"He is actually rejuvenated.
I must order some new white smocks for him to receive his visitors in.
Someone brought him an old copy of the Illustrated London News last
night. We will send him illustrated papers every week."
In the dull old brain, God knows what spark of life had been relighted.
Young Mrs. Doby related with chuckles that granddad had begged that his
chair might be dragged to the window, that he might sit and watch the
village street. Sitting there, day after day, he smoked and looked at
his pictures, and dozed and dreamed, his pipe and tobacco jar beside
him on the window ledge. At any sound of wheels or footsteps his face
lighted, and if, by chance, he caught a glimpse of Betty, he tottered
to his feet, and stood hurriedly touching his bald forehead with a
reverent, palsied hand.
"'Tis 'urr," he would say, enrapt. "I seen 'urr--I did." And young Mrs.
Doby knew that this was his joy, and what he waited for as one waits for
the coming of the sun.
"'Tis 'urr! 'Tis 'urr!"
The vicar's wife, Mrs. Brent, who since the affair of John Wilson's fire
had dropped into the background and felt it indiscreet to present tales
of distress at the Court, began to recover her courage.
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