"My dearest, what is it?" I cried, running to him as he subsided on the sofa. "Oh, why will you be so active at your time of life? You'll kill yourself if you go on so. What have you done now? You've strained something internal with that flute--I know you have."
"I've found it! I've found it!" he cried, trembling all over.
"Of course, or else you couldn't play it," I replied.
"I've found IT," he repeated, raising his hand wildly and waving a manuscript over his head. "Read that--Oh, why was I ever born? Read it, I tell you. It's a real agreement, on parchment, not a nightmare at all. He's got the other, no doubt; the one I signed. I've bartered away my immortal soul for ten more years of horrible life, and I'm growing younger every moment!"
"Where did this come from?" was all I could say, taking a parchment scroll from my grandpapa's shaking hand.
"It fell out of the cupboard where I keep my flute music," he groaned. "Read it, read it slowly, aloud. Is there any escape? It seems very loosely worded. Oh why, why didn't Jack live? He would have got me out of this appalling fix if anybody could."
Jack, or John, was my father--a very able solicitor; but what law is capable of coping with utterly unprincipled people who live in another world? I read the thing. It was written in English, and signed with a strange scrawl, like a flash of black lightning. Attached to it hung a seal of flame-coloured wax. To show my unhappy grandparent's exact position I had better transcribe this document. Thus it ran:
"Know all men, and others, by these presents that in consideration of a compact, signed, sealed, and delivered by Daniel Dolphin, of No. 114, Windsor Road, Ealing, County of Middlesex, England, I hereby undertake to provide him with certain years of life, to the number of ten, over, above, and beyond the number (of one hundred) which it was originally predestined that he should exist. And, further, it is to be noted, observed, and understood that each of the said ten years hereinbefore abovementioned shall embrace a period of life formerly extending over a decade of ordinary mundane years; and it is also understood, granted, and agreed that the aforementioned Daniel Dolphin do henceforth and hereafter grow younger instead of older, which provision I hereby undertake for the reason that human life protracted beyond a century, ceases to give the possessor thereof pleasure or gratification in any sort."
Then followed the date, the signature, and an address, which need not be insisted upon, but which was sufficiently clear.
"What does it mean, grandpapa?" I asked faintly.