Eager to communicate the joyous news, glad in the prospect of seeing his simple-hearted friend, he went at a great pace up the ascending road.  There were the three houses, looking drearier than ever in a faint gleam of winter sunshine.  There were his old windows.  But—­what had happened to the roof?  He stood in astonishment and apprehension, for, just above the room where he had dwelt, the roof was an utter wreck, showing a great hole, as if something had fallen upon it with crushing weight.  As indeed was the case; evidently the chimney-stack had come down, and doubtless in the recent gale.  Seized with anxiety on Mr. Spicer’s account, he ran round to the back of the garden and tried the door; but it was locked as usual.  He strained to peer over the garden wall, but could discover nothing that threw light on his friend’s fate; he noticed, however, a great grove of dead, brown artichoke stems, seven or eight feet high.  Looking up at the back windows, he shouted Mr. Spicer’s name; it was useless.  Then, in serious alarm, he betook himself to the house on the other side of the passage, knocked at the door, and asked of the woman who presented herself whether anything was known of a gentleman who dwelt where the chimney-stack had just fallen.  News was at once forthcoming; the event had obviously caused no small local excitement.  It was two days since the falling of the chimney, which happened towards evening, when the gale blew its hardest.  Mr. Spicer was at that moment sitting before the fire, and only by a miracle had he escaped destruction, for an immense weight of material came down through the rotten roof, and even broke a good deal of the flooring.  Had the occupant been anywhere but close by the fireplace, he must have been crushed to a mummy; as it was, only a few bricks struck him, inflicting severe bruises on back and arms.  But the shock had been serious.  When his shouts from the window at length attracted attention and brought help, the poor man had to be carried downstairs, and in a thoroughly helpless state was removed to the nearest hospital.

‘Which room was he in?’ inquired Goldthorpe.  ‘Back or front?’

‘In the front room.  The back wasn’t touched.’

Musing on Mr. Spicer’s bad luck—­for it seemed as if he had changed from the back to the front room just in order that the chimney might fall on him—­Goldthorpe hastened away to the hospital.  He could not be admitted to-day, but heard that his friend was doing very well; on the morrow he would be allowed to see him.

So at the visitors’ hour Goldthorpe returned.  Entering the long accident ward, he searched anxiously for the familiar face, and caught sight of it just as it began to beam recognition.  Mr. Spicer was sitting up in bed; he looked pale and meagre, but not seriously ill; his voice quivered with delight as he greeted the young man.

’I heard of your inquiring for me yesterday, Mr. Goldthorpe, and I’ve hardly been able to live for impatience to see you.  How are you, sir?  How are you?  And what news about the work, sir?’