Full page illustration captioned: “Well, that was a narrow escape!” chimed the quaking voice of the octogenarian. I’m sore afraid the house is in a bad way. I’ve seen many like.”

An elderly man stands in the ruins of his home with flood waters breaking through the floor.

Banner with title and author in the foreground, a grim reaper in the middle ground, and a cottage in the upper-right background.

A drop cap letter “T” in the upper right corner decorates the start of the story. A young man sits in a chair pulled up to the hearth: “‘This infernal rain on the roof that makes me dream so,’ he said, overturning the chair as he started to his feet.”

Captioned: “Liz sprang upon him, throwing her arms about his neck. She had not kissed him three times before the floor broke beneath them.” The young man, Tom Hard, and Liz Lupton were to be married at the end of the week.