“But I say yes. Why, you’re only ninety.”
“Ninety-three, doctor—ninety-three, and ’most worn out.”
“Nonsense; there’s a deal of work to be got out of you yet. Had your pipe?”
“Pipe? No. How can a man have a pipe who has no tobacco?”
“Ah well, never mind,” said the doctor, “I’ve brought you some physic.”
“Then I won’t take it,” cried the old man angrily. “I won’t take it, and I won’t pay for it, not a penny.”
“Wait till you’re asked,” said the doctor drily, as he threw a packet of tobacco in the old fellow’s lap. “There’s your medicine. Now say you will not take it if you dare.”
The old man’s red-rimmed eyes twinkled at the sight of the shredded-up weed, around which his hand closed like the claws of a hawk. Then rising slowly, he took down from the chimneypiece a curious-looking old tobacco-box, which seemed as if it had been hammered out of a piece of sheet lead, and began to stuff the tobacco in.
“Where did you get that leaden box? Moredock?” said the visitor.
“I—I made it,” said the old man, with a furtive look.