All of which might indicate to those versed in such matters that Squire Phin Look understood litigation better than love-making, which has its own court days, its calendar for service, its notice and its set time for appeal. He, however, felt that he had played the part of chivalry. So the morning had seemed fair and he had slapped Hiram on the back at breakfast time and had hummed a tune as he walked to his office, and everything had seemed to be music, even the mournful cooing of “Hard-Times’s” tin flute. And when old Sumner Badger came dragging up the stairs and into the office, and dolorously announced that he was going to die inside of two days and wanted to make his will, the Squire leaned back in his chair and laughed, to the indignant disgust of old Sumner. “If there’s anything funny about my havin’ a call to the Speret Land I’d be much obleeged if you’d ’loosidate it, Squire Phin Look.” There was a scowl on the old man’s yellow face, and his shock of white hair bristled. “Die!” echoed the Squire; “why, Sum, who talks of dying with the sun warm overhead, and the waves sparkling out yonder in the Cove, and even Asa Brickett’s coffee-grinder down there playing dance music with every twist of the handle? Never say die, Sum.” “I donno what’s happened to chirk you up so’t you giggle at your neighbour’s solum warnin’s as have come to ’em, nor I don’t care a ding, Squire Look, but it ain’t right to mix in your own joys with others’ sorrers.” A close observer might have seen in the lawyer’s countenance a flicker of contrition, as though he had suddenly remembered that every man in Palermo didn’t have such cause for joy as he. “Sun a-shinin’, you say!” went on Badger, grimly. “Yes, and a sun-dog each side of it like wings on a bat, and a-showin’ that we’re goin’ to have a line gale that will blow the knot-holes out of apple trees. Waves sparklin’, hey? Porgy scum from that stinkin’ Cod Lead fact’ry that they’ve stuck under our noses out our way. Music in a coffee-grinder! And Brickett chargin’ three cents more a pound for Rio than he ever done. There’s some as can laugh at a fun’ral, but they ain’t got no good wit.” “I never laughed yet at anybody’s troubles, Uncle Sum,” said the Squire, gently; “but you and I, with life still in us, don’t know the day and the hour of our passing out. You’re not going to die.” “You think you know more about me than my guardeen angel, do you, hah? When my guardeen angel comes a-rappin’ the death knock on my headboard night after night I know what it means.” The Squire remembered that Badger was a Spiritualist of fervent faith. He made no comment. “Three times at our circle Mis’ Achorn has seen a shroud around me and angel hands beckoning over my head. You ain’t denyin’ that Mis’ Achorp is the best medium in this country, be ye?” “Mrs. Achorn is, probably, a good and well-meaning woman, Sum, I have no doubt; but if I were you I wouldn’t let any one scare me into conniptions. It doesn’t pay.”