"I suppose you can go, then. No, I have no instructions: you know what to say as well as I do. We don't give way a jot, mind. Oh, and--Tom!" added Jacob, calling him back as he went out. "Yes, sir." "I am intending to raise your salary. From the beginning of next month, you will have a hundred and fifty a-year." "Oh, thank you, Uncle Jacob." Tom spoke as he in his ready good-nature felt--brightly and gratefully. Nevertheless, a shade of disappointment did cross his mind, for he thought his position in the house ought to be a different one. "And I am _sure_ it is quite as much as I ought to do for him," argued Jacob with his conscience. And he put away unpleasant prickings and set to work like a house on fire. It was one o'clock when Valentine came in. He had an excuse ready for his father: the latter, turning out of the clerks' room, chanced to see him enter. "He had been down to Tyler's to see if he could get that money from them." It was an untruth, for he had stayed all the while at the Bell; and his father noticed that his face was uncommonly flushed. Old Jacob had had his suspicions before; yes, and spoken of them to Valentine: he now motioned him to go before him into the private room. "You have been drinking, sir!" "I!--good gracious, no," returned Valentine, boldly, his blue eyes fearlessly meeting his father's. "What fancies you do pick up!" "Valentine, when I was your age I never drank a drop of anything till night, and then it was only a glass of beer with my supper. It seems to me that young men of the present day think they can drink at all hours with impunity." "I don't drink, father." "Very well. Take care you do not. It is a habit more easily acquired than left off. Look here: I am going to give you fifty pounds a-year more. Mind you _make it do_: and do not spend it in waste." It was not very long after this that Jacob Chandler had a shock: a few months, or so. During that time he had been growing thinner and weaker, and looked so shrivelled up that there seemed to be nothing left of him. Islip, small place though it was, had a market-day--Friday;--when farmers would drive or walk in and congregate at the Bell. One afternoon, just as the ordinary was over, Jacob went to the inn, as was his general custom: he had always some business or other to transact with the farmers; or, if not, something to say. His visit to them over, he said good-day and left: but the next minute he turned back, having forgotten something. Some words fell on his ear as he opened the door. "Ay. He is not long for this world." They were spoken by old Farmer Blake--a big, burly, kind-hearted man. And Jacob Chandler felt as certain that they were meant to apply to himself as though his name had been mentioned. He went into a cold shiver, and shut the door again without entering.