"That gal Mollie says you better come up and see th' missus——"
"Why? What's wrong with her?"
"I d'n know, n' more don't Mollie. She thinks she's had a stroke."
"Wait five minutes and I'll go back with you," and in five minutes they were crunching through the lanes, all hard underfoot with frost that lay like snow, and white and gay with hedge-row lacery of spiders' webs in feathery festoons, and, up above, a crimson sun rising slowly through the mist-banks over the bare black trees.
"What makes Mollie think your mistress has had a stroke?" asked the Doctor. "What does Mollie know about strokes?"
"I d'n know. 'Sims to me she've had a stroke,' was her very words. She've just laid on her bed all day an' all night without speakin' a word, Mollie says,—eatin' noth'n, and drinkin' noth'n, which is onnat'ral; an' sayin' noth'n, which in a woman is onnat'ral too."
"She was quite worn out with nursing Mr Carew."
"Like enough. He wur a handful an' no mistake. Th' house is a deal quieter wi'out him. But who's goin' to run th' pack?—that's what bothers me."
"Don't you worry, Job. Someone will turn up to run the pack all right."
"Mebbe, but it depends on who 'tis. Why not yourself now, Doctor?"