The Doctor coughed loudly, and our action seemed to have given the gentlemen present colds. Then the Doctor signed to his wife, whispered to her, and she left the room with Cook and Polly Hopley. Next he signed to Mr Rebble and Mr Hasnip, who both came and shook hands with me, bowed to the General and my uncle, and they too left the room, with Burr major and Dicksee.
“Mercer,” said the Doctor then.
“No, no,” cried the General; “let him stop. Come here, sir: over here.”
The General spoke in so severe a voice, and frowned so much, that Mercer looked at him shrinkingly, and the harder as the old man brought his hand down heavily upon his shoulder—Tom’s face seeming to say, “What have I done now?”
“So, sir, you have been longing for a watch all this time, have you, eh?”
“Yes, Sir Hawkhurst,” said Tom slowly. Then, with animation, “But I did always try very hard not to want one.”
“Then you shall have one, as good a one as money can buy.”
Mercer’s face was a picture of astonishment, changing to doubt and then to delight as he fully realised that the General meant it.
“Do you hear, Frank? Oh, I say!” Then, catching the old man’s hand in both of his; he cried, “May I have a hunter?”
“You shall, my boy. And Frank Burr, you shall have one too.”