A regular sharp, teasing winter came on; rain, and freeze, and blow; and then our pore old Tom he got dreadful shaky at last, and his cough teased him awful, so none of us was surprised when we found one day as he warn't come to the yard; nor we warn't surprised next day when he didn't come; nor yet when a whole week passed away and his keb stood under the shed, and his 'oss kep in the stable, for they was such bad 'uns none of our chaps'd have anything to do with 'em; and more'n once I see the guv'nor stand with his hat half-raised in one hand, and scratting his head with t'other, as he looked at the old worn keb, as much as to say, "I shall never make anything outer that any more." Christmas arternoon comes, and I thinks as I'll go and have a look at Tom. So I tidies up a bit, puts on a white choker, and ties it coachman's fashion, and fixes it with a horse-shoe pin, as my missus give me when we was courting. Then I brushes my hat up, and was just going off, when the missus says, "Wot d'yer want yer whip for?" she says. "Wot do I want my whip for?" I says, and then I stops short, and goes and stands it up in the corner by the drawers, for it didn't seem nat'ral to go out without one's whip, and it ain't often as we goes out walking, I can tell you. Well, I toddles along, and gets to the place at last, where Tommy held out: tall house it was, just aside Awery Row, and opposite to a mews; werry pleasant lookout in summer-time, for the coachmen's wives as lived over the stables was fond of their flowers and birds; but even in winter time there was allus a bit o' life going on: chaps cleaning first-class 'osses, or washing carriages, or starting off fresh and smart to drive out shopping or in the park. Fine, clean-legged, stepping 'osses, and bright warnished carriages and coachmen in livery; and all right up to the mark, you knew. So I goes on upstairs, for I knowed the way to his room, along of having had supper with him one night--mussels and a pot of stout we had--so I didn't ring three times like a stranger, but walks up one pair, two pair, three pair stairs, and then I stops short, for the door was ajar, and I could see a gentleman's back, and hear talking; so I says to myself, "That's the doctor," I says, and I sets down on the top stair to get my wind, and then I turns quite chilly to hear poor old Tom's voice, so altered and pipy I didn't know what to make of it, as he says.