He was capable of becoming almost delirious about music. Mary Morfe had
seated herself in silence.
At last Eva and Mr Morfe approached the fire and the mantelpiece again.
Mr Morfe shut up the score, dismissed his delirium, and looked at the
clock, quite prepared to see it pointing to twenty-nine and a half
minutes past nine. Instead, the clock pointed to only twenty-two
minutes past nine.
"By Jove!" he exclaimed. He went nearer.
"By Jove!" he exclaimed again rather more loudly. "I do believe that
clock's stopped!"
It had. The pendulum hung perpendicular, motionless, dead.
He was astounded. For the clock had never been known to stop. It was a
presentation clock, of the highest guaranteed quality, offered to him as
a small token of regard and esteem by the members of the Bursley Orpheus
Glee and Madrigal Club to celebrate the twelfth anniversary of his
felicitous connection with the said society. It had stood on his
mantelpiece for four years and had earned an absolutely first-class
reputation for itself. He wound it up on the last day of every month,
for it was a thirty-odd day clock, specially made by a famous local
expert; and he had not known it to vary more than ten minutes a month at
the most.
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