Hardly had these dreadful words left his lips when a change came over
the old man's face; it seemed to stiffen, and putting one hand to his
heart he staggered back into his chair, pointing and making signs as
he fell towards a little cupboard in the angle of the wall. His son at
once guessed what had happened; his father had got one of the attacks
of the heart to which he was subject, and was motioning to him to
bring the medicine which he had before shown him, and which alone
could save him in these seizures. Actuated by a common impulse of
humanity, Philip for the moment forgot their quarrel, and stepped with
all speed to fetch it. As it happened, there stood beneath this
cupboard a table, and on this table lay the document which his father
had been reading that afternoon before the arrival of Mr. Bellamy. It
was his will, and, as is usual in the case of such deeds, the date was
endorsed upon the back. All this Philip saw at a single glance, and he
also saw that the will was dated some years back, and therefore one
under which he would inherit, doubtless the same that his father had
some months before offered to show him.

It flashed through his mind that his father had got it out in order to
burn it; and this idea was followed by another that for a moment
stilled his heart.

"_If he should die now he cannot destroy it!_ If he does not take the
medicine he _will_ die."

Thought flies fast in moments of emergency. Philip, too, was a man of
determined mind where his own interests were concerned, and his blood
was heated and his reason blinded by fury and terror. He was not long
in settling on his course of action. Taking the bottle from the