Volume Two—Chapter Sixteen.

The Gilded Pill.

One morning, when the sun was making the sea shimmer and glisten like so much frosted silver in constant motion, Tom Fraser awoke, calm and placid, after a long, burning time of fever, to find the soft, pleasant face of Mrs Shingle bending over him; and, on seeing him awake, she stole gently away, and, while he lay wondering and trying to make out what it all meant, and whether it was a dream, the door once more opened, and he knew he was awake, for Jessie appeared, to creep to his bedside and clasp him in her arms.

Invalids recover fast under such circumstances. In his character of the best doctor in London, sick and injured as he was, Tom’s coming had instantaneously effected Jessie’s cure; and now, in turn, she nursed him back to health, ready to become his wife when he should ask her to crown his joy.

It was not long first; for at a meeting one day, old Hopper had proposed to Dick that they should put down so much apiece for the young folks, and this was done without their consent, the donors almost quarrelling as to who should give most.

Old Hopper won.

It was some little time after, when Richard Shingle and his wife had returned to town, that the former called upon his old friend in his chambers, where there was a long chat about the young people, and also about Max Shingle.

“Don’t you make yourself uncomfortable about him,” said Hopper gruffly. “He won’t starve as long as there’s any one to swindle. As for his wife, young Tom will see that she don’t want, and so will I, for the sake of the past.”

“Why, hallo!” cried Dick suddenly, after the conversation had turned upon music, and they had arranged for what was called “a good scrape,”—“what have you got here?”

As he spoke he took a small bill from the chimney-piece, and began looking at it with a grim smile of contempt on his face.

“Can’t you read?” said Hopper roughly. “Plain enough, isn’t it? ‘The Gilded Pill for every ill.’”

“Yes, but—”

”‘Yes, but,’—I haven’t been well lately. And I’m going to take a few: they say they’re good for nearly everything.”

“Oh, but I wouldn’t do that,” said Dick dubiously.

“Hey? not do it? why not? Speak up: this traffic makes such a noise.”

“Oh, take them if you like,” said Dick, smiling. “They won’t hurt you.”

“How do you know?” cried Hopper testily. “Everybody says they’re good. Hey? How do you know?”

“That’s my secret,” said Dick, laughing.

“Your what? Look here: what do you mean?”

“I say, take ’em if you like—hundreds of thousands do. Small boxes one and three-halfpence, large boxes two-and-nine, with the Government stamp.”

“Bah! I know all about that,” said Hopper, rattling a box close to his ear, and then opening it, to show a dozen boluses covered with gold foil. “Have one?”

“No, thanks,” said Dick, smiling. “I know ’em by heart—compound rhubarb and a little new bread. That’s my secret, my fortune, old lad.”

“What!” cried Hopper. “Hey? what! You made your fortune with these?”

“Yes,” said Dick; “the murder’s out now. My bright idea was—The Gilded Pill. But I was not at all proud of it, so I kept it dark.”

“Well, I am blessed,” said Hopper.

“Glad of it. So am I, old man. It’s paid me well, but there was always a skeleton in the cupboard.”

“Hey?”

“Skeleton, old man. I’ve paid thousands to Government for stamps, but they wouldn’t have let me off if anything had gone wrong.”

“But these pills couldn’t go wrong, could they?”

“I don’t think so, Hopper; but I never meet a doctor without feeling queer,—the faculty is like a cloud to me, and behind it I always seem to see an inquest coming off through somebody taking too much of my stuff.”

“The idea of your keeping it all to yourself! You might have told me.”

“You never told me you were a wealthy man, and Uncle Rounce in Australia.”

“Humph!”

“I say, Hopper, would you give up the pills now?”

Hopper’s answer was emphatically—“No.”

The End.