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Oh no, I'm sure,' said the good-tempered landlady, rising,
and going towards him. 'Be of better cheer, sir. These are only sick
fancies.'

'What are only sick fancies?' he retorted. 'What do you know about
fancies? Who told you about fancies? The old story! Fancies!'

'Only see again there, how you take one up!' said the mistress of the
Blue Dragon, with unimpaired good humour. 'Dear heart alive, there is
no harm in the word, sir, if it is an old one. Folks in good health have
their fancies, too, and strange ones, every day.'

Harmless as this speech appeared to be, it acted on the traveller's
distrust, like oil on fire. He raised his head up in the bed, and,
fixing on her two dark eyes whose brightness was exaggerated by the
paleness of his hollow cheeks, as they in turn, together with his
straggling locks of long grey hair, were rendered whiter by the tight
black velvet skullcap which he wore, he searched her face intently.

'Ah! you begin too soon,' he said, in so low a voice that he seemed to
be thinking it, rather than addressing her. 'But you lose no time. You
do your errand, and you earn your fee. Now, who may be your client?'

The landlady looked in great astonishment at her whom he called Mary,
and finding no rejoinder in the drooping face, looked back again at him.
At first she had recoiled involuntarily, supposing him disordered in
his mind; but the slow composure of his manner, and the settled purpose
announced in his strong features, and gathering, most of all, about his
puckered mouth, forbade the supposition.

'Come,' he said, 'tell me who is it? Being here, it is not very hard for
me to guess, you may suppose.'

'Martin,' interposed the young lady, laying her hand upon his arm;
'reflect how short a time we have been in this house, and that even your
name is unknown here.'

'Unless,' he said, 'you--' He was evidently tempted to express a
suspicion of her having broken his confidence in favour of the landlady,
but either remembering her tender nursing, or being moved in some sort
by her face, he checked himself, and changing his uneasy posture in the
bed, was silent.

'There!' said Mrs Lupin; for in that name the Blue Dragon was licensed
to furnish entertainment, both to man and beast. 'Now, you will be well
again, sir. You forgot, for the moment, that there were none but friends
here.'

'Oh!' cried the old man, moaning impatiently, as he tossed one restless
arm upon the coverlet; 'why do you talk to me of friends! Can you or
anybody teach me to know who are my friends, and who my enemies?'

'At least,' urged Mrs Lupin, gently, 'this young lady is your friend, I
am sure.'

'She has no temptation to be otherwise,' cried the old man, like one
whose hope and confidence were utterly exhausted. 'I suppose she is.
Heaven knows. There, let me try to sleep. Leave the candle where it is.'

As they retired from the bed, he drew forth the writing which had
occupied him so long, and holding it in the flame of the taper burnt
it to ashes.

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