnly, waiting, as he cryptically announced, until he was needed, and there was a note in the doctor's handwriting:

"

"Go at once to Mrs. Kestrell's and stay there for the night. Your aunt is very ill, but there is nothing you can do. I'll come and explain matters to you at Mrs. Kestrell's to-morrow. Show her this note, and say I'm relying on her kindness."

"Where is he?" Paul finally succeeded in saying, though his voice was faint and his mind nothing but an empty, buzzing box.

Mr. Silva jerked his thumb over his shoulder towards the stairs. "You're not to go up," he said. "They've telegraphed to Bridgetown for the ambulance."

Paul supposed the "ambulance" was some especially