In a few minutes the messenger returned, flushed and panting from his run. The doctor wasn’t at home, he said; he had gone to visit a patient several miles away; when he returned they would send him on.
Uncle Mark listened, smiling faintly, then he said:—
‘Ah, I don’t want ne’er a doctor, mate. I’ve got my physic at last, Lord knows.’
‘Mark, Mark, don’t ‘ee talk so,’ said Mrs. Peartree, almost breaking down.
But Uncle Mark smiled faintly again, and reached forth his trembling hand towards her.
‘Mother,’ he said, ‘’tain’t no use denying of it, I’m agoing away. That there spar did the job for me—but nobody’s to blame for it, only me;’ then, as his wandering gaze fell upon his brother, who sat sobbing in a corner, he asked suddenly:—
‘Luke, mate, what’s come o’ th’ old barge?’
‘She be clean sunk, mate,’ returned Luke, dashing away the tears with the back of his rough, weatherbeaten hand. ‘She be sunk out there in the river, up to Southam Beacon.’
‘She was a good wessel,’ said Mark, faintly; ‘many’s the year we sailed her, you and me. And she be sunk at last!’
‘O, mate,’ cried Uncle Luke, piteously, ‘don’t take on about that. We’ll get her up again, but if you go and die we shall all be adrift together—little Madlin, and mother, and me, and all our hearts’ll be broke.’