“And no mustard-poultice last night?”
“Mustard-poultice? Strange question! never had a mustard-poultice in my life.”
“Quite sure? let me see your throat.”
“More sure than I am that you’re not gibing a poor fellow,” replied he, pulling down his neckcloth. “I don’t belong to you now, so be off, unless you want me to sweep your vent for sixpence—cheap, as things go, and I’ll leave you the soot to hide your shame for what you did to me yon time.”
Well, I took the joke, and really I had no reason in the world for doubting his word as to either the throat or the blister, but I confess I was startled, and couldn’t account for the discrepancy between the story of the lady of Ballynagh and that of her son. Things were out of their natural fitness, and there was some explanation required to bring them into conformity with it and themselves. What that explanatory thing was I couldn’t tell, and so I walked into the grocer’s.
“Why,” said I, “Biddy Riddel’s black darling has no sore throat, after all. He is standing at the close-head quite well, with his throat, which I have seen, as black as soot.”
“Strange enough,” said he.
“Have you sold her any ham of late?” said I, after musing a little.
“Too poor for that,” he replied; “all goes for whisky, and Biddy’s half-ounces of tea, with, no doubt, a bit of coarse meat occasionally, to which an ounce of Durham would, of course, be out of the question.”
“Did she ever buy from you any mustard before?” I inquired again.