But he detained me rather pointedly; and after a short time, in which he appeared to be considering something, he begged me to sit down again, and consider whether I would listen to a short statement of facts on which he wanted my advice.

"They are," he said, "I fear, a little painful, and therefore I do not press it; but I should be sincerely obliged to you." He then said, "I did not at the time tell you, my dear Chris, what Doctor Hall said to me the other day, because I thought it better to tell no one; but the events of the last week have caused me to change my mind.

I feel that I must be perfectly open.
"The fact was, that he warned me that I showed unequivocal symptoms of a dangerous heart disease.

He could not answer for anything, he said.

I had seen that something was wrong from his expression, so I insisted on knowing everything." I can hardly describe my sensations at this announcement--I felt the room swim and shake; and yet it was made in such a deliberate matter-of-fact tone, that it flashed across me for an instant that Arthur was joking, and together with it came a curiously dismal sense of unreality, that is well known to all those who have passed through any great strain or emotional crisis, as if, suddenly, the soul had fallen out of everything, and they were nothing but lifeless empty husks, hollow and phantasmal.
"But," I gasped, "you never said anything of this at the time: you--you behaved just as usual." "I certainly tried to," he said.