“‘Bell! Jessie!’ he gasped, as the gate closed after the doctor, ‘who was that chap?—what persuasion, I mean? Was he a rascally—’
“He was in too great a rage to say the words, and so I said it for him.
“‘He was a homœopathist, father. Didn’t he help you quick? You never groaned a groan after the third swallow.’
“‘Third swallow be—no, I won’t swear, but I will say Thunder and Mars!’ he roared; ‘have I been insulted in my own house? I won’t stand it! I’ll gag, I’ll heave, I’ll puke, but what I’ll get rid of the stuff! Give me water for the colic,—me!’
“‘But if the water answered the purpose, why do you care?’ Bell asked, and father gave her a look very like, ‘Et tu Brute.’
“He could not deny that he was better,—that something had helped him; but it wasn’t sweetened water; no indeed; and I might heave it out of the window.
“I took up the goblet to do so, when he yelled:
“‘Don’t be a fool because you made one of me! Set that glass down and bring me that phial.’
“I obeyed, and he read on the little yellowish paper: ‘For Colic. For an adult, take six every hour. For children from two to three, according to age. Prepared by R. West, M.D., Beechwood.’
“He read it aloud twice, then asked, ‘Who the —— was R. West, M.D., and how the plague came he there?’