“Profane fiddler on heart-strings! Snake!”
More he would have added, but, convulsed, could not; so, without another word, taking up the child, who had followed him, went with a rocking pace out of the cabin.
“Regardless of decency, and lost to humanity!” exclaimed the herb-doctor, with much ado recovering himself. Then, after a pause, during which he examined his bruise, not omitting to apply externally a little of his specific, and with some success, as it would seem, plained to himself:
“No, no, I won’t seek redress; innocence is my redress. But,” turning upon them all, “if that man’s wrathful blow provokes me to no wrath, should his evil distrust arouse you to distrust? I do devoutly hope,” proudly raising voice and arm, “for the honor of humanity—hope that, despite this coward assault, the Samaritan Pain Dissuader stands unshaken in the confidence of all who hear me!”
But, injured as he was, and patient under it, too, somehow his case excited as little compassion as his oratory now did enthusiasm. Still, pathetic to the last, he continued his appeals, notwithstanding the frigid regard of the company, till, suddenly interrupting himself, as if in reply to a quick summons from without, he said hurriedly, “I come, I come,” and so, with every token of precipitate dispatch, out of the cabin the herb-doctor went.
CHAPTER XVIII.
INQUEST INTO THE TRUE CHARACTER OF THE HERB-DOCTOR.
“Sha’n’t see that fellow again in a hurry,” remarked an auburn-haired gentleman, to his neighbor with a hook-nose. “Never knew an operator so completely unmasked.”
“But do you think it the fair thing to unmask an operator that way?”
“Fair? It is right.”