"Silence, you ribalds!" said Mr. Magnus. "You had a large attendance, I hear, Plinlimmon; more women than men, though, I suppose? Men don't come in the daytime."
"There was a great gathering of the female aristocracy," said Plinlimmon, perking up his head.
"One old woman jawing always brings together a lot of others," growled Mr. Dunster, beneath his breath. He had been apparently dozing in a far corner of the room, but had roused up at the word "aristocracy,"--as sure an irritant to him as a red rag to a bull,--and his bright blue eyes were gleaming.
"I didn't think much of your delivery, Plinlimmon," said Mr. Slater.
"It was as slow as a midday postman's, and not so sure," said Mr. Schrink; "you got uncommonly drowsy and bag-pipy at times."
"I'll tell you what it is Plinlimmon," said Mr. Dunster; "you are uncommonly dreary! You're a swell, and you can't help it; but you were horribly slow. I'll tell you what it is, my young friend; you're far too dull by yourself,--you want a piano."
During the roar which followed this remark, Beresford felt a light touch on his arm, and turning round saw Dr. Prater.
Not to be known to Dr. Prater was to confess that the "pleasure of your acquaintance" was of little value; for assuredly, had it been worth any thing, Dr. Prater would have had it by hook or by crook. A wonderful man, Dr. Prater, who had risen from nothing, as his detractors said; but however that might be, he had a practice scarcely excelled by any in London. Heart and lungs were Dr. Prater's specialities; and persons imagining themselves afflicted in those regions came from all parts of England, and thronged the doctor's dining room in Queen-Anne Street in the early forenoons, vainly pretending to read Darwin On the Fertilisation of Orchids, the Life of Captain Hedley Vicars, or the Supplement of yesterday's Times; and furtively glancing round at the other occupants of the room, and wondering what was the matter with them. That dining-room looked rather different about a dozen times in the season, of an evening, when the books were cleared away, and the big bronze gas-chandelier lighted, and the doctor sat at the large round-table surrounded by a dozen of the pleasantest people in London. Such a mixture! Never was such a man for "bringing people together" as Dr. Prater. The manager of the Italian Opera (Dr. Prater's name was to all the sick-certificates for singers) would be seated next to a judge, who would have a leading member of the Jockey Club on his other hand, and a bishop for his vis-à-vis. Next the bishop would be a cotton-lord, next to him the artist of a comic periodical, and next to him a rising member of the Opposition, with an Indian colonel and an American comedian, here on a starring engagement, in juxtaposition. The dinner was always good, the wines excellent, and the doctor was the life and soul of the party. He had something special to say to every one; and as his big protruding eyes shone and glimmered through his gold-rimmed spectacles, he looked like a convivial little owl. A very different man over the dinner-table to the smug little pale-faced man in black, whom wretched patients found in the morning sitting behind a leather-covered table, on which a stethoscope was conspicuously displayed, and who, after sounding the chests of consumptive curates or struggling clerks, would say, with an air of blandness, dashed with sorrow, "I'm afraid the proverbially treacherous air of our climate will not do for us, my dear sir! I'm afraid we must spend our winter at Madeira, or at least at Pau. Good day to you;" and then the doctor, after shaking hands with his patient, would slip the tips of his fingers into his trousers-pockets, into which would fall another little paper-package to join a number already there deposited, while the curate or clerk, whose yearly income was perhaps two hundred pounds, and who probably had debts amounting to twice his annual earnings, would go away wondering whether it was better to endeavour to borrow the further sum necessary at ruinous interest, or to go back and die in the cold Lincolnshire clay parish, or in the bleak Northern city, as the case might be. On one thing the doctor prided himself greatly, that he never let a patient know what he thought of him. He would bid a man remove his waistcoat with a semi-jocund air, and the next instant listen to a peculiar "click" inside his frame, which betrayed the presence of heart-disease liable at any moment to carry the man off, without altering a muscle of his face or a tone of his voice. "Hum! ha! we must be a little careful; we must not expose ourselves to the night-air! Take a leetle more care of yourself, my dear sir; for instance, I would wear a wrap round the throat--some wrap, you know, to prevent the cold striking to the part affected. Send this to Bell's, and get it made up, and take it three times a-day; and let me see you on--on Saturday. Good day to you." And there would not be the smallest quiver in the hard metallic voice, or the smallest twinkle in the observant eye behind the gold-rimmed glasses, although the doctor knew that the demon Consumption, by his buffet, had raised that red spot on the sufferer's cheek, and was rapidly eating away his vitality.
But if Dr. Prater kept a strict reticence to his patients as regarded their own ailments, he was never so happy as when enlarging to them on the diseases of their fellow-sufferers, or of informing esoteric circles of the special varieties of disorder with which his practice led him to cope. "You ill, my dear sir!" he would say to some puny specimen; then, settling himself into his waistcoat after examination, "you complain of narrow-chestedness,--why, my dear sir, do you know Sir Hawker de la Crache? You've a pectoral development which is perfectly surprising when contrasted with Sir Hawker's. But then he, poor man! last stage,--Madeira no good,--would sit up all night playing whist at Reid's Hotel. Algiers no good,--too much brandy, tobacco, and baccarat with French officers--nothing any good. You, my dear sir, compared to Sir Hawker--pooh, nonsense!" Or in another form: "Any such case, my dear madam? any such case?"--turning to a large book, having previously consulted a small index--"a hundred such! Here, for instance, Lady Susan Bray, now staying at Ventnor, living entirely on asses'-milk--in some of our conditions we must live on asses'-milk--left lung quite gone, life hanging by a thread. You're a Juno, ma'am, in comparison to Lady Susan!" There was no mistake, however, about the doctor's talent; men in his own profession, who sneered at his charlatanerie of manner, allowed that he was thoroughly well versed in his subject. He was very fond of young men's society; and, with all his engagements, always found time to dine occasionally with the Guards at Windsor, with a City Company or two, or with a snug set en petit comité in Temple chambers, and to visit the behind-scenes of two or three theatres, the receptions of certain great ladies, and occasionally the meetings of the Flybynights Club. To the latter he always came in a special suit of clothes on account of the impregnation of tobacco-smoke; and when coming thither he left his carriage and his address, in case he was required, at the Minerva, with orders to fetch him at once. It would never have done for some of his patients to know that he was a member of the Flybynights.
Such was Dr. Prater, who touched Beresford on the arm and said, "Not again, my dear sir! I will not be balked of the opportunity of saying, 'how d'ye do?' to you again."