The announcement would have been a shock. It would have kept the poor
girl awake of nights. She would have been for ever seeing the hand of
Death at my throat. Every time we met she would have noted on my face,
in my gait, infallible signs of my approaching end. I had not the right
to inflict such intolerable pain on one so near and dear to me.
Besides, I am vain enough to want to walk forth somewhat gallantly into
eternity; and while I yet live I particularly desire that folks should
not regard me as half-dead. I defy you to treat a man who is only going
to live twenty weeks in the same pleasant fashion as you would a man who
has the run of life before him.
There is always an instinctive shrinking from decay. I should think that
corpses must feel their position acutely.
It was entirely for Eleanor's sake that I refrained from taking her into
my confidence. To her question I replied that I had not the right to
tie her for life to a helpless valetudinarian. "Besides," said I, "as
my health grows worse my jokes will deteriorate, until I am reduced to
grinning through a horse-collar at the doctor.
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