Doctor Craddock rode slowly along the grassy track which led from Thornleigh to Little Upton, and as he rode he smiled to himself.  Though he had been settled for more than a dozen years in this quiet corner of Lancashire, his Southern mind had not yet become accustomed to the idiosyncrasies of his North Country patients.  He had just been to see old Robert Wainwright, who was suffering from an acute attack of gout in his right foot, and who was, in consequence, unapproachable in every sense of the word, answering the Doctor’s questions only by an unintelligible growl or an impatient jerk of the head.  Moreover, on being informed that he must not expect to set foot to the ground for several days more, he had emitted a kind of incredulous roar, and had announced his opinion that his medical adviser was a gradely fool.  Poor Mrs. Wainwright had subsequently apologised for her lord’s shortness of temper, explaining in deprecating tones that he was apt to be took that way sometimes; adding that he had been moiderin ever sin’ mornin’ about Club Day.

“He reckons he’s th’ owdest member, ye know.  Him an’ Martin Tyrer, of Little Upton, is mich of an age, an’ they’n walked same number of times—­they’re a bit jealous one o’ th’ t’other an’ our Gaffer reckons if he bides awhoam, owd Martin ‘ull be castin’ up at him, an’ sayin’ he’s beat him.”

“There’ll be no Club meeting for Tyrer, either, to-morrow,” Doctor Craddock said; “he’s laid up with a bad attack of bronchitis.”

“Eh, is he?” exclaimed Mrs. Wainwright, with such visible satisfaction that the Doctor smiled now as he recalled it; she had barely patience to escort him to the door, and before he mounted his horse, he heard her joyfully informing her Gaffer that owd Martin Tyrer had getten th’ ’titus, and she hoped that now he’d be satisfied and give ower frettin’ hissel’.

“I shall have an equally warm reception here, I suppose,” said the Doctor to himself, as he dismounted before Tyrer’s door, “but, whatever happens, the old man must not think of going out to-morrow.  It would be serious if he caught fresh cold.”

Martin Tyrer was sitting, almost upright, in his bed, supported by many pillows, for when he lay down, as his wife explained to the Doctor, he fair choked.  He was an immensely tall and stout man, with a large red face, and a stolid lack-lustre eye, which he brought solemnly to bear upon the Doctor as he entered the room.

“Well,” said Craddock, “how are you to-day, Tyrer?  Better, I hope.”

Tyrer rolled his eyes in the direction of his wife, apparently as an intimation that she was to answer for him.

“Noan so well,” said Mrs. Tyrer lugubriously, proceeding thereupon to give accurate, not to say harrowing, particulars of her master’s symptoms; Tyrer, meanwhile, suffering his glance to wander from one to the other, and occasionally nodding or shaking his head.  It was not until she paused from want of breath that he put in his word.