“Is Round gone, then?” asked Mr. Burr, a young man who had left the room soon after he came in, having been annoyed with his valetudinarian twaddle.
“He’s no more,” answered Miss Glass, in a tone somewhat ironically funereal.
“Why, he’s not dead, is he?” inquired Mr. Burr, quickly. “I should not be surprised if he were; for, judging from what he said, one would expect him to die any moment.”
“O no; he’s not the one to die yet, be sure of that; but he’s gone for the night,” said Miss Glass.
“Thank goodness for his departure: I do not mean to another world, but from this company. Yet where would be the harm in wishing him in heaven, where none shall ever say they are sick?” said Mr. Ferriday.
“I see no harm in wishing a good thing like that,” said Miss Bond—“a good thing for him and other people too.”
“Don’t be so unkind and unmerciful,” said Mrs. Grant.
“I do not think I am so,” replied Miss Bond, “for if he was in heaven, he would be cured of all his diseases; and he says he never shall be in this world. And then other people would be happily exempted from the misery of listening to his invalid tales every time they met with him.”
“How his wife does to live with him I cannot tell,” remarked Miss Bond.
“I suppose she is used to him,” said Mr. Burr.