“That keeps us here for the night,” said the doctor; and being hungry, a fire was lit, and a capital little dinner of preserved game and fish prepared, of which all partook, and then made preparations for passing the night.
Volume Three—Chapter Thirteen.
Medical Aid.
Doctor Bolter visited his patient two or three times, waking up with the greatest of regularity every two hours for the purpose, and administering a few drops of a cordial that he always carried wherever he went, it having wonderful qualities of its own, so the doctor said, and being competent to cure almost every disease, but smelling very strongly of brandy.
His patient slept heavily, and she was still sleeping as the doctor’s coffee was ready just before sunrise.
“Humph!” he muttered; “it’s a precious good job my wife isn’t here, or she’d be as cross as two sticks, for the poor thing is a wonderfully handsome girl in spite of her black, filed teeth, and dark skin. Poor lassie! how she has scratched herself. Why, her feet are cut and swollen and full of thorns. I’ll bet ten pounds to twopence she’s a runaway slave.”
There was no one to take the bet, and the doctor went on:
“Poor lass! she has put me in a fix. I can’t take her back with me, because nothing upsets Harley more than having to deal with the domestic institutions of the Malays; and if they get under the protection of the British flag a slave is a slave no longer. Then, too, there is Mrs Bolter. Bless that woman! what a pity it is that she is of such a jealous disposition.