“Nothing at all,” was the reply. “No, sir, I can present you with a clean bill of health.”
“Then why have you come? Not for nothing, doctor,” said the Resident sharply.
“Here, I say,” cried the little doctor, “don’t be so horribly inhospitable when a man comes to see you?”
“Inhospitable? Nonsense! You have not come across here to find hospitality. Now, doctor, speak out. What is it? Do you know anything?”
“Plainly, no. But the fact is,” said the visitor, clearing his throat, “I am not busy now; Mrs Bolter is a good deal away from home, so I thought this would be a favourable opportunity for taking a boat and a man or two, and going up the river to explore a few of the side streams so as to try and find Helen Perowne.”
“Rubbish!” said the Resident, sharply.
“Eh?” ejaculated the doctor, who was taken aback by the Resident’s quick, unceremonious way of speaking.
“I said Rubbish, Bolter, and I now say Humbug, man! Do you think I do not know better than that?”
“My dear Harley!” exclaimed the little doctor, indignantly.
“Look here, Bolter, you want an excuse for one of your gold hunts—your Ophir explorations. Why don’t you go, then, without all this childish excuse? You are your own master.”