“It was an act of benevolence, sir, detained Mr. Cashel,” interrupted the doctor. “I believe no appointment can be broken with a safer apology.”
“Ho! ho!” said Linton, throwing up his eyebrows, as if he suspected a snare to his friend's simplicity. “Which of the missions to convert the blacks, or what family of continuous twins are you patronizing?”
“Good-bye, sir,” said the doctor, turning towards Cashel. “I'd ask your pardon for the liberty I have already taken with you, if I were not about to transgress again.” Here he looked Linton fully in the face. “Mr. Cashel has done a kind and worthy action this morning, sir; but if he does many more such, and keep your company, he is not only a good man, but the strongest principled one I ever met with.”
As the last word was uttered, the door closed after him, and he was gone.
“So then, I 'm the Mephistopheles to your Faust,” said Linton, laughing heartily; “but what piece of credulous benevolence has cost you this panegyric and me this censure?”
“Oh, a mere trifle,” said Cashel, preparing to leave,—“a simple grant of renewal to an old tenant on my estate.”
“Only that,” said Linton, affecting the coolest indifference, while by a keen glance at Kennyfeck he revealed a profound consciousness of his friend's simplicity.
“Nothing more, upon my honor; that little cottage of Tubber-beg.”
“Not that fishing lodge beside the river, in an angle of your own demesne?” asked Linton, eagerly.
“The same. Why, what of it?”