"Well, and what's wrong with the Baronet?"
"Gout; he drinks two glasses of port, I've observed, at dinner, and it always disagrees with him. Pray do stop it--the port, I mean."
"The great toe--the best place, isn't it?"
"No better, sir. There's nothing, nothing of the stomach?--I brought this in _case_," and he held up a phial.
"No, but I don't like his looks; he looks so haggard and exhausted."
"H'm, I'd like to see him at once; I don't know his room though."
So Dives put him in charge of a guide, and they parted.
"Well, Sir Jekyl, how d'ye do, hey? and how's all this? Old enemy, hey--all in the foot--fast in the toe--isn't he?" began the Doctor as he entered the Baronet's room.
"Ay, in the toe. Sit down there, Pratt, beside me."
"Ah, ha! nervous; you think I'll knock him, eh? Ha, ha, ha! No, no, no! Don't be afraid. Nothing wrong in the stomach--no chill--retching?"
"_Head_ all right, too; nothing queer there?"
"Nothing in the knuckles--old acquaintance, you know, when you meet, sometimes a squeeze by the hand, eh? Ha, ha, ha!"
"No, nothing in the hand," said the Baronet, a little testily.
"Nor any wandering sensations here, you know, and there, hey?" said the little fellow, sitting down briskly by his patient.
"Troublesome to talk, hey?" asked Pratt, observing that he seemed faint, and talked low and with effort.
"I see, no pain; all nicely fixed in the toe; _that_ could not be better, and what do you refer it to? By Jove, it's eighteen, _nineteen_ months since your last! When you came down to Dartbroke, for the Easter, you know, and wrote to me for the thing with the ether, hey? You've been at that d--d bin, I'm afraid, the forbidden fruit, hey? Egad, sir, I call it fluid gout, and the crust nothing but chalk-stone."
"_No--I haven't_," croaked the Baronet savagely.
"Ha, ha, ha!" laughed the Doctor, drumming on his fat knee with his stethoscope. "Won't admit--won't allow, hey?" As he spoke he was attempting to take him by the wrist.
"Turn that d--d fellow out of the room, and bolt the door, will you?" muttered Sir Jekyl, impatiently.
"Hey? I see. How are _you_, Mr. Tomlinson--no return of that bronchial annoyance, eh? I'll ask you just now--we'll just make Sir Jekyl Marlowe a little more comfortable first, and I've a question or two--we'd be as well alone, you see--and do you mind? You'll be in the way, you know; we may want you, you know."