One morning, however, soon after Easter
1850, she awoke feeling seriously unwell. For some little time there had
been a talk of fever in the neighbourhood, but in those days the
precautions that ought to be taken against the spread of infection were
not so well understood as now, and nobody did anything. In a day or two
it became plain that Miss Pontifex had got an attack of typhoid fever and
was dangerously ill. On this she sent off a messenger to town, and
desired him not to return without her lawyer and myself.
We arrived on the afternoon of the day on which we had been summoned, and
found her still free from delirium: indeed, the cheery way in which she
received us made it difficult to think she could be in danger. She at
once explained her wishes, which had reference, as I expected, to her
nephew, and repeated the substance of what I have already referred to as
her main source of uneasiness concerning him. Then she begged me by our
long and close intimacy, by the suddenness of the danger that had fallen
on her and her powerlessness to avert it, to undertake what she said she
well knew, if she died, would be an unpleasant and invidious trust.
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