In trying to raise his hand to his hat for a bow, the ghastly hue again overspread his face, and he staggered. Without further parley his two aids laid hold of him, one on each side, and supported him into the house, up one, two flights of linen-draped stairs, to a back bedroom. Mrs. Hunt would have let her husband faint on the sidewalk before she would have received company in that chamber in its present condition; for the handsomest articles of furniture stood covered up in another apartment, and their place was supplied by a plain bureau, wash-stand and bed belonging to the boys' room, a story higher up. The wisdom of this precaution was manifest in the signs of neglect and slovenliness displayed on all sides. One could have written his name in the dust upon the glass; there was dirt in every corner and under each chair and table; the wash-basin was partly full of dirty suds, and the towels and counterpane shockingly dingy. These things were not remarked by the intruders until they had got their charge to bed, resisted no longer by him, for he began to comprehend his inability to help himself. "There is no one besides ourselves on the premises, not even a servant," one of them said apart to his associate, after a brief absence from the room. "If you will stay with him until I come back I will go for a doctor." The invalid caught the last word. "Indeed, Mr. Hammond, there is no need for you to do anything more--no necessity for calling in a physician. I am quite comfortable now, and shall be well by morning." Mr. Hammond, who was a director in the bank, and sincerely honored the honest veteran now prostrated by his devoted performance of duty, took the hot, tremulous hand in his. "I cannot allow you to peril your valuable health, my dear sir. Unless you positively forbid it, I shall not only call your physician, but drop in again myself this evening, and satisfy my mind as to whether you require my presence through the night." He was as good as his word; but no amount of persuasion could induce Mr. Hunt to accept his offered watch. He would be "uneasy, unhappy, if his young friend sacrificed his own rest so uselessly," and loath as he was to leave him to solitude and suffering, Mr. Hammond had to yield. At his morning visit, he found the patient more tractable. After tedious hours of fevered wakefulness, he had endeavored to rise, only to sink back again upon his pillow--dizzy, sick, and now thoroughly alarmed at the state of his system. He did not combat his friend's proposal to obtain a competent nurse, and to look in on him in person as often as practicable; still, utterly refused to allow his wife to be written to on the subject of his indisposition. "I shall be better in a day or two, probably before she could reach me. I have never had a spell of illness. It is not likely that this will be anything of consequence. I greatly prefer that she should not be apprised of this attack."